Who Is Richard Adams Cordray? Director of Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Resigns

Richard Adams Cordray, the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, resigned Friday. Following his resignation, President Donald Trump announced Mick Mulvaney, who is currently director of the Office of Management and Budget, will take over as the acting director of the agency.

Born on May 3, 1959, in Columbus, Ohio, Cordray is an American lawyer and politician who served as the first director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau from 2012 to 2017. Prior to this, Cordray has served as Ohio's attorney general, solicitor general and treasurer.

Cordray grew up in Grove City, Ohio, where he attended public schools. While studying in the Grove City High School, Cordray emerged champion in the high school quiz show – ‘In The Know.’ During this time he used to work in McDonald’s for a minimum wage.

He graduated from high school in 1977 as co-valedictorian of his class. He took up his first job in politics as an intern for United States Sen. John Glenn when he was a junior at James Madison College, Michigan State University. Cordray earned Phi Beta Kappa honors – the oldest honor society for the liberal arts and sciences in the U.S. In 1981, he graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in Legal and Political Theory.

As a Marshall scholar, Cordray earned a masters degree with first class honors in Economics from Brasenose College, Oxford. Marshall Scholarship is a postgraduate scholarship for intellectually distinguished young Americans to study at any university in the United Kingdom. He also earned a Varsity Blue in basketball in 1983.

In 1986, he earned his Juris Doctor degree with honors from the University of Chicago Law School. There he served as the editor-in-chief of the University of Chicago Law Review. After he took up a job as a law clerk at the U.S. Supreme Court, he went to his high school to deliver the commencement speech for the graduating class of 1988.

Cordray began his career as a clerk for Judge Robert Bork, and two Supreme Court associate justices – Byron White and Anthony Kennedy. After serving as a clerk for White from 1987 to 1988, he was hired by the international law firm Jones Day to work in its Cleveland office.

He also taught various courses at the Ohio State University Moritz College of Law and Georgetown University.

Cordray got married in 1992 to Margaret “Peggy” Cordray – a law professor at the Capital University of Law. And the couple has twins – a daughter and a son. They currently stay near Grove City, Ohio. After rendering 43 years of service, Cordray’s father retired as an Orient Developmental Center program director for mentally retarded residents. His mother was a social worker, teacher, and founder of Ohio's first foster grandparent program for individuals with developmental disabilities.

Cordray also carried the Olympic Flame through Findlay, Ohio, as part of the nationwide torch relay in the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. He has also served as a member of the Advisory Board for the Friends of the Homeless and part of Al Gore’s select group popularly known as Leadership '98.

In 1987 he became an undefeated five-time ‘Jeopardy!’ Champion.