In January 2020, the board that runs Charleston International Airport picked a new chief executive without considering a single outside candidate, The Post and Courier reported. It chose one of its own members: Elliott Summey, then chairman of Charleston County Council.

One board member resigned in protest. Mount Pleasant Mayor Will Haynie and Charleston Mayor John Tecklenburg, through a proxy, voted no, saying the job should have gone through an open search. Critics said Summey, the son of North Charleston Mayor Keith Summey, lacked aviation experience and was picked for his political connections, the newspaper reported.

“Hopefully, the people who support me will be happy with the results in a couple of years from my hard work and those who have disagreed with the process will say, ‘He is the right man for the job,’” Summey told the Post and Courier at the time.

More than six years later, he is president and CEO of the Charleston Regional Aviation Authority, which runs Charleston International and three smaller airports.

Politics and real estate

Summey served three terms on County Council, including as chairman, and multiple terms on the airport board, according to the authority. He worked in commercial, industrial and medical real estate development, the Post and Courier reported in 2020.

His backers on the board wanted someone who knew the airport’s expansion plans and had political ties. “Elliott may not be the best we can get, but he is grounded in Charleston,” said Vic Rawl, a county councilman who sat in for Summey at the meeting where he was hired, according to the newspaper.

Summey defended skipping a search. “If you already know who you want, it’s disingenuous to the people who apply to put them through the process,” he said.

He started July 1, 2020, at $290,000 a year plus an $18,000 car allowance, the newspaper reported. Passenger traffic had plunged nearly two-thirds in the pandemic. The authority cut $25 million from its spending plan and froze hiring. Summey required masks in the terminal and looked for money in unused airport buildings and land.

“We can’t just be about passenger count,” he told the Post and Courier that fall. “Economic development is extremely important to quality of life.”

In February 2023, the board voted unanimously to extend his contract through June 2026 and raise his pay nearly 14% to $330,000, the newspaper reported. Board Chair Helen Hill credited his “steady and experienced hand.” The authority has not announced a contract running past June 2026 on its website, which still lists him as president and CEO.

Records and gates

Charleston International handled a record 6.34 million passengers in 2025, according to an Explore Charleston tourism report cited by ABC News 4. In 2019, the year before Summey took over, about 4.8 million people passed through, the Post and Courier reported.

Much of the early growth came from Breeze Airways, which began flying from Charleston in 2021, the Post and Courier reported in 2023. The airline’s new Buffalo, New York, route, announced Oct. 13, will be its 30th nonstop destination from the airport, the newspaper reported.

In July 2025, the airport broke ground on its $105 million West Gates expansion, which will add four gates and raise gate capacity by 15%, according to the airport.

“The West Gates Expansion is about more than additional gates,” Summey said at the groundbreaking.

In May, he told CAPA TV, an aviation industry outlet, that the concourse would open in December, with Breeze as its anchor. In August, The Post and Courier reported that the gates would open in early 2027. Construction was still underway in mid-October, the newspaper reported.

Public fights

In July, the airport said it would pursue a Transportation Security Administration program that would have let a private contractor screen passengers. TSA ended the program in August. In September, union members representing TSA officers rallied at the airport over fears that screening could still be privatized, ABC News 4 reported. Summey told the station the airport had no such plans. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” he said.

In November 2025, U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace demanded his resignation after airport police reports said she cursed at officers and TSA agents on her way to an Oct. 30 flight, according to The Post and Courier and Fox News. Mace called the police report a “political hit job” and said Summey was “well aware of these breaches and has done nothing to secure my safety,” South Carolina Public Radio reported.

Summey did not resign. In a statement reported by South Carolina Public Radio, he defended the airport’s police. “I take this responsibility with the utmost seriousness,” he said.

In the May interview, Summey said the airport “has become such an integral part of all that growth and all of the quality of life that is Charleston.”