Top Senate Republican opposes Obama labor nominee Perez

By Rachelle Younglai and Roberta Rampton

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate's top Republican on Wednesday came out strongly against President Barack Obama's nominee for labor secretary, accusing Thomas Perez of being a crusading ideologue who would bend the laws to advance his agenda.

Perez's nomination must be confirmed by the Senate and the speech from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell suggests that Republicans will throw up procedural hurdles to prevent him from serving as the Obama administration's next labor secretary.

"Unbound by the rules that apply to everyone else, Mr. Perez seems to view himself as free to employ whatever means at his disposal, legal or otherwise, to achieve his ideological goals," McConnell said on the Senate floor.

Perez, 51, is currently head of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division and has worked on civil rights issues in a series of government positions during his career.

McConnell's speech was designed to rally his members to oppose the nomination, and it provides cover for other Republicans who may be thinking about opposing Obama's pick, said George Washington University's Sarah Binder, an expert on Congress.

"I think it matters that it is Mitch McConnell here, laying the marker down on why he's opposing the nominee," Binder said.

The Oversight Committee in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives also has issues with Perez and has subpoenaed private emails he used to conduct government business.

Democratic Representative Elijah Cummings joined Republicans on Wednesday in asking Perez to turn over the documents. A spokeswoman for Cummings was not immediately available to explain the lawmaker's reasons.

LATINO SUCCESS STORY

Obama has described Perez's career as exemplifying the American success story. Perez, the son of immigrants from the Dominican Republic, helped pay for college by working as a garbage collector and in a warehouse.

The nomination was championed by Hispanic groups, which have pushed for more representation in the Cabinet.

As labor secretary, he would have a key role in Obama's efforts to raise the minimum wage and overhaul immigration laws.

Republicans allege that Perez entered into a quid pro quo deal with St. Paul, Minnesota, in which he got the city to withdraw a Supreme Court appeal in exchange for the department not filing charges alleging St. Paul had filed false claims in a government funding application.

Perez denies the allegation.

On Wednesday, Republican Senator Marco Rubio - a Hispanic often touted as a potential presidential candidate in 2016 - also said he thought Perez would be a "disastrous" choice.

"Many Americans, especially those of us of Hispanic descent, celebrate his success and his personal story," Rubio said in a statement. "Unfortunately, intellect and work ethic are not sufficient qualifications for a cabinet secretary."

SECOND DELAY FOR VOTE

The Senate Health and Labor Committee had been scheduled to vote on Perez's nomination on Wednesday. But Republicans invoked an obscure rule that prevents committees from meeting when the Senate is in session.

The committee is expected to hold the vote on May 16, marking the second time the panel has had to reschedule the vote due to Republican maneuvers. Although Obama's Democrats control the Senate 55-45, they would need 60 votes to clear a procedural roadblock.

The Health and Labor Committee chairman, Democratic Senator Tom Harkin, said he has given Republicans ample time to vet Perez and said his colleagues were now delaying the vote for "delay's sake."

The White House accused Republicans of "politicizing" the nomination but brushed off concerns Perez would be blocked.

"He's enormously qualified and there has not been a case made that is not political and partisan against his nomination, and we hope and expect the Senate will move forward," spokesman Jay Carney told reporters.

Two of Obama's other Cabinet picks, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Central Intelligence Agency Director John Brennan, had tough confirmations but eventually succeeded.

Obama has had a difficult time getting Senate approval for his Cabinet choices compared to his predecessors, Binder said. Previous presidents have rarely had to meet a 60-vote threshold to secure a confirmation, whereas Republicans have made that "the new norm" for Obama.

"There's no doubt that many nominations are killed by being drawn out and wearing down the nominee," Binder said, explaining that the longer the delay until a vote, the more time opposition can "fester and grow."

(Reporting by Rachelle Younglai and Roberta Rampton; Additional reporting by Ayesha Rascoe; Editing by Cynthia Osterman, Eric Walsh and Eric Beech)

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Labor Sec. Nominee Faces Harsh GOP Scrutiny

Secretary of Labor nominee Thomas Perez faced two hours of intense scrutiny at his nomination hearing Thursday morning as he sought to alleviate Republican concerns over his role in the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice.

