From Deputy Chief of Staff to Chief of Staff
Katie Heller has been promoted to Chief of Staff in the office of Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-CA-51), stepping into the role at the start of 2026 after nearly four years as the California Democrat's Deputy Chief of Staff.
Heller has spent the bulk of her congressional career inside Jacobs' office, joining as Scheduling Director and Operations Director in January 2021 before moving up to Deputy Chief of Staff in March 2022. She holds a bachelor's degree in strategic communications from West Virginia University and interned in the Senate office of former Sen. Joe Manchin (I-WV) in 2013.
The Office She Helps Run
Jacobs sits on the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the House Armed Services Committee, giving her office a wide portfolio spanning defense, military personnel, human rights, and arms sales oversight. As Ranking Member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee's Africa Subcommittee, Jacobs has been active in a series of hearings in the 119th Congress. Recent completed hearings have covered the crisis in Sudan, conflict and religious persecution in Nigeria, Chinese mineral extraction and exploitation in Africa, and peace efforts in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda. On the Armed Services side, the Military Personnel Subcommittee has held hearings on military department personnel posture and a restructuring of the Military Health System and its effects on readiness and beneficiary access.
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