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McConnell is a Southern Baptist.[124] He was married to his first wife, Sherrill Redmon, from 1968 to 1980, and had three children.[125] Following their divorce, she became a feminist scholar at Smith College and director of the Sophia Smith Collection.[126][127] His second wife, who married him in 1993, is Elaine Chao, the former Secretary of Labor under George W. Bush.[128] On November 29, 2016, incoming President Donald Trump nominated Chao to serve as the Secretary of Transportation. She was confirmed by the Senate on January 31, 2017, in a 93–6 vote.[128] McConnell himself voted “present” during the confirmation roll call.[129]

McConnell is on the Board of Selectors of Jefferson Awards for Public Service.[130]

In 1997, he founded the James Madison Center for Free Speech, a Washington, D.C.-based legal defense organization.[131][132] McConnell was inducted as a member of the Sons of the American Revolution on March 1, 2013.[133]

In 2010, the OpenSecrets website ranked McConnell one of the wealthiest members of the U.S. Senate, based on net household worth.[134] His personal wealth was increased after receiving a 2008 personal gift to him and his wife, given by his father-in-law James S. C. Chao after the death of McConnell’s mother-in-law, that ranged between $5 and $25 million.