Washington: Indian-American Harmeet Kaur Dhillon has resigned as the US Assistant Attorney General and head of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, becoming the first senior official to leave the Trump administration since the midterm elections.
US Attorney General Todd Blanche announced her resignation in a social media post on Thursday, saying Dhillon had "led the Civil Rights Division with conviction".
“She has defended the civil liberties of every American and enforced the law without fear or favour,” Blanche wrote on X.
Today, I accepted the resignation of Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who led the Civil Rights Division with conviction the past 18 months. She has defended the civil liberties of every American and enforced the law without fear or favor. The Department is grateful for her dedicated public service, and we wish her every success in her future endeavors.
“The department is grateful for her dedicated public service, and we wish her every success in her future endeavours,” he added.
Dhillon told Fox News that she had resigned of her own volition. She said she had withheld the announcement at the request of White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles until after Election Day.
“Serving my country as AAG for Civil Rights has been the honour of a lifetime. We ushered in the downfall of illegal DEI, we fought to protect women and girls’ sports, and so much more. I want to thank President Trump for giving me this opportunity. I look forward to what’s next,” Dhillon said in a post on X.
Born in Chandigarh into a Punjabi Sikh family, Dhillon's parents initially moved to London before eventually settling in the United States.
A staunch ally of US President Donald Trump, Dhillon ran her own law firm in San Francisco for several years before joining the Justice Department. Her law firm was also part of Trump's campaign legal team.
She is a frequent guest on conservative podcasts and maintains an active presence on social media. Unlike her predecessors, Dhillon regularly posted videos about the work being undertaken by her division.
In media interviews, she acknowledged that she often generated ideas for civil rights investigations based on posts she encountered on social media.
Speaking at a Moms for Liberty event in New York in May, Dhillon described her family's move to the United States as the “greatest gift” her parents had given her.
“My dad was an orthopaedic surgeon. Mom and Dad left India in the 1970s because it was a Russian client state. They had a dictated two-children policy and a planned economy, and Mom and Dad didn't want to raise their kids in that kind of an environment, so they came to America,” Dhillon said.
“Besides life, the greatest gift that Mom and Dad gave me was bringing me here to America and allowing me to be sworn in as a naturalised American citizen when I was 10 years old,” she added.
Dhillon said her parents moved to the US at a time when the country faced a shortage of doctors and Washington was inviting medical professionals during the Vietnam War.