Everett M. Woodel Jr. — profile dossier

Pandemic-program role: None substantive. Career/political SBA field official who served as Acting Administrator only during the ~one-month transition window in early 2025; no pandemic-relief policy role.
Institution · office: SBA · Acting Administrator (Jan–Feb 2025); later Great Lakes Regional Administrator; now Acting Chief Counsel for Advocacy · Type: acting (in the relevant role)
Tenure (relief-relevant): Acting SBA Administrator, Jan. 20, 2025 – Feb. 2025.

The job (role mechanics)

Level / appointment: Acting designation — President-designated Acting Administrator during the 2025 transition (the Administrator is an EX-II/PAS position; he held it in an acting/caretaker capacity, not by Senate confirmation). A career-and-political SBA field executive; now Acting Chief Counsel for Advocacy (Office of Advocacy).
Reports to: The President (as Acting Administrator, briefly heading the agency); in his Great Lakes Regional Administrator and Advocacy roles, up through SBA leadership.
Core responsibility: Caretaker leadership of the agency for the ~one-month transition window — routine continuity, no pandemic-relief policy role (the relief programs had long stopped lending). Earlier: SBA Columbus district director (6 yrs), then Great Lakes Regional Administrator (IL, IN, MI, MN, OH, WI).
Pay: While Acting Administrator, occupied the EX-II position ($225,700 in 2025; senior-pay freeze ran through March 14, 2025). His underlying field-executive role is typically SES/GS-15-range. Source: Ex Pdf 1656165Ca5Cdc4Fc (original: opm.gov · stored capture). His actual pay during the acting stint is not documented in a first-party source.
Expectations / mandate: Keep the agency running during the presidential transition (sign routine transition-period correspondence) pending a confirmed Administrator.
Tenure norm: Acting/transitional, serving at the pleasure of the President. His actual service: Acting SBA Administrator from Jan. 20, 2025 until Loeffler's confirmation in February 2025; then Great Lakes Regional Administrator and Acting Chief Counsel for Advocacy.

Who they are

Everett M. Woodel Jr. is a career-and-political SBA field executive who briefly led the agency as Acting Administrator during the 2025 presidential transition. He was designated by President Trump on January 20, 2025 to serve as Acting Administrator until the confirmation of Kelly Loeffler in February 2025; he then became the SBA's Great Lakes Regional Administrator (serving Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin) and, per his current sba.gov bio, is the agency's Acting Chief Counsel for Advocacy. Before this he was the SBA district director in Columbus, Ohio, for six years, and earlier held roles in Ohio state government and over a decade in congressional service for Ohio's Fifth Congressional District.

Education

MBA, Ohio University; B.S. in Education, Bowling Green State University. U.S. Army veteran.

Career before the pandemic

Over a decade in congressional service (district director and deputy communications director, Ohio's 5th District); Ohio state government roles (director of public affairs, Ohio Treasurer's Office; director of operations, Industrial Commission of Ohio); private-sector roles (regional director, VEIC; director of business development, American Structurepoint). Became SBA Columbus district director (a post he held for six years).

Role in the pandemic relief programs

His only SBA-headquarters leadership role (Acting Administrator) was a ~30-day transition caretaker in early 2025, after the relief programs had ended.

Documents written or signed

No pandemic-relief rulemaking or program document is attributable to him.

Career after / where they are now

SBA Great Lakes Regional Administrator following his acting stint; listed on sba.gov as Acting Chief Counsel for Advocacy (Office of Advocacy) as of 2026.

Sources held in this archive

Original source documents and archived captures

Sources (first-party)

Official SBA bio (current): Official SBA bio current (original: sba.gov · stored capture)
SBA, "Everett Woodel Jr. Selected to Lead SBA's Columbus District": 1634921 7a7d814e7a01fcc9 (original: sba.gov · stored capture) (link now dead; copy taken from the Internet Archive, 31 May 2020)