Ex-Labor Secretary Ordered Cash Thrown at Stripper

Chavez-DeRemer is elected to represent Oregon's 5th Congressional District, where she becomes one of the most labor-friendly Republicans in the House. She loses her reelection bid in 2024.

She takes over the Labor Department. Her tenure opens with a staff party at which, the report says, she pressured officials to drink and "ridiculed them for abstaining."

Shortly after taking office, at the end of a five-day work trip, she brings subordinates to Angels PDX, a strip club in Oregon, for what the report calls an "off-the-record stop." She takes money from her purse and asks her driver to "drop the bills one by one onto the partially nude woman," according to the report. When the agent hesitates, her bodyguard tells him to "follow Chavez-DeRemer's instructions." The agent complies "against his wishes" and is then told not to discuss it with anyone. The incident is reported the next day. Travel vouchers for the trip show taxpayers covered $1,324.21 in transportation, $722 in lodging, $655 in meals and $188.35 in other expenses.

On two trips to Las Vegas, evidence "appeared to indicate" Chavez-DeRemer and the head of her security detail spent at least "portions overnight" in each other's hotel rooms, the report says. Hotel surveillance footage and other records "corroborated the unusually close nature of the relationship." Investigators did not obtain sufficient direct evidence to establish the relationship was romantic or sexual.

She travels to Palm Beach, Florida, for a conservative gala at Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate, staying three nights at a luxury hotel and spa at a nightly rate of $529 before taxes, and is reimbursed more than $2,000 — far above the federal rate. Gifts she failed to properly disclose include rodeo tickets from a lobbyist, an alligator-hide wallet received in Springfield, Louisiana, and two cowboy hats given at an America First Policy Institute event in Palm Beach.

The New York Times reports that her husband, Shawn DeRemer, faced sexual assault allegations and was barred from the department's headquarters. A criminal investigation into the matter has since been closed.

The senior security agent at the center of the relationship findings resigns. He is not named in the report.

Whistleblower complaints about her leadership surface publicly. She resigns after one year on the job and leaves for a private-sector position. She had been scheduled to sit for an inspector general interview; her attorney later declined to make her available.

The inspector general publishes the report.