- Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer resigned amid abuse of power allegations, including an affair.
- Chavez-DeRemer, a former GOP lawmaker, had rare union support for a Republican.
- Keith Sonderling will serve as acting labor secretary following her departure announcement.
WASHINGTON — Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer is out of President Donald Trump's Cabinet, the White House said Monday, after multiple allegations of abusing her position's power, including having an affair with a subordinate and drinking alcohol on the job.
Chavez-DeRemer is the third Trump Cabinet member to leave her post after Trump fired his embattled Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in March and ousted Attorney General Pam Bondi earlier this month.
In a statement posted on social media, Chavez-DeRemer praised Trump and wrote, "I am proud that we made significant progress in advancing President Trump's mission to bridge the gap between business and labor and always put the American worker first."
Unlike other recent Cabinet departures, Chavez-DeRemer's exit was announced by a White House aide, not by the president on his social media account.
"Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer will be leaving the Administration to take a position in the private sector," White House communications director Steven Cheung said on the social media site X. "She has done a phenomenal job in her role by protecting American workers, enacting fair labor practices, and helping Americans gain additional skills to improve their lives."
He said Keith Sonderling, the current deputy labor secretary, would become acting labor secretary in her place. The news outlet NOTUS was the first to report Chavez-DeRemer's resignation.
Labor chief and family faced multiple allegations
Chavez-DeRemer's departure follows reports that began surfacing in January that she was under a series of investigations.
A New York Times report last Wednesday revealed that the Labor Department's inspector general was reviewing material showing Chavez-DeRemer and her top aides and family members routinely sent personal messages and requests to young staff members.
Chavez-DeRemer's husband and father exchanged text messages with young female staff members, according to the newspaper. Some of the staffers were instructed by the secretary and her former deputy chief of staff to "pay attention" to her family, people familiar with the investigation told the Times.
Those messages were uncovered as part of a broader investigation of Chavez-DeRemer's leadership that began after the New York Post reported in January that a complaint filed with the Labor Department's inspector general accused Chavez-DeRemer of a relationship with the subordinate.
She also faced allegations that she drank alcohol on the job, and that she tasked aides to plan official trips for primarily personal reasons.
Both the White House and the Labor Department initially said the reports of wrongdoing were baseless. But the official denials got less full-throated as more allegations emerged — and when Chavez-DeRemer might be out of a job became something of an open question in Washington.
At least four Labor Department officials have already been forced from their jobs as the investigation progressed, including Chavez-DeRemer's former chief of staff and deputy chief of staff, as well as a member of her security detail, with whom she was accused of having an affair, the New York Times reported.
"I think the secretary demonstrated a lot of wisdom in resigning," Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., said Monday after her departure was made public.
She enjoyed union support — rare for a Republican
Confirmed to Trump's Cabinet on a 67-32 vote in March 2025, Chavez-DeRemer is a former House GOP lawmaker who had represented a swing district in Oregon. She enjoyed unusual support from unions as a Republican but lost reelection in November 2024.
In her single term in Congress, Chavez-DeRemer backed legislation to make it easier to unionize at the federal level, as well as a separate bill to protect Social Security benefits for public-sector employees.
Some prominent labor unions, including the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, backed Chavez-DeRemer, who is the daughter of a Teamster, for Labor Secretary. Trump's decision to pick her was viewed by some political observers as a way to appeal to voters who are members of or affiliated with labor organizations.
But other powerful labor leaders were skeptical when she was tapped for the job, unconvinced that Chavez-DeRemer would pursue a union-friendly agenda as a part of the incoming GOP administration. At her Senate confirmation hearing, some senators questioned whether she could uphold that reputation in an administration that had fired thousands of federal employees.
She was a key figure in Trump's deregulatory push
Aside from reports of wrongdoing in recent months, Chavez-DeRemer had been one of Trump's more low-profile Cabinet picks, but took key steps to advance the administration's deregulatory agenda during her tenure.
For instance, the Labor Department last year moved to rewrite or repeal more than 60 workplace regulations it saw as obsolete. The rollbacks included minimum-wage requirements for home health care workers and people with disabilities, and rules governing exposure to harmful substances and safety procedures in mines. The effort drew condemnation from union leaders and workplace safety experts.
The proposed changes also included eliminating a requirement that employers provide adequate lighting for construction sites and seat belts for agriculture workers in most employer-provided transportation.
During Chavez-DeRemer's tenure, the Trump administration canceled millions of dollars in international grants that a Labor Department division administered to combat child labor and slave labor around the world, ending their work that had helped reduce the number of child laborers worldwide by 78 million over the last two decades.
In her statement on Monday, Chavez-DeRemer said, "While my time serving in the Administration comes to a conclusion, it doesn't mean I will stop fighting for American workers."
The Labor Department has a broad mandate as it relates to the U.S. workforce, including reporting the U.S. unemployment rate, regulating workplace health and safety standards, investigating minimum wage, child labor and overtime pay disputes, and applying laws on union organizing and unlawful terminations.
Contributing: Steven Sloan, Will Weissert and Cathy Bussewitz
