Grace Hou

Grace B. Hou has been Deputy Governor for Health and Human Services for Governor JB Pritzker since October 10, 2023. As the Deputy Governor, Grace oversees the work of the 12 Health and Human Services cabinet agencies and boards or commissions whose reach touches every corner of Illinois, improving the lives of millions of individuals and families across the state. Under her leadership, the Health and Human Services team tackles several critical initiatives, including the implementation of the state’s plan to erase medical debt, coordination of the public health approach to decreasing gun violence, the response to new arrivals, management of the Office of New Americans, the establishment of a Multi-Sector Plan on Aging, and the creation of a cross-agency Justice Cabinet.

Prior to her role as Deputy Governor, Grace served on Governor JB Pritzker’s Cabinet as the Secretary of the Illinois Department of Human Services (IDHS) from 2019-2023. The team at IDHS made notable achievements under her direction, including leading Illinois to attain one of the highest response rates for the 2020 Census; launching the state’s inaugural gun violence prevention office; ensuring that families and children have food on their tables and access to public health insurance; elevating people with lived experience with mental illness to share their pathways to recovery; protecting hundreds of community providers; and saving countless lives during COVID-19.

Grace also previously served as the Assistant Secretary at IDHS from 2003 to 2012, and during that time she was an architect of Illinois’ Immigrant Integration New American’s Gubernatorial Executive Order, which was nationally recognized.

Grace has dedicated her career to advancing social justice by working in the non-profit and public service sectors systems for change improvement through public policy development and implementation, social services provision, community organizing and engagement, and philanthropy. Prior to joining Governor JB Pritzker’s administration, Grace most recently served as the President of Woods Fund Chicago from February 2012 to March 2019. Woods Fund Chicago is a bold grantmaking foundation that finds—and funds—projects that draw on the power of communities to fight the brutality of poverty and structural racism.

She has served as the Executive Director of the Chinese Mutual Aid Association (CMAA) and as the Development Manager at CMAA where she became an advocate for immigrants’ rights. Grace is a child of immigrants from Taiwan.

She is Board Chair of the national American Public Human Services Association, board member of the Healthy Communities Foundation, a 2001 Leadership Greater Chicago fellow, a member of The Commercial Club, a National Academy of Public Administration fellow, and a German Marshall fellow.