David L. Chew

David L. Chew was appointed by President Ronald Reagan on January 30, 1985, to serve as Staff Secretary and Deputy Assistant to the President. Subsequent occupants of the Office of the Staff Secretary have held the higher rank of Assistant to the President as opposed to the lower rank of Deputy Assistant to the President, which Chew held. Chew is the highest ranking Asian American to serve in the Executive Office of the President.

Prior to his appointment as Staff Secretary, From 1981 to April 1984, Chew served as Executive Assistant to Secretary of the Treasury Donald Regan. When Regan swapped positions with James Baker to become the White House Chief of Staff, Chew migrated from the Treasury Department to become the White House Staff Secretary.

After Regan was implicated in the Iran-Contra Affair, investigators interviewed Regan's subordinates, including Chew, in an effort to find corroborating evidence of President Reagan's involvement. Chew claimed to have no knowledge of such activities. Skeptical members of the press that did not believe that such a high ranking member within the White House could have no knowledge of the events dubbed Chew one of the "Three Blind Mice" along with Regan confidantes Thomas C. Dawson and Dennis Thomas.

Chew received a B.S.F.S. in Foreign Service from Georgetown University in 1974. In 1979, he left his position as director of research for Timmons and Co., a consulting firm in Washington, DC., to become an administrative assistant to Senator Robert Dole.

Chew previously was vice president of Citizen's Choice, a public interest organization affiliated with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.