David Perdue

David Alfred Perdue Jr. (born December 10, 1949) is an American diplomat, politician, and businessman serving as the 14th United States ambassador to China since 2025. A member of the Republican Party, Perdue previously served as a United States senator for Georgia from 2015 to 2021. He was an unsuccessful candidate for governor of Georgia in 2022.

After 12 years as a management consultant, Perdue became the senior vice president for Reebok, eventually becoming CEO. He later joined PillowTex, a North Carolina textile company; the company went bankrupt and folded shortly after his departure in 2003. He subsequently became CEO of Dollar General.

Perdue first ran for the U.S. Senate in 2014, defeating Democratic nominee Michelle Nunn, daughter of former U.S. senator Sam Nunn. Perdue ran for reelection in 2020, losing to Democrat Jon Ossoff, a former investigative journalist and filmmaker, in a January 5, 2021, runoff election. After the November 2020 presidential election, Perdue called for the resignation of Georgia's top elections official and claimed without evidence that there were unspecified "failures" in the election. He later supported a lawsuit by Trump allies seeking to overturn the election results, and asserted without evidence during his 2022 gubernatorial election campaign that his 2020 Senate election was stolen.

Perdue was linked to the 2020 congressional insider trading scandal for allegations of STOCK Act violations. The basis was stocks he sold before the 2020 stock market crash allegedly using knowledge from a closed Senate meeting. The U.S. Department of Justice closed its inquiry in mid-2020 without bringing charges. Perdue unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination in the 2022 Georgia gubernatorial election against incumbent Brian Kemp.

David Perdue was born in Macon, Georgia, the son of David Alfred Perdue Sr., and the former Gervaise Wynn, both schoolteachers. His father, a Democrat, was the elected superintendent of schools for Houston County, Georgia from 1961 to 1980.

Perdue was raised in Warner Robins, Georgia, and graduated from Northside High School in 1968,. He went to college for one year at the United States Air Force Academy starting in June 1968, after receiving an appointment from Congressman Jack Brinkley of Georgia, but dropped out after earning low grades. In 1969 Perdue wrote to Congressman Brinkley that he wanted to quit the Air Force Academy writing, "I have made a mistake and I do not want this type of career."

Perdue later transferred to Georgia Tech, where he earned a Bachelor of Science degree in industrial engineering in 1972, and a Master of Science degree in operations research in 1975.

Perdue is the first cousin of former governor of Georgia and former U.S. secretary of agriculture Sonny Perdue by their grandfather George Ervin Perdue Sr. As such, Perdue is not related to any descendent of the family that founded and operates Perdue Farms.

Perdue began his career in 1972 at Kurt Salmon Associates, an international consulting firm, where he worked for 12 years as a management consultant, leaving in 1984. From 1991 to 1992, Perdue was a managing director at international clothing company Gitano Group Inc. in Singapore. In 1992, Perdue took a position as senior vice president of Asia operations for Sara Lee Corporation. During his tenure, Perdue was involved in sourcing suppliers in China and Hong Kong while the company closed dozens of plants in the U.S., four of them in Georgia. Two years later, Perdue became senior vice president of operations at Haggar Clothing, increasing international production in lower-cost countries to 75 percent of the company's operations.

In 1998, Perdue joined Reebok as a senior vice president, eventually rising to president and CEO of the Reebok Brand. He is credited with rejuvenating its sneaker line. Perdue negotiated a contract with the National Football League that a former Reebok executive called "revolutionary" for repositioning the company's shoe brand.

Perdue left Reebok in June 2002 to become the CEO of PillowTex, a North Carolina textile company. The company had recently emerged from bankruptcy with a heavy debt load and an underfunded pension liability. Unable to obtain additional funding from the company's investors or find a buyer for the company, he left the company in 2003 after nine months on the job and $1.7 million in compensation. An internal auditor noted that Perdue's long absences from its North Carolina Headquarters was "terrible for morale. We felt he'd given up." In July 2003, Pillowtex announced it would go out of business, leaving 7,650 workers out of work nationwide.

After leaving Pillowtex, Perdue became CEO of Dollar General. Before he joined the company, it had recently overstated profits by $100 million and paid $162 million to settle shareholder lawsuits. Perdue overhauled the company's inventory line and logistics network and updated its marketing strategy. After initially closing hundreds of stores, the company doubled its stock price and opened 2,600 new stores. During his four years as CEO, almost 2,500 individual employment cases were filed in federal court against the company, compared to 76 in the prior four years.

