Jacob Reses, the 35-year-old chief of staff who has been at Vice President JD Vance's side since before he ever held public office, will leave the Trump administration at the end of the summer. A source familiar with the matter confirmed the departure to Jewish Insider, which reported the news on June 11. NBC News first reported Reses' planned exit.
Reses told Vance several months ago that he intended to step away after learning he and his wife were expecting their first child. He married Rachel Altman, the director of outreach at the Foundation for American Innovation, a tech think tank, in January.
The departure removes one of the most quietly influential figures in Vance's orbit, a confidante who helped shape the vice president's political career from its earliest days and earned the trust of senior officials across the administration. The volume and warmth of the tributes from cabinet-level figures suggest Reses' role extended well beyond managing Vance's schedule.
Reses first became a confidante to Vance in 2021 and advised him through both the primary and general election contests for the Ohio Senate seat Vance briefly held. Before that, he served as a senior advisor in the Senate office of Sen. Josh Hawley, the Missouri Republican. Two sources familiar with the matter told Jewish Insider that Hawley was among those who encouraged Vance to pick Reses as his chief of staff.
Vance did exactly that, naming Reses to the post immediately after winning the Senate race. Reses stayed on when President Trump tapped Vance as his running mate in 2024, and he carried the chief of staff title into the White House.
Jewish Insider described Reses as having worked with a roster of prominent figures in the conservative movement, including Tucker Carlson, Stephen Miller, Russell Vought, and Michael Needham. He also worked with Heritage Action, an affiliate of the Heritage Foundation.
That network speaks to something worth noting: Reses was not a creature of the old Republican establishment. He came up through the populist-conservative infrastructure that has reshaped the party. His departure is a personal decision, not a political one, but it still leaves a gap in an office that has been central to Vance's role as a public voice for the administration's agenda.
Washington departures often produce boilerplate well-wishes. The statements surrounding Reses' exit were notably specific, and came from figures who do not always align on internal matters.
Vice President Vance issued the most personal tribute, calling Reses irreplaceable in the bluntest terms available to a sitting official.
"Jacob's been by my side for my whole career in public life. I can't imagine having been on this life-changing journey without him. From day one of my time as a senator-elect, I could not have asked for a more loyal and discerning advisor and friend as my chief of staff. I'll miss him dearly, but he won't be far, and I plan to keep his counsel close until our paths cross again."
White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles praised Reses' range, saying no task had been too big or too small for him to handle.
"Jacob has been an important part of our White House leadership team and has served the Vice President with absolute distinction. From diplomacy and war, to complicated matters, to the most minute logistics, there has been no task too big or too small for him to tackle. It has been a privilege to have a partner like Jacob in the vice president's office with such humility, discretion, and loyalty. He will be missed in the halls of the West Wing, but he will always be a friend and ally we can all rely upon and I hope will come back often."
Wiles' statement is worth reading carefully. She described Reses as a "partner" in the vice president's office, language that suggests a collaborative relationship between the VP's shop and the West Wing chief of staff's operation. That kind of alignment is not guaranteed in any White House, and it is not always easy to maintain when internal policy debates grow heated.
White House Special Envoy Steve Witkoff offered perhaps the most colorful assessment, referencing joint diplomatic missions.
"Don't let Jacob fool you, beneath his kind exterior he's a killer. It's been a delight to get to know him through the vice president, and our foreign adventures from Israel to Pakistan have been historic. He commands respect in every room he walks into, and I've been proud to have him by my side in negotiating some of the toughest deals for the president. We haven't seen the last of him."
The mention of Israel and Pakistan points to the scope of Reses' involvement. A vice presidential chief of staff does not typically sit in on high-stakes international negotiations. That Witkoff described Reses as someone who was "by my side" in those settings suggests the VP's office played a more hands-on role in foreign policy than the title alone would indicate.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio kept his statement shorter but no less warm, saying Reses "understands the moment we're in and he spent every day fighting to deliver results for the president." Rubio added that Reses' "intellect, leadership, and humor will be missed."
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent tied Reses' work to the administration's economic priorities. He recalled meeting Reses over dinner shortly before the Republican convention and said he had no idea they would become such close partners.
"His counsel to me and to the vice president has been invaluable as we have fought to reshore critical industries and rebalance the economy from debt-driven consumption to production, saving, and investment. We will miss him enormously."
Bessent's framing is telling. He credited Reses with helping advance a specific economic vision, reshoring industry, shifting from consumption to production and investment. That is not generic praise. It places Reses at the center of the administration's most ambitious domestic agenda items, including the kind of policy fights that have drawn legal challenges and required sustained political coordination.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche described Reses as "tough, smart, hardworking, and loyal, the perfect combination to succeed in the Trump White House." Blanche added that he would miss working with Reses to advance the president's agenda but was "excited to see what he does next."
That question, what Reses does next, remains unanswered. Jewish Insider reported that a source in the vice president's office suggested Reses could rejoin the team at some point down the line. No successor has been named.
The administration has navigated a number of complex legislative and national security challenges in recent months, including last-minute congressional negotiations that have tested the White House's relationships on Capitol Hill. Losing a chief of staff who had built trust across multiple power centers, from the West Wing to the State Department to Treasury, is the kind of transition that rarely shows up in headlines but is felt in hallways.
Reses is leaving for the most straightforward reason a person can offer: he is about to become a father. In a city that treats every departure as a signal of dysfunction, that simplicity is worth taking at face value.
The harder question is whether the vice president's office can replicate the institutional relationships Reses built over five years at Vance's side. Chiefs of staff are replaceable on paper. The ones who earn praise from every corner of an administration are harder to replace in practice.
Washington chews through staff at a relentless pace. When a 35-year-old walks away from one of the most powerful offices in the building to go be a dad, it says something good, about him, and about what still matters outside the Beltway.