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On the fifth night of his second term, Donald Trump executed his first Friday Night News Dump, firing at least 18 inspectors general who were responsible for rooting out corruption, ethical lapses and mismanagement in federal agencies throughout the government. The president did not appear to have the legal authority to take such steps, but the Republican did it anyway.
Roughly 10 weeks later, the White House still needs to replace many of the IGs who were ousted, and it was against this backdrop that Politico reported:
President Donald Trump tapped a former House member who lost a scandal-tinged re-election bid last year to serve as the Labor Department’s internal watchdog as part of a slate of nominations for top jobs at the agency announced late Monday. Former Rep. Anthony D’Esposito, who worked as a New York City Police Department detective before being elected to Congress, was selected to serve as Labor’s inspector general.
The Politico report added that D’Esposito might be an “awkward fit” for the position, and it’s worth appreciating why.
The New York Republican arrived on Capitol Hill in early 2023, and it didn’t take long for the congressman to run into some trouble. Indeed, The New York Times reported in September 2024 that D’Esposito hired his fiancée’s daughter to work as a special assistant in his district office, paying her $3,800 a month in taxpayer money. Around the same time, the GOP congressman also reportedly added his mistress to his official payroll, generating a series of questions about the legal and ethical lines he apparently crossed.
The Times’ report, which was not independently verified by MSNBC or NBC News, added that his fiancée eventually found out about the affair and briefly broke up with him, at which point the New York Republican stopped paying both women.
D’Esposito didn’t explicitly deny the accuracy of the reporting, though he did issue a statement that read in part, “My personal life has never interfered with my ability to deliver results for New York’s 4th district, and I have upheld the highest ethical standards of personal conduct.”
This was not persuasive to his constituents: D’Esposito, after having served just one term, narrowly lost his re-election bid in his competitive Long Island district.
Roughly six months later, Trump — who has a curious habit of finding jobs for Republicans whom voters have rejected — has decided that D’Esposito should be the inspector general at the Department of Labor, where he would be expected to serve in an independent capacity, investigating ethical lapses, despite his own alleged ethical lapses.
This is a Senate-confirmed position. D’Esposito’s confirmation hearings are bound to be interesting.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.