Jennifer Carnahan

Carnahan is a businesswoman and spent her career in marketing and strategy for some of the world’s top companies and sports organizations, including: McDonald’s Corporation, General Mills, Ecolab, The Florida Marlins and Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

Jennifer Carnahan is the current Chair for the Republican Party of Minnesota and was elected as the party's first Asian-American Chairwoman on April 29, 2017. She is also the wife of U.S. Representative from Minnesota's 1st congressional district, Jim Hagedorn.

She was elected as Chairwoman Minnesota Republican Party in 2017. Under the motto Make Minnesota Red 2018, the state party hoped to carry the momentum of Trump almost winning Minnesota in 2016, however the party did not do well in those elections, losing both U.S. Senate races, and all state constitution offices.

Prior to her election as chair, she was elected as a National Delegate to the 2016 Republican National Convention in Cleveland and she was a 2016 Republican Party candidate for the Minnesota Senate in the 59th district. She was defeated by incumbent Democrat Bobby Joe Champion.

Carnahan received her Bachelor of Science Degree from the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University where she majored in Broadcast Journalism in 1999. She went on to receive her Masters of Business Administration from the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota in 2010.

On November 11, 1976, Carnahan was left on the back doorstep of a rural hospital in South Korea. Five-months later she was adopted by a Minnesota family. She graduated from Osseo Senior High School in 1995.