At issue is a lengthy report released earlier this week in which GOP leaders accuse Perez of attempting to influence the city of St. Paul, Minn., to withdraw a housing discrimination case before it could be brought before the Supreme Court. In exchange, the Department of Justice agreed not to intervene in two whistleblower cases against St. Paul that could have won up to $200 million for taxpayers.

Sen. Lamar Alexander engaged Perez in a heated line of questioning, accusing Perez of doing "an extraordinary amount of wheeling and dealing."

"You have a duty to protect the money, a duty to protect the whistleblower, and at the same time, it seems to me that you're manipulating the legal process to try to get the result you want from the Supreme Court in a way that's inappropriate," Alexander, R-Tenn., said.

Perez defended his actions, saying DOJ chooses not to stay out of "a lot of different things."

"It was in the interest of justice and it was entirely appropriate to do so in the opinion of professional responsibility people and others," he told the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee. "I believe the resolution reached in this case was in fact in the interest of justice."

Democratic senators had kind words for Perez. Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., introduced him as "one of Maryland's favorite sons," saying "we believe he is the right man for the job."

Senator Patty Murray, D-Wash., joined in the praise, adding "you have a very amazing, impressive, wide range of experience that you are bringing from a number of different agencies…You're something of a turn-around expert for public sector agencies, so thank you for that."

When asked what his very top priority would be should he be confirmed as Secretary of Labor, Perez had one answer: "jobs, jobs, jobs."

He expanded on his goals and priorities, including reauthorizing the Workforce Investment Act, maintaining pension security, and spending his first 100 days as secretary on a listening tour of America, reaching out to small businesses and workers alike.

"The president has asked all of us to consider three questions in the decisions we make," Perez said. "How do we make America a magnet for jobs? How do we equip our people with the skills they need to succeed in those jobs, and how do we ensure that an honest day's work leads to a decent living?"

Perez concluded, "These questions are at the core of the mission of the Department of Labor, and if confirmed you have my word that I will keep them there."

The committee is expected to vote on Perez's nomination on Thursday, April 25.

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GOP lawmakers blast Labor secretary nominee

WASHINGTON (AP) — GOP lawmakers are criticizing Labor secretary nominee Thomas Perez over what they call a questionable deal he brokered while serving as the nation's top civil rights enforcer.

Three top Republicans issued a report Sunday accusing Perez of misusing his power to persuade the city of St. Paul, Minn., to withdraw a case from the Supreme Court.

In exchange, the Justice Department agreed not to intervene in two whistleblower cases against St. Paul that could have won up to $200 million for the government.

Republicans call the deal inappropriate and say Perez misled senior officials. But Democrats say Perez was up front about the strategy. The Justice Department says the decision was cleared with senior officials and was in the best interests of the nation.

Perez's Senate confirmation hearing is Thursday.

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Obama to nominate package of labor board members

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama on Tuesday nominated three candidates for full terms on the National Labor Relations Board, which has been in limbo since a federal appeals court invalidated his recess appointments to the agency.

Obama urged the Senate to move swiftly in confirming the members — two Republicans and one Democrat — along with two other Democrats he nominated in February. That would fill all five seats on the board.

But the move is already facing opposition from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who remains angry that the nominee package includes the two Democratic lawyers Obama installed last year without Senate confirmation.

The board has been a partisan lightning rod during Obama's presidency, with Republican lawmakers and business groups furious over decisions and rules they say are aimed at helping labor unions win more members.

Obama is renominating board Chairman Mark Pearce, a Democrat, and nominating two new Republicans to the board: lawyers Harry I. Johnson III and Philip A. Miscimarra, who have represented companies in labor-management disputes.

The president also had nominated Democrats Sharon Block and Richard Griffin to full terms on the board in February. They have been sitting on the board since January 2012, when Obama made them recess appointments after Senate Republicans vowed to block Obama's NLRB nominees. Republicans complained the board was issuing too many pro-union decisions.

The White House hopes that Senate Republicans will favor the five-member package nomination of two Republicans and three Democrats. Both Republican nominees have passed muster with GOP leadership.

"I urge the Senate to confirm them swiftly so that this bipartisan board can continue its important work on behalf of the American people," Obama said in a statement.

But McConnell said he would not consider Block and Griffin.

"At a minimum, the president needs to send two new Democrat nominees to replace the two who were unconstitutionally appointed," McConnell said.

McConnell also said the Senate would give Pearce's nomination added scrutiny "given his decision to continue purporting to exercise government power, despite the circuit court's ruling that he does not lawfully possess it."

