Joseph DeFelice


Joseph "Joe" DeFelice is a Donald Trump appointee for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. He currently serves as the Assistant Deputy Secretary for the Office of Field Policy and Management as well as Regional Administrator for the Mid-Atlantic region. He was previously the head of the Philadelphia Republican Party, playing a role in Trump's popularity in the Northeast region of Philadelphia. He was also as an adjunct professor at La Salle University and Widener University.
DeFelice also served as chairman of the Mayfair Community Development Corporation and president of the Mayfair Civic Association.

Chair of Philadelphia GOP

DeFelice became chair of the Philadelphia Republican City Committee in February 2016. Prior to his chairmanship, he was the executive director of the local party since 2013.

Role in 2016 elections

He was chair of the Philadelphia GOP, when the party won successes in the 2016 United States elections in the area. Trump outperformed in the city the previous Republican candidate, Mitt Romney by 2 percentage points. “Among the city’s wards that are more than 75 percent African American,” the Washington Post reported, “Trump got about 1,300 — or 31 percent — more votes than Romney.”
In the 2016 elections, Republican state representative Martina White fended off a Barack Obama-endorsed opponent in her Northeast Philadelphia district, where Democrats outnumber Republicans two-to-one. John Taylor's campaign, continued his tenure in the state house for an additional year.
DeFelice stepped down from his Philadelphia GOP chairman position in April 2017 to fill the post of regional administrator of the Mid-Atlantic region in the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development under Ben Carson. The region covers Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Washington, D.C. and West Virginia.