George T. Whitesides is a candidate for the 27th Congressional district in California. Previously, George served as Chief of Staff for NASA in the Obama Administration, and later as CEO of Virgin Galactic, which over ten years he led to space operations and a public company listing. He co-founded Megafire Action, an advocacy organization that supports solutions to the wildfire crisis, and is a partner at Convective Capital, a firm that invests in firetech companies. He is the cofounder of AstroAccess, a non-profit organization dedicated to encouraging universal design and accessibility principles in spaceflight. Earlier in his career, he was the Executive Director of the National Space Society. He serves on Caltech’s Space Innovation Council and Princeton’s Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Advisory Board. He is the recipient of NASA’s Distinguished Service Medal and the Exceptional Public Achievement Medal, which he received for co-chairing the Antelope Valley Covid Task Force. He is a mentor in the Matthew Isakowitz Fellowship Program, and supported the formation of BLAST, the Black Leaders in Aerospace Scholarship and Training (BLAST) Program. George has a masters degree in remote sensing and GIS from Cambridge University, an undergraduate degree in policy from Princeton University, and was a Fulbright scholar to Tunisia. He is married to Loretta Hidalgo Whitesides.