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled in January that Obama violated the Constitution when he bypassed the Senate to fill vacancies on the board. Since then, Republicans have claimed the board lacks any legitimacy to act.

The nominations come as House Republicans prepare to vote this week on a measure that would effectively shut down the board until it has permanent members confirmed by the Senate.

Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander, top Republican on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, on Tuesday reiterated his previous call for Block and Griffin to leave the board while the Senate reviews the nominations.

The White House has insisted the appeals court decision is wrong and plans to appeal it to the Supreme Court. But the ruling has prompted employers in more than 100 cases to claim the board, which referees labor-management disputes, lacks authority to take action against them because two of its members are not there legitimately. It also has frustrated labor unions who worry the board can't crack down on unfair labor practices.

The president claimed that he made the recess appointments last year while the Senate was on a break. But the appeals court panel ruled that a recess occurs only during the breaks between formal yearlong sessions of Congress, not just any informal break. It also ruled that a vacancy must come into being during a recess in order to be valid.

The White House says the first-of-its-kind ruling runs contrary to more than 150 years of practice and would invalidate hundreds of recess appointments in Democratic and Republican administrations.

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka expressed his support for the five-nominee package, noting it includes Republicans "who have views on labor relations matters that we do not agree with. But working people need and deserve a functioning NLRB, and confirmation of a full package will provide that stability."

Randel Johnson, vice president at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce for labor issues, said the board has issued many decisions "of serious concern to the business community and we hope that the Senate, as it vets these nominees, will closely examine the entirety of the board's recent actions."

House Republicans are expected to pass a measure this week that would prevent the NLRB from conducting business until the Senate confirms new members constituting a quorum or the U.S. Supreme Court decides the board has the authority to act. But the measure is not expected to make any headway in the Democratic-controlled Senate.

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Business, labor close on deal for immigration bill

WASHINGTON (AP) — Big business and major labor unions appeared ready Friday to end a fight over a new low-skilled worker program that had threatened to upend negotiations on a sweeping immigration bill in the Senate providing a pathway to citizenship for 11 million immigrants already in the U.S.

Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., who's been brokering talks between the AFL-CIO and the Chamber of Commerce, said in a statement that negotiators are "very close, closer than we have ever been, and we are very optimistic." He said there were still a few issues remaining.

The talks stalled late last week amid a dispute over wages for workers in the new program, and senators left town for a two-week recess with the issue in limbo. Finger-pointing erupted between the AFL-CIO and the chamber, with each side accusing the other of trying to sink immigration reform, leaving prospects for a resolution unclear.

But talks resumed this week, and now officials from both sides indicate the wage issue has been largely resolved. An agreement would likely clear the way for a bipartisan group of senators to unveil legislation the week of April 8 to dramatically overhaul the U.S. immigration system, strengthening the border and cracking down on employers as well as remaking the legal immigration system while providing a path to citizenship for 11 million illegal immigrants already in the U.S.

"We're feeling very optimistic on immigration: Aspiring Americans will receive the road map to citizenship they deserve and we can modernize 'future flow' without reducing wages for any local workers, regardless of what papers they carry," AFL-CIO spokesman Jeff Hauser said in a statement. "Future flow" refers to future arrivals of legal immigrants.

Under the emerging agreement, a new "W'' visa program would bring tens of thousands lower-skilled workers a year to the country. The program would be capped at 200,000 a year, but the number of visas would fluctuate, depending on unemployment rates, job openings, employer demand and data collected by a new federal bureau pushed by the labor movement as an objective monitor of the market.

The workers would be able to change jobs and could seek permanent residency. Under current temporary worker programs, workers can't move from employer to employer and have no path to permanent U.S. residence and citizenship.

The new visas would cover dozens of professions such as long-term care workers and hotel and hospitality employees. Currently there's no good way for employers to bring many such workers to the U.S.; an existing visa program for low-wage nonagricultural workers is capped at 66,000 per year and is supposed to apply only to seasonal or temporary jobs.

The Chamber of Commerce said workers would get paid actual wages paid to American workers or the prevailing wages for the industry they're working in, whichever is higher. The Labor Department determines prevailing wage based on rates prevailing in specific localities, so that it would vary from city to city.

The labor organization had accused the chamber of trying to pay workers in the new program poverty-level wages, something the chamber disputed.

There