Who were the first cabinet members to resign in Trump's second term 2025?
Executive summary
No cabinet secretaries resigned during Donald Trump’s second term in 2025; multiple tracking outlets and contemporary reporting concluded the White House finished the year with no departures from confirmed cabinet posts, though two announced nominees withdrew before taking office and several non‑cabinet officials and appointees resigned or were pushed out amid broader personnel upheaval [1] [2] [3].
1. The simple answer: none — no cabinet resignations in 2025
By the end of calendar year 2025, independent trackers reported that President Trump’s second‑term cabinet experienced no actual resignations of confirmed cabinet secretaries, with Ballotpedia explicitly stating “Trump has not yet had any cabinet departures in his second term” through its year‑end review [1], and commentary observers noting an unusually stable second‑term roster compared with the chaos of his first term [2].
2. What counts as a “cabinet resignation” and why that matters
Scholars and trackers distinguish between confirmed cabinet secretaries, acting officials, cabinet‑level appointees and other White House staff when counting turnover; Brookings’ methodology, for example, clarifies departures are counted based on announced resignations of cabinet members and that turnover metrics vary by which positions are included [3]. That technical framing is relevant because several high‑profile departures in 2025 involved acting officials, political appointees outside the Senate‑confirmed cabinet, or nominees who withdrew before Senate confirmation — none of which changes the headline that no confirmed cabinet secretary resigned [3] [1].
3. Withdrawals and aborted nominations created some headline noise
The absence of cabinet resignations did not mean a quiet personnel year: Ballotpedia documented that Matt Gaetz — announced as Trump’s pick for attorney general — withdrew from consideration November 21, 2025, and that Trump rescinded the nomination of Elise Stefanik for U.N. ambassador in March 2025, illustrating churn among prospective appointees even though sitting cabinet secretaries stayed in place [1].
4. Broader context: administration turnover beyond the cabinet
Reporting from outlets such as TIME and NPR documented a wave of resignations, firings and mass departures across the federal workforce and among senior non‑cabinet officials in 2025 — for instance, thousands of federal workers left or were removed as part of broad personnel changes and agency reorganizations — and commentators pointed to significant turmoil and calls for resignations even when those did not translate into cabinet exits [4] [5]. Opinion pieces and columnists highlighted intense criticism of the cabinet’s composition and performance, but those critiques do not equate to recorded cabinet resignations [6].
5. How dissent and legal disputes blurred the picture
Some high‑profile “resignations” or departures reported in late 2025 involved legally fraught or contested offices rather than routine cabinet turnover; The Atlantic, for example, covered the curious case of Alina Habba’s announcement about stepping down from a New Jersey post she was later found to lack authority to hold, a matter rooted in court rulings rather than a conventional cabinet resignation [7]. Such episodes fed narratives of instability even while leaving the roster of confirmed cabinet secretaries intact.
6. Limits of the available reporting and alternative perspectives
Available public tracking through early January 2026 supports the conclusion of zero cabinet secretaries resigning in 2025, but this assessment depends on public announcements, the definitional choices of trackers (who may or may not include acting officers) and the time cutoffs used by outlets — Brookings, Ballotpedia and major news outlets reflect those boundaries and converge on the same finding within those constraints [3] [1] [2]. Critics who argue the administration was unstable point to mass federal departures and scandals that prompted calls for resignations, but those critiques do not change the factual record about confirmed cabinet officials in 2025 [4] [6].