Perdue is credited for arranging the sale of Dollar General in 2007 to private equity investors KKR. In 2007 and 2008, he received $42 million in compensation from Dollar General. After the sale to KKR, Dollar General faced shareholder lawsuits alleging that Perdue and other executives undersold shareholders; it paid $40 million to settle those lawsuits.

Perdue touted his business experience, and particularly his experience at Dollar General, in running for political office as a Republican candidate. According to Perdue, "We added about 2,200 stores, created almost 20,000 jobs and doubled the value of that company in a very short period of time. Not because of me, but because we listened to our customers and employees." He was endorsed by the National Federation of Independent Business.

Perdue's political opponents targeted his business career during the campaign, specifically for outsourcing work offshore. He said he was "proud of" finding lower-cost labor for some companies. Critics noted that he had contributed to a total of thousands of jobs lost following the final closure of Pillowtex, while Perdue left the company after nine months with a nearly $2 million buyout.

Perdue's campaign paid a $30,000 fine due to violations in fundraising reports from the 2014 election. The penalty came after an FEC auditor found the 2014 campaign received at least $117,000 in prohibited contributions and more than $325,000 that exceeded legal limits on campaign donations. Perdue's campaign had raised nearly $14 million, setting records for funds raised in a Georgia Senate election.

The race was considered competitive. Perdue defeated Democratic nominee Michelle Nunn 52.89% to 45.21%.

In June 2016, at the Faith and Freedom Coalition's Road to Majority conference, Perdue said, "We should pray for Barack Obama. But I think we need to be very specific about how we pray. We should pray like Psalms 109:8 says. It says, 'Let his days be few, and let another have his office'". In a statement, Perdue's office clarified: "He in no way wishes harm to our president and everyone in the room understood that".

On December 5, 2024, President-elect Donald Trump announced Perdue as his nominee for United States ambassador to China in the second Trump administration. Perdue's confirmation hearing was held at the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on April 3, 2025.

During his confirmation hearing, Perdue stated the "two countries will naturally have areas of disagreement" and "we should seek areas where our interests align to develop a better and safer working relationship." On April 29, 2025, the United States Senate confirmed him with a vote of 67 to 29.

On May 7, 2025, Perdue was sworn in as an ambassador by President Donald Trump at a ceremony held in the Oval Office. On May 15, 2025, Perdue arrived in China to take up his position and on the following day, he presented his credentials to the director-general of the Protocol Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China Hong Lei.

Perdue rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. He had criticized the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and supported Trump's appointment of Scott Pruitt as EPA administrator, saying in 2017, "Outside of eliminating the EPA altogether, Scott Pruitt is the next best thing." Perdue was one of 22 Republican senators to sign a letter to Trump urging him to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Agreement. As of 2020, Perdue lives in a private beachfront community that is building sea walls to combat sea level rise, a known effect of climate change.

Perdue was a close ally of President Trump during his tenure in the Senate. Some of Perdue's only public criticism of Trump centered on tariffs. Perdue was initially reluctant to support Trump's proposed tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum, but came to support them.

On January 11, 2018, Perdue attended a meeting at the White House at which, according to some participants, Trump purportedly referred to Haiti, El Salvador and African countries as "shithole nations" and remarked the United States should not take additional immigrants from them. Perdue said he did not recall Trump making those statements. Perdue subsequently elaborated that Trump "did not use that word", and that the accusation was "a gross misrepresentation". Off the record White House officials told the Washington Post that Perdue privately expressed belief that Trump had said "shithouse", not "shithole". On January 1, 2021, Perdue absented himself from the override of Trump's veto of the defense spending bill.

In December 2017, Perdue voted for the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. He voted for the 2017 budget, which could add as much as $1.5 trillion to deficits over ten years, because he said the tax cuts could lead to more revenue due to the economic growth they would encourage.

Perdue supports a constitutional balanced budget amendment.

Perdue married Bonnie Dunn in August 1972. The couple lives in Sea Island, Georgia. They had a daughter who died in infancy and two sons, David A. Perdue III and Blake Perdue, as well as three grandchildren.