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Ed Cox is a lawyer with a record of service to the Republican Party and to his state and country in the domestic and international arenas. He has served three U.S. Presidents, four New York Governors and the Republican Party at the state and national levels. He was elected Chairman of the New York State Republican Party on March 13, 2023, having previously served as its Chairman from 2009 to 2019.
After helping finance the 2020 presidential campaign and subsequent senate races in Georgia, Cox initiated, organized and co-led a team that won fair congressional and state senate districts after a two-year and four million dollar political and litigation fight. Republicans won most of the resulting competitive congressional districts for a total of eleven – seven more than the four Republican districts of the defeated Democrat gerrymander. The team subsequently raised, and tactically spent, eight million super PAC dollars supporting Lee Zeldin’s New York gubernatorial campaign, which helped carry most of the competitive congressional districts.
For more than 50 years Cox has been involved in presidential campaigns, beginning in 1968 with the Nixon campaign. In 1972, he campaigned extensively as a family surrogate for President Nixon and in 1980 was active in the Reagan campaign. In 1984, he conceived and organized the statewide volunteer effort that helped carry New York State for Reagan. In 1988 and 1992, Cox organized the New York speakers’ bureau for George H.W. Bush’s presidential campaigns. Cox has participated in every Republican National Convention, and the subsequent presidential campaigns, since 1996.
Cox has assisted candidates at all levels throughout New York in numerous election cycles. In the critical election of 1994, he played a key role electing George Pataki Governor. In 2008, he served as the New York State Chairman of John McCain’s presidential campaign. Starting in 2013, as Chairman of the New York Party, Cox was intensively involved from time to time advising Donald Trump in his quest for the presidency.
Under President Reagan, Cox served as Senior Vice President and General Counsel of the government corporation which financed major synthetic fuels projects. As a Trustee of the State University of New York (SUNY) from 1995 to 2009 and subsequently Chairman of its Finance, Charter School and Community College Committees and of the State University Construction Fund, he developed cutting-edge policies and programs for community colleges, charter schools, teacher training, facilities construction and SUNY’s finance and administration. As a member of the Commission on Judicial Nominations, Cox played a key role under four Governors in the selection of judges for New York's highest court. As Chairman of New York’s Council of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation from 1995 to 2009, Cox was a part of Governor Pataki’s upgrading and expansion of New York’s magnificent system of parks.
In positions both in and out of government Cox has been involved in energy, environmental, education, economic and budget policies. For 35 years he was a director of a New York Stock Exchange oil and gas independent, Noble Energy, and for a number of years has been a director or trustee of the Citizens Budget Commission, the Committee for Economic Development, the New York Institute for Special Education and the National Parks of New York Harbor Conservancy. He is a former Chairman and a present member of the board of the Student Sponsor Partners and of the New York League of Conservation Voters Education Fund and is the Secretary of the Economic Club of New York.
Cox traveled extensively abroad, meeting with heads of state or government in more than 30 countries with or on behalf of Richard Nixon and also for the Reagan and H.W. Bush administrations. He is a Director of the Foreign Policy Association, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a Director of England’s Ditchley Foundation in America.
His writings on public policy have appeared in The New Republic, the Antitrust Law Journal, the New York Post, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Daily News, the Albany Times Union and Crain’s New York Business, among others. He is co author of a report and subsequent book credited with revitalizing the Federal Trade Commission.
Cox was born in Suffolk County, Long Island, and raised in Yorkville, New York City, where he graduated from Trinity High School. He received his B.A. degree in 1968 from Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and his J.D. degree from Harvard Law School in 1972.
He is a proud veteran, having joined the Reserve Officers Training Corp (ROTC) at Princeton in 1964, where he was battalion commander. He later completed infantry officer and airborne training at Fort Benning, Georgia, and served as a reserve officer with the 11th Special Forces Group.
Cox practiced corporate and finance law for more than 35 years starting at Cravath, Swaine & Moore and later as a member of the Management Committee and Chairman of the Corporate Department at Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler LLP. At Cravath and throughout his career, he represented clients in a wide variety of industries, including finance, insurance, manufacturing, commodities, utilities, software and biotech, and in a wide variety of transactions and related litigations, including then cutting-edge securitizations; mergers and acquisitions; and public, private, municipal, international, utility and project financings. His transactional work earned him the designation as a Super Lawyer in the practice of Securities and Finance law.
He and Tricia Nixon met as seniors in high school in New York and were married in the Rose Garden of the White House in 1971. In addition to her significant participation in the public and private political life of her father, Tricia has served numerous organizations furthering major medical and educational efforts. They have one son, Christopher Nixon Cox, who is a graduate of Princeton, magna cum laude, and of the New York University School of Law. Chris practiced law at a major New York firm, was subsequently Vice Chairman of a $250 billion asset manager and is now the lead partner in several venture finance partnerships and on the boards of a biotech firm and a major media company.
