London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Tuesday, Nov 18, 2025

The Justice Department Is Revisiting Its Sexual Harassment Policies

The Justice Department Is Revisiting Its Sexual Harassment Policies

Internal reports have documented numerous incidents of sexual misconduct involving senior-level officials.
The Justice Department is launching a new effort to review and potentially revise its sexual harassment policies, according to a memo that Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco sent to all employees on Friday.

Monaco’s memo doesn’t specify what policies might be changed or what prompted the latest review, but the DOJ inspector general’s office for years has investigated and confirmed complaints of sexual harassment and misconduct across the department, and recent news reports have detailed and confirmed these and other allegations. BuzzFeed News has previously reported on a slew of sexual harassment and misconduct complaints that were investigated and substantiated by the inspector general’s office, including a former federal prosecutor who harassed multiple women he came into contact with across various agencies; a former senior official accused of sexually assaulting a woman he worked with and harassing others; and a former US attorney (whose name DOJ unsuccessfully argued to keep secret after BuzzFeed News sued) accused of violating DOJ policies by having a relationship with a subordinate.

Monaco has tasked a steering committee to do a comprehensive review and report its recommendations to her within 180 days, according to a copy of the memo reviewed by BuzzFeed News.

“The Department of Justice is committed to providing a workplace free from sexual harassment and misconduct,” Monaco wrote. Citing an executive order that President Joe Biden signed in March highlighting the need to support “gender equity and equality” across the federal government, Monaco wrote, “It is therefore critical to our duty as principled defenders of the law to combat sexual harassment and misconduct in our own workplace and hold offenders accountable for their actions.”

The department’s Gender Equality Network, or DOJ GEN, has long pushed the department to strengthen its policies around preventing sexual harassment and tracking and responding to complaints. The group sent a letter to Monaco in February following the publication of an investigation by the San Francisco Chronicle into sexual harassment within the immigration court system, which is an arm of DOJ; the Chronicle first reported Monaco’s memo.

In an email to DOJ GEN members on Friday obtained by BuzzFeed News, the group’s president, Stacey Young, wrote that she would be serving on the new steering committee and was “thrilled that everyone now knows that the Justice Department is finally taking its systemic sexual harassment problem seriously.” Young declined a request for comment.

In 2017, the DOJ inspector general’s office released a report identifying “significant weaknesses” with how officials had responded to sexual harassment and misconduct allegations in the Civil Division. The report described situations where male employees accused of groping, stalking, or otherwise harassing women in the workplace received minimal punishments.

In response to that 2017 report, then–deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein established a working group to review the department’s sexual harassment policies and issued new guidance in 2018. But as the New York Times reported at the time, those directives largely left it up to the individual divisions within the department to decide how to carry out anti–sexual harassment efforts, and critics worried that would continue to lead to uneven enforcement.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
UK Unveils Sweeping Asylum Reforms with 20-Year Settlement Wait and Conditional Status
UK Orders Twitter Hacker to Repay £4.1 Million Following 2020 High-Profile Breach
Popeyes UK Eyes Century Mark as Fried-Chicken Chain Accelerates Roll-out
Two-thirds of UK nurses report working while unwell amid staffing crisis
Britain to Reform Human-Rights Laws in Sweeping Asylum Policy Overhaul
Nearly Half of Job Losses Under Labour Government Affect UK Youth
UK Chancellor Reeves Eyes High-Value Home Levy in Budget to Raise Tens of Billions
UK Urges Poland to Choose Swedish Submarines in Multi-Billion € Defence Bid
US Border Czar Tom Homan Declares UK No Longer a ‘Friend’ Amid Intelligence Rift
UK Announces Reversal of Income Tax Hike Plans Ahead of Budget
Starmer Faces Mounting Turmoil as Leaked Briefings Ignite Leadership Plot Rumours
UK Commentator Sami Hamdi Returns Home After US Visa Revocation and Detention
UK Eyes Denmark-Style Asylum Rules in Major Migration Shift
UK Signals Intelligence Freeze Amid US Maritime Drug-Strike Campaign
TikTok Awards UK & Ireland 2025 Celebrates Top Creators Including Max Klymenko as Creator of the Year
UK Growth Nearly Stalls at 0.1% in Q3 as Cyberattack Halts Car Production
Apple Denied Permission to Appeal UK App Store Ruling, Faces Over £1bn Liability
UK Chooses Wylfa for First Small Modular Reactors, Drawing Sharp U.S. Objection
Starmer Faces Growing Labour Backlash as Briefing Sparks Authority Crisis
Reform UK Withdraws from BBC Documentary Amid Legal Storm Over Trump Speech Edit
UK Prime Minister Attempts to Reassert Authority Amid Internal Labour Leadership Drama
UK Upholds Firm Rules on Stablecoins to Shield Financial System
Brussels Divided as UK-EU Reset Stalls Over Budget Access
Prince Harry’s Remembrance Day Essay Expresses Strong Regret at Leaving Britain
UK Unemployment Hits 5% as Wage Growth Slows, Paving Way for Bank of England Rate Cut
Starmer Warns of Resurgent Racism in UK Politics as He Vows Child-Poverty Reforms
UK Grocery Inflation Slows to 4.7% as Supermarkets Launch Pre-Christmas Promotions
UK Government Backs the BBC amid Editing Scandal and Trump Threat of Legal Action
UK Assessment Mis-Estimated Fallout From Palestine Action Ban, Records Reveal
UK Halts Intelligence Sharing with US Amid Lethal Boat-Strike Concerns
King Charles III Leads Britain in Remembrance Sunday Tribute to War Dead
UK Retail Sales Growth Slows as Households Hold Back Ahead of Black Friday and Budget
Shell Pulls Out of Two UK Floating Wind Projects Amid Renewables Retreat
Viagogo Hit With £15 Million Tax Bill After HMRC Transfer-Pricing Inquiry
Jaguar Land Rover Cyberattack Pinches UK GDP, Bank of England Says
UK and Germany Sound Alarm on Russian-Satellite Threat to Critical Infrastructure
Former Prince Andrew Faces U.S. Congressional Request for Testimony Amid Brexit of Royal Title
BBC Director-General Tim Davie and News CEO Deborah Turness Resign Amid Editing Controversy
Tom Cruise Arrives by Helicopter at UK Scientology Fundraiser Amid Local Protests
Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson Face Fresh UK Probes Amid Royal Fallout
Mothers Link Teen Suicides to AI Chatbots in Growing Legal Battle
UK Government to Mirror Denmark’s Tough Immigration Framework in Major Policy Shift
UK Government Turns to Denmark-Style Immigration Reforms to Overhaul Border Rules
UK Chancellor Warned Against Cutting Insulation Funding as Budget Looms
UK Tenant Complaints Hit Record Levels as Rental Sector Faces Mounting Pressure
Apple to Pay Google About One Billion Dollars Annually for Gemini AI to Power Next-Generation Siri
UK Signals Major Shift as Nuclear Arms Race Looms
BBC’s « Celebrity Traitors UK » Finale Breaks Records with 11.1 Million Viewers
UK Spy Case Collapse Highlights Implications for UK-Taiwan Strategic Alignment
On the Road to the Oscars? Meghan Markle to Star in a New Film
×