Agency: U.S. Department of Labor Role: Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs, Office of Public Affairs (2025 – present) Severity: P2

Note on title: The task brief characterized this role as “Chief of Staff, Office of Public Affairs.” The official DOL leadership directory lists Aaron Britt’s title as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs, one of two deputy-level roles under Assistant Secretary Courtney Parella. This profile uses the official title.

Quick Navigation

• Bio and Background
• Role and Communications Function
• Messaging Strategy
• Significant Public Statements
• Controversies
• Overall Veracity Track Record
• Social Media Accounts
• Key Source Links

Bio and Background {#bio}

Aaron Britt is the Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Office of Public Affairs at the U.S. Department of Labor. An Iowa native, he holds a B.A. in Politics and Economics from Drake University in Des Moines.¹

Britt’s career has been spent almost entirely in Republican press and communications operations. He began as a Page for the Speaker of the Iowa House of Representatives and worked as a Clerk in the Iowa legislature for several sessions, and as a Field Director for a congressional campaign.¹

Before moving to Washington, D.C., he served as Communications Director at the Republican Party of Iowa during the 2020 election cycle, overseeing press operations for the 2020 Iowa Caucus, several competitive U.S. House races, and a U.S. Senate race.¹

On Capitol Hill, Britt held senior communications roles for four years:

• Press Secretary, U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) — one of the most prominent and longest-serving Republican senators
• Communications Director, Congressman Randy Feenstra (R-Iowa, IA-4)

Most recently before DOL, Britt served as Communications Director for then-Representative Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-OR), where he spearheaded earned media and press strategy for her campaign and congressional communications.¹ Chavez-DeRemer was subsequently nominated and confirmed as Secretary of Labor. Britt transitioned with her to DOL. LegiStorm records show Britt was listed as Chavez-DeRemer’s Communications Director on January 1–2, 2025, immediately before the administration transition.²

Role and Communications Function {#role}

Britt serves as one of two Deputy Assistant Secretaries in the DOL Office of Public Affairs (OPA), alongside Mike Trupo, under Assistant Secretary Courtney Parella.³ The OPA manages all external communications for the Department of Labor, including press relations, social media, earned media campaigns, and official public messaging.

The DOL OPA has been the source of several nationally reported social media controversies during the Trump administration’s second term. The office operates DOL’s official social media accounts across X (formerly Twitter), Instagram, and other platforms, and has been responsible for major campaigns including Operation Firewall (targeting H-1B visa workers).⁴

Agency context: The Department of Labor under Secretary Chavez-DeRemer has faced significant internal turbulence. In May 2025, Chavez-DeRemer’s chief of staff and deputy chief of staff were forced out within 24 hours after the White House told DOL leaders to fire them. The firings came amid a whistleblower complaint alleging professional misconduct by the secretary, which was referred to the inspector general’s office.⁵

Messaging Strategy {#messaging-strategy}

The DOL Office of Public Affairs under the Trump administration has pursued an aggressive social media messaging strategy centered on:

• “American Workers First” branding — emphasizing native-born workers and restricting H-1B visas through Operation Firewall
• AI-generated imagery featuring almost exclusively white male workers, framed in a Norman Rockwell or New Deal poster aesthetic⁶
• Historical symbolism — pairing Trump with figures like Theodore Roosevelt, invoking patriotic and nationalistic themes
• “America 250” anniversary branding — tying Trump’s image to national heritage celebrations

The Seattle Times reported that the DOL’s social media campaign “has made a dramatic shift during the Trump administration, launching a social media campaign with illustrations that appear to be AI-generated and that almost exclusively feature white men — part of an effort to promote the hiring of American citizens over foreign workers.”⁶ The paper further reported that “The Labor Department’s Office of Public Affairs, which is behind the social media campaign, doubled down on the postings after White House officials expressed approval of an early post.”⁶

Significant Public Statements {#statements}

Aaron Britt’s individual public statements are not extensively documented in open sources; the OPA communicates primarily through agency accounts and DOL’s official spokesperson. Attribution of specific social media posts or press releases to Britt individually is not possible from public record.

A spokesperson for the Department of Labor responded to criticism of the white-only social media imagery with a statement: “The Washington Post is manufacturing outrage that doesn’t exist. Twisting social media posts celebrating American workers and the American Dream into a race story is absurd.”⁶ The identity of the spokesperson making this statement has not been publicly confirmed as Britt specifically.

