Amid allegations of ethical misconduct, Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer has stepped down. The investigation centers on claims involving her husband’s inappropriate behavior towards female staff, her directive for employees to supply alcohol during business trips, and rumors of a romantic involvement with her security personnel.
Steven Cheung, the White House Communications Director, confirmed her resignation on Monday, praising her performance as “phenomenal.”
Chavez-DeRemer’s exit marks her as the third cabinet member to leave under Donald Trump’s second term. Previously, Kristi Noem departed from the Department of Homeland Security in March, followed by Pam Bondi’s removal as Attorney General earlier this month.
At 58, Chavez-DeRemer has been embroiled in an ethics investigation initiated late last year following allegations of improper conduct. Her husband, Dr. Shawn Deremer, is also under scrutiny by the Inspector General due to suggestive texts sent to younger female employees.
This resignation adds to the department’s ongoing troubles, which have included allegations of alcohol-fueled work trips to strip clubs and casinos, along with reports of liquor stockpiled at the Washington DC office.
Text messages reveal that Chavez-DeRemer and her former deputy chief of staff requested staff members to bring alcohol during official trips, sometimes during working hours.
She even allegedly drank on the job, with the Labor Department Inspector General’s complaint claiming that the Labor Secretary maintains ‘a stash’ of bourbon, Kahlua and champagne at her office in Washington DC.
Chavez-DeRemer also took subordinates to a strip club in Oregon last year, the New York Post reported.
President Donald Trump’s Secretary of Labor Lori Chavez-Deremer has resigned
Deremer was the subject of an ethics probe regarding alcohol in the office and an alleged affair with one of her security guards
Ex-Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-Deremer with her husband Shawn Deremer. Shawn Deremer was hit with accusations he sexually harassed a Labor Department staffer late last year. However, charges were never brought against the former secretary’s husband
The alleged trip to club Angels PDX on April 18, 2025, came at the end of a five-day visit that officially included a meeting with Democratic Governor Tina Kotek, a truck manufacturer CEO and a tour of an Intel chip facility.
Documents seen by the Post showed $2,890.06 in taxpayer money was spent on the Oregon trip.
The former Labor Secretary was allegedly involved with one of her security guards in an affair.
Brian Sloan stepped down last week after being accused of a romantic relationship with the married secretary, according to two department officials cited by Politico.
He had previously been placed on leave amid the Department of Labor’s Office of Inspector General’s probe into allegations that Chavez-DeRemer engaged in unprofessional conduct.
Her husband Dr. Deremer, an anesthesiologist, was barred from the department headquarters earlier this year after multiple women told the inspector general that he had made unwanted advances towards them.
One of the women filed a report with DC’s Metropolitan Police Department.
Video of the interaction caught on security cameras shows Dr. DeRemer ‘giving one of the women an extended embrace’ and has been reviewed by law enforcement.
The secretary’s departure is the third Cabinet-level shakeup Trump’s inner-circle has seen since the start of his second term
Shawn Deremer texted young female Department of Labor staffers
A woman told police she was sexually assaulted inside the department’s Washington headquarters on December 18, according to a police report obtained by the Daily Mail.
The department and the federal prosecutor’s office later said they would not bring charges over the allegation.
In the original complaint to the inspector general, first reported by the New York Post in January, Chavez-DeRemer was accused of asking a staffer to bring rosé to her hotel room.
‘Do they sell by the bottle,’ she asked. The staffer replied that they did but they were out of rosé.
She responded: ‘How about the josh sauvi B.’
The messages were undated but included a picture of the menu from a hotel bar in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, where the secretary went on an official visit last July.
In a text on September 5, Chavez-DeRemer’s then-deputy chief of staff Rebecca Wright told one of the staff to grab ‘a bottle or 2’ of wine or champagne.
‘Lori wants to do a toast when this meeting is over,’ Wright told the staffer.
Chazez-DeRemer’s personal attorney Nick Oberheiden said in a statement: ‘While she continues to strongly dispute the allegations that have been raised, Secretary Chavez-DeRemer believes it is in the best interest of the country to allow the administration to remain fully focused on delivering results for the American people.
‘She is grateful for the opportunity to serve and remains committed to supporting the President’s agenda moving forward.’
