Labor Secretary's husband is barred from the Department after sexual misconduct allegations.

OK. Hon. Pay attention. The Secretary of Labor, Lori Chavez-DeRemer, has a husband. The husband, Shawn DeRemer, is not an employee of the Department of Labor. He is, by trade, an anesthesiologist, in Portland, Oregon. This is fine. Many cabinet secretaries have spouses who are not on the payroll. That’s good. That’s normal.

What is not normal, on the public record this week, is what Shawn DeRemer was doing at the Department of Labor’s headquarters, on Constitution Avenue, in Washington, DC. The New York Times reported, and the Department confirmed, that two women who work at the agency accused him, in writing, of sexual assault in the form of inappropriate touching, in the building.

Two women. In the building. Working there. Touched. Inappropriately. By the Secretary’s husband, who does not work there.

The Department, when asked, said it had barred DeRemer from the building. Did not say when the alleged conduct occurred. Did not say what the Department was doing about it. Said the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington had closed the investigation with no charges because the U.S. Attorney’s Office had concluded there was no evidence of a crime.

Hon. Stay with me. The standard the U.S. Attorney’s Office uses to charge an anesthesiologist with a crime is not the standard the Department of Labor uses to bar a private citizen from its building. These are two different standards. The one requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law. The other requires the Department of Labor saying so. The Department, here, said so. They barred him. They are not arguing he did not do it. They are acknowledging he did enough of it that he is no longer welcome in the building his wife runs.

I want you to picture, for a moment, the meeting in which the Secretary of Labor of the United States sat down with general counsel of the Department of Labor and discussed the bar. The conversation. Buddy. Buddy. I have never had a meeting like that. Nobody at this bar has ever had a meeting like that. The Secretary of Labor’s general counsel had to tell the Secretary of Labor that her husband was not permitted to come pick her up at the side entrance anymore. Because two of her employees had reported him.

That meeting happened. In a building. On Constitution Avenue. In 2026.

The Secretary remained in post in February. The Cabinet meeting on the following Wednesday went, according to the official photos, as scheduled.

Funny how nobody at the family table on Sunday asks what’s going on at work, dear.