Sen. Bill Cassidy, the Republican chairman of the Senate labor committee, blocked four of President Trump's nominees Friday after an inspector general report detailed drinking on the job, strip club visits, and a "toxic" workplace under the former Labor secretary.
Cassidy placed a hold on nominees to three independent federal labor agencies, refusing to move them forward until the White House gives lawmakers a full briefing on the findings against former Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer. The hold affects Mike Doyle, nominated to the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission; Walter Darr, nominated to the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service; and Doug Ralph and Loren Sweatt, both nominated to the National Mediation Board.
The Louisiana Republican, who leads the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, said in a statement that neither members nor staff had been briefed on what the Labor Department's internal watchdog found, and that he would not let business continue until that changed.
Cassidy told reporters:
"Now that the investigation is complete, we need answers. Members and staff were not briefed on the findings. That is unacceptable and disregards Congress's constitutional oversight role."
He added that the committee "will not consider additional labor nominees until bipartisan members and staff have been fully briefed." Under Senate rules, any senator can place a hold on a nominee at any time for any reason, a procedural tool that effectively stalls a confirmation vote until the hold is lifted.
The inspector general's report, released by the Labor Department's Office of Inspector General the day before Cassidy's announcement, drew on testimony from more than three dozen witnesses who worked under Chavez-DeRemer. Their accounts painted a picture of a cabinet office where professional standards collapsed.
Witnesses described a "toxic, intimidating and humiliating" environment. The secretary and two of her top aides "regularly" drank on the job. Aides delivered verbal "beatdowns" to employees for what the report called "perceived performance deficiencies."
Rebecca Wright, Chavez-DeRemer's deputy chief of staff, allegedly "selected staff based on physical appearance rather than professional qualifications," the report found. The investigation also examined what the watchdog described as an "inappropriate relationship" between Chavez-DeRemer and her bodyguard, Brian Sloan.
Cassidy has had a complicated final stretch in the Senate. He clashed publicly with his own party earlier in this Congress, and he lost his primary to a Trump-backed challenger. He will leave the Senate in January.
But a lame-duck senator still chairs the committee, and Cassidy used that authority Friday to force the White House's hand. His demand for a bipartisan briefing, not a partisan one, signals he wants the findings on the record before new nominees slide through.
The inspector general's findings went beyond workplace culture. During one incident, Chavez-DeRemer visited a strip club and "ordered one of her security detail to drop cash on 'partially nude dancers,'" the report stated.
Investigators also found that the former secretary improperly used government funds for personal travel. She accepted several expensive gifts without declaring them, including an alligator-hide wallet, work boots, baby gifts, and cowboy hats, all items that federal ethics rules require officials to disclose.
Chavez-DeRemer, a former Oregon congresswoman, resigned in April, roughly three months after the New York Post first reported on the inspector general's probe into her relationship with Sloan and allegations that she abused her position. The broader Senate confirmation calendar was already strained before Cassidy's hold added four more names to the backlog.
Keith Sonderling, Trump's pick to replace Chavez-DeRemer as Labor secretary, is not affected by Cassidy's hold. Sonderling has already cleared the HELP Committee and awaits a full Senate vote. The four blocked nominees, by contrast, are headed to smaller independent agencies that handle workplace safety disputes and labor mediation, agencies that deal with collective bargaining and other worker issues.
Cassidy's move puts the White House in a bind. The senator is not demanding that Trump withdraw anyone. He is demanding information, specifically, a briefing on what the administration knew about Chavez-DeRemer's conduct and when it knew it. No White House response to the hold or the briefing demand has been reported.
The situation echoes a familiar pattern: a cabinet-level scandal that metastasizes because the executive branch treats congressional oversight as optional. Cassidy's statement made the constitutional stakes explicit. Congress has a right to know what happened inside a federal department, and stonewalling a committee chairman, even a departing one, carries a cost.
Cassidy backed the administration on other confirmation fights this Congress, making his decision to dig in here harder to dismiss as partisan gamesmanship. He voted with the White House when he thought the nominee deserved it. Now he is using the same authority to pump the brakes.
The open questions are significant. Who else in the administration was aware of the inspector general's investigation before the report went public? Were any steps taken to address the allegations while Chavez-DeRemer was still in office, or did the White House wait for her to resign on her own? And what happened to Brian Sloan, the bodyguard at the center of the probe?
None of those answers are in the public record yet. That is precisely Cassidy's point.
When Julia Letlow won the Louisiana primary to succeed Cassidy, some observers assumed his remaining months in office would be quiet. Instead, he is using the leverage he has left to force accountability on a scandal that embarrassed the administration and, by the witnesses' own accounts, made life miserable for the rank-and-file employees who had to work under it.
Taxpayers funded the travel. Taxpayers paid the bodyguard's salary. Taxpayers employed the workers who endured what dozens of witnesses called a humiliating workplace. The least Congress can do is find out what went wrong, and whether anyone in a position of authority tried to stop it before the inspector general had to.
