San Francisco Conservative Harmeet Dhillon Resigns From Justice Department
Harmeet Dhillon, the San Francisco lawyer who led the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, has resigned, Attorney General Todd Blanche confirmed Thursday. The departure comes just after Democrats won control of Congress in Tuesday’s midterms.
By the Bay Area Brief staff · Edited by Seamus McKenna · · 2 min read
Phillip Burton Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse in San Francisco. Photo: Marincyclist / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped, resized and color-graded). Archive photo of the area; not a photo of the events in this story.
Harmeet Dhillon, the San Francisco lawyer who led the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, has resigned, Attorney General Todd Blanche confirmed Thursday. The departure comes just after Democrats won control of Congress in Tuesday’s midterms.
The San Francisco Standard reported that Dhillon had recently promoted a nationwide deployment of election monitors. During her tenure, the division also pursued investigations involving UCSF medical-school admissions and San Francisco Unified School District policies.
CBS News reported that Dhillon’s leadership brought a sharp change in the division’s priorities and substantial staff departures. Blanche praised her public service; civil-rights advocates criticized her record. Dhillon founded her San Francisco law firm in 2006 and joined the administration after Senate confirmation in April 2025.
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