This study aimed to investigate the relationship between ethical leadership and empowerment of teachers in secondary schools in Ardabil city. The present study is applied in terms of its purpose and descriptive-correlational in terms of its data collection method. The statistical population of the study included 547 male and female teachers working in secondary schools in Ardabil city in the academic year 1404-1405, of which 226 people were selected as samples using stratified random sampling. The data collection tools included the Karlshun Ethical Leadership Questionnaire (2011) and the Spreitzer and Mishra Employee Empowerment Questionnaire (1992). The data were analyzed using SPSS software and PLS structural equation modeling. The findings showed that there is a positive and significant relationship between ethical leadership and teacher empowerment, and teachers under the ethical leadership of principals experienced a sense of self-efficacy, professional independence, and higher participation in educational decision-making. Also, the mediation analysis of organizational trust showed that this variable plays a partial mediating role between ethical leadership and teacher empowerment, such that both the direct path and the indirect path through organizational trust were significant. The total path coefficient between ethical leadership and teacher empowerment, considering the mediator organizational trust, was 0.877, indicating a significant effect of ethical leadership on teacher empowerment, both directly and through increasing organizational trust. These results indicate that promoting ethical behaviors of school leaders can increase teachers' organizational trust and lead to their empowerment, improved teaching quality, and improved school performance.