Published : 10 Nov 2026, 12:46 AM
Updated : 10 Nov 2026, 12:46 AM
US Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate, head of the Justice Department's Civil Division, has resigned, Attorney General Todd Blanche announced on Monday in a post on X.
Shumate is the fourth senior Justice Department official to resign since President Donald Trump's Republicans suffered significant losses in the midterm elections last week.
Shumate, who also served in the Justice Department during Trump's first term, oversaw a division that challenged corporate diversity initiatives, healthcare clinics serving transgender minors and local governments that did not cooperate with the Trump administration's immigration crackdown.
He also defended Trump's efforts to revoke citizenship from naturalised immigrants in court.
Like other divisions in the Justice Department, the Civil Division has lost significant numbers of staff since Trump won re-election two years ago, including in the unit that defends the administration's policies in court.
Under Shumate, the division recently offered signing bonuses of up to $25,000.
It was not immediately clear why Shumate was resigning.
Other senior Justice Department officials who have recently left include Harmeet Dhillon, who led the Civil Rights Division; John Eisenberg, who headed the National Security Division; and Jason Reding Quiñones, a US attorney who pursued probes into past criminal investigations of Trump.
