DePauw graduate Pitcock to serve as Pence’s chief of staff

Josh Pitcock

A 1998 DePauw University graduate has been named chief of staff for Vice President-elect Mike Pence.

Josh Pitcock, a native of Anderson, previously worked on Pence’s congressional staff and was hired under contract to be Indiana’s federal lobbyist after Pence became governor in 2013.

In his new role, Pitcock will serve not only as chief of staff but as an assistant to the president in the Trump White House.

Incoming White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said Pitcock will be among a group of “key leaders in helping to implement the president-elect’s agenda and bring real change to Washington.”

Pitcock was the subject of a minor controversy during the presidential campaign, when it was discovered that he was still earning $23,000 a month a month as Indiana’s sole Washington lobbyist while also having a paid position within the campaign.

In an interview with the Anderson Herald Bulletin, Pitcock’s father Jerry said his son became interested in politics while at DePauw, where he took a course taught by a professor who traveled to Washington for a weekly television news program.

That professor was Ken Bode, the now-retired former network news journalist, who hosted Washington Week in Review on PBS while teaching at DePauw’s Center for Contemporary Media.

Pitcock was a political science major and Asian studies minor at DePauw, where he was a standout diver. He went on to earn a law degree from Wake Forest University.