Keen On

As Donald Trump’s 79 year-old Secretary of Commerce, Wilbur Ross was the oldest first-time Cabinet appointee in American history. Ross’ mom, however - Agnes, a lifelong New Jersey schoolteacher and proud Democrat - probably wouldn’t have been proud of her boy. As he acknowledges in his new memoir, Risks and Returns, Agnes always wanted her son to attend law school and was far from thrilled when Wilbur, then known on Wall Street as the “King of Bankruptcy,” became associated with Trump over one of his notorious bankruptcies. But as Wilbur confessed to me, he’s still thinking, at the grand old age of 86, of making Agnes proud by going back to law school. Although, of course, that plan might be waylaid if Trump is, indeed, elected in November and invites the Wall Street financier back into his administration. Before being named President Trump’s secretary of commerce in 2017, Wilbur Ross had already earned a reputation as the “King of Bankruptcy” over his 55-year career on Wall Street. Often working on high-pr