Meg Whitman

Longtime chief executive of eBay and Hewlett Packard, Whitman held senior business leadership positions at some of the most prominent companies in American technology and media, including The Walt Disney Company and Quibi. In 2014, Forbes ranked her 20th on its list of the 100 Most Powerful Women in the World, and in 2008 The New York Times cited her as among the women most likely to become the first female president of the United States.

Whitman also pursued a career in politics, running as the Republican candidate for governor of California in 2010. She spent $144 million of her own fortune on that race, which at the time made her the single largest self-funding candidate in American political history; only Michael Bloomberg's 2020 presidential campaign later surpassed that figure. She lost the election to Jerry Brown, 54% to 41%. She later served as a senior official on Mitt Romney's presidential campaigns in 2008 and 2012, before supporting Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden in the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections. She served as United States Ambassador to Kenya from July 2022 to November 2024 under President Biden.