Lori Chavez-DeRemer, President Trump’s embattled labor secretary, stepped down on Monday as multiple scandals and investigations closed in on her.
“Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer will be leaving the administration to take a position in the private sector,” Steven Cheung, a White House spokesman, posted on X. He said that Keith Sonderling, the deputy secretary of labor, would serve as acting secretary.
Mr. Cheung said Ms. Chavez-DeRemer had “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.” But pressure on her mounted in recent weeks, as investigators and Congressional leaders homed in on questions about her conduct in office, and that of her aides and family members.
The Labor Department’s inspector general’s office is nearing the end of a monthslong investigation into a whistle-blower’s allegations of professional misconduct by Ms. Chavez-DeRemer and her closest aides, including claims that she was having an affair with a member of her security team and that she used department resources for personal trips. Ms. Chavez-DeRemer was expected to be interviewed in the matter in the coming days.
Investigators spoke with several dozen witnesses, and uncovered evidence that Ms. Chavez-DeRemer and her staff abused federal spending limits on personal trips, several people familiar with the investigation said, including on fancy hotels, S.U.V. rentals and meals. Four people have already left or been forced out of their jobs in connection with the investigation.
Investigators had also reviewed personal text messages sent to young female staff members by Ms. Chavez-DeRemer, her former deputy chief of staff, her husband and her father. The messages, reported last week by The New York Times, suggested that the secretary was drinking during the workday and raised questions about professionalism with her staff.
The likelihood of embarrassing details coming out through the inspector general inquiry was compounded by a parallel inquiry on Capitol Hill: Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the Republican chair of the Judiciary Committee, demanded internal records and statements from the department in connection with the allegations.
Ms. Chavez-DeRemer’s husband has been barred from the department’s headquarters, after female staff members accused him of making unwanted sexual advances, including filing a police report.
Although police and prosecutors have said they would not bring criminal charges against him, the situation has continued to reverberate in the secretary’s office: In recent weeks, three claims of a hostile work environment were filed against Ms. Chavez-DeRemer with the department’s civil rights office.
Mr. Sonderling, a labor lawyer with a decade of government experience, has been effectively leading the Labor Department during Ms. Chavez-DeRemer’s tenure, multiple employees told the Times.
Ms. Chavez-DeRemer, 58, a one-term former Republican congresswoman from Oregon, was nominated to the secretary position with backing from the Teamsters union, whose president, Sean O’Brien, had supported Mr. Trump’s 2024 run.
But her leadership of the department left many employees frustrated and demoralized, including career staff and political appointees. Dozens described, in interviews with The Times, a toxic workplace characterized by an absentee secretary and hostile aides.
