Hill Climbers
Five more cabinet chiefs of staff confirmed
Five more cabinet chiefs of staff have been confirmed as of June 3, and the list includes top aides for Defence Minister David McGuinty, Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Rebecca Alty, and Environment and Climate Change Minister Julie Dabrusin.
The latest five bring the total tally to 24 confirmed chiefs of staff—22 for ministers, and two for secretaries of state—11 of whom are women.
In McGuinty’s new office as defence minister, Hill Climbers understands that Cory Pike has been tapped to take over as chief of staff.
Pike was most recently chief of staff to then-foreign affairs minister Mélanie Joly, a role he stepped into this past January. Up until the Dec. 20, 2024, cabinet shuffle, Pike had been chief of staff to Dominic LeBlanc as then-public safety minister since August 2023.
Pike’s history on the Hill dates back to the Paul Martin government years. He worked in then-interim Liberal leader Bob Rae’s office between 2011 and 2013, and was a senior campaign mobilization strategist for the Liberals during the 2015 election, after which he was hired as director of issues management and regional affairs to then-public safety minister Ralph Goodale. Pike took charge of his first cabinet office at the start of 2019, when he was named chief of staff to then-rural economic development minister Bernadette Jordan. He went on to similarly run Jordan’s office as then-fisheries minister.
Following the 2021 election—which saw Jordan lose her House seat—Pike landed in then-public services minister Filomena Tassi’s office as a senior adviser for COVID response. After Liberal MP Helena Jaczek took over that portfolio in August 2022, she promoted Pike to chief of staff. Prior to becoming LeBlanc’s chief of staff in 2023, Pike spent a brief few months as a senior adviser to Harjit Sajjan as then-emergency preparedness minister and Privy Council president.
Looking to Alty’s burgeoning team, Seth Pickard-Tattrie has been named chief of staff to the Crown-Indigenous relations minister.
Pickard-Tattrie was recently acting chief of staff to then-justice minister Arif Virani, having overall worked for the federal justice minister since the start of 2019, beginning as a special assistant for operations. By the end of 2020, Pickard-Tattrie had worked his way up to director of parliamentary affairs, and in 2023 he added on the title of deputy of chief staff.
A former lawyer and ex-Nova Scotia Liberal staffer, Pickard-Tattrie first landed on the Hill in the fall of 2018, and spent his first almost six months as a special assistant for operations to then-Treasury Board president Scott Brison.
Jumping to Dabrusin’s office as environment minister, Caroline Lee has landed the role of chief of staff.
While it’s Lee’s first time helming a cabinet office, she’s not new to the portfolio and had been working for then-environment minister Steven Guilbeault since July 2023, starting as a senior policy adviser. She was promoted to deputy director of policy last fall.
Lee previously spent close to four years working for the Canadian Climate Institute, ending as mitigation research director, and is a former energy policy analyst with the International Energy Agency’s environment and climate change unit. Among other past jobs, Lee is also a former climate change mitigation policy analyst and economist for the Government of New Brunswick.
Indigenous Services Minister Mandy Gull-Masty has likewise elevated a first-time chief of staff to run her office, Tania Monaghan.
Monaghan is a member of the Cree Nation of Wemindji, Eeyou Istchee; her boss, Gull-Masty, is the first Indigenous person to hold the role of Indigenous services minister.
Monaghan was most recently director of rights implementation to the federal justice minister, having worked in that office since early August 2021, beginning under then-minister David Lametti and continuing through Virani’s time in the portfolio. For roughly two years prior, Monaghan had been a senior legal adviser with Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, and between 2016 and 2019, she worked for the Assembly of First Nations as a senior policy analyst. She’s also a former analyst with the Grand Council of the Crees.
Finally, Justice Minister and Attorney General Sean Fraser, who is also responsible for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, has lured back his trusted aide, Savannah DeWolfe, to resume her post as his chief of staff.
DeWolfe was previously chief of staff to Fraser as then-housing, infrastructure, and communities minister.
Fraser was dropped from cabinet this past December after originally announcing that he would not seek re-election. Fraser changed his mind after now-Prime Minister Mark Carney was elected Liberal leader in March and was re-elected as the MP for Central Nova, N.S., on April 28.
Not long after Fraser was dropped from cabinet, DeWolfe posted a new job on her LinkedIn: as Tent Partnership for Refugees’ director for Canada.
DeWolfe and Fraser are understood to have a close working relationship; Fraser has even been credited with introducing DeWolfe to her now-wife, Emily, who also previously worked on the Hill.
A former Senate page, Savannah DeWolfe was first hired as an assistant in Fraser’s MP office at the end of 2015, starting soon after he was first elected to the House. She landed her first ministerial role in 2018 as an Atlantic regional adviser and assistant to the parliamentary secretary to then-environment minister Catherine McKenna; at the time, Fraser was McKenna’s parliamentary secretary.
Fraser was appointed to cabinet for the first time in 2021—becoming minister for immigration, refugees, and citizenship—and subsequently hired DeWolfe as his director of operations and legal affairs. She stepped into the role of chief of staff after Fraser was shuffled into the housing portfolio in July 2023.
Among other things, DeWolfe’s CV includes roughly three years—overlapping with her time working both as a lawyer, and in federal politics—as a commissioner with the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission.
Editor’s Note: This story was updated on June 4 to correct that it is Tania Monaghan, and not Tania Amghar, who has been named chief of staff to Indigenous Services Minister Mandy Gull-Masty. The Hill Times apologizes for this error.
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