Controversies {#controversies}

1. Far-Right and White Nationalist Imagery in Official Social Media (October 2025 – January 2026)

The DOL Office of Public Affairs, which Britt leads as one of its deputies, has been at the center of a sustained and nationally reported controversy over its social media content.

October 2025 — Operation Firewall posters: In October 2025, DOL posted a series of posters promoting Operation Firewall — Trump’s initiative restricting H-1B visas — on official social media accounts. The posters featured AI-generated images almost exclusively depicting white men in heroic, idealized poses. Art experts and historians said the images mimicked the aesthetic of Norman Rockwell paintings and historical government propaganda, including fascist European propaganda. Critics said the campaign “is not realistically portraying the diversity of the country’s workforce and is sending messages that feel exclusionary.”⁶⁷ Snopes reviewed the images and confirmed their publication by DOL, finding “many similarities” between some images and Nazi propaganda posters, though it noted it “was not possible to definitively confirm the department’s intention.”⁷

January 2026 — “One homeland, one people, one heritage” post: On or around January 8, 2026, DOL posted a social media message reading: “One homeland, one people, one heritage. Remember who you are, American.” Social media users and experts quickly noted the similarities between this phrase and Nazi Party slogans. CNBC reported that experts “see numerous other examples of the Trump administration — including the Labor Department — echoing white supremacist language, ideas or aesthetics online.”⁸ The DOL also posted a photo of a saluting Trump with the text “Trust the plan” — the recurring phrase of the far-right QAnon conspiracy theory.⁸

PBS NewsHour reported the full “One homeland, one people, one heritage” DOL post and placed it in the context of administration-wide social media content that “echo rhetoric linked to extremist groups,” alongside DHS/ICE recruitment ads featuring a phrase — “We’ll have our home again” — described by experts as a white supremacist anthem.⁹

2. Giant Trump Portrait on Department of Labor Building (August 2025)

In August 2025, a three-story banner featuring Trump’s second inaugural portrait, the America 250 logo, and the words “American Workers First” was draped over the Frances Perkins Building — the DOL’s Washington, D.C. headquarters. It was displayed alongside an American flag and a portrait of Theodore Roosevelt.¹⁰¹¹

The display drew widespread commentary comparing it to authoritarian regimes’ use of government buildings to project leaders’ images. Newsweek noted that “Historically, authoritarian leaders—such as Josef Stalin in the Soviet Union and Mao Zedong in China—have used government buildings to project control and reinforce their image.”¹¹ The New Republic characterized it as the Trump administration “pulling from the dictator playbook.”¹²

The DOL stated the banner was part of Labor Day and “America’s 250th birthday” celebrations.¹⁰

Overall Veracity Track Record {#track-record}

Rating: Insufficient individual record for scoring

Aaron Britt’s individual public statements are not documented in sufficient quantity to assess a personal veracity score. His accountability relevance stems primarily from his leadership role within the DOL Office of Public Affairs, which has produced multiple nationally reported controversies involving imagery experts have compared to fascist and white nationalist propaganda. As a Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs, Britt bears institutional responsibility for the office’s output, though the degree of his personal involvement in specific posts is not documented in publicly available sources.

Spokesperson Misinformation Assessment {#misinformation-assessment}

Designation: None

Advocacy vs. Misinformation determination: Britt’s documented in-role conduct concerns his institutional responsibility, as one of two Deputy Assistant Secretaries, for the DOL Office of Public Affairs’s social-media output; the profile documents no individual in-window statement by Britt carrying an institutional fact-check rating, and thus contains no basis to establish a pattern of knowing misinformation attributable to him personally.

Comparative Baseline: Insufficient in-window fact-check record versus the cross-administration press-secretary reference class.

Framework note: The Spokesperson Misinformation Assessment evaluates the transition from advocacy to knowing misinformation, not one-sided spin. Vigorous advocacy for an administration’s agenda is protected message discipline, not misinformation.

Framework disclosure: This assessment applies a published analytical framework to documented, in-role public statements by a public official, filtered to their tenure window. All factual predicates are cited to institutional fact-checkers. This assessment is subject to update as new evidence emerges or prior evidence is corrected.

Social Media Accounts {#social-media}

No personal public social media accounts for Aaron Britt have been identified in open sources.

Key Source Links {#sources}

Factual correction requests: If you believe information in this profile is incorrect, please contact factcheck@patriot.university with your name (optional), the specific claim, and any supporting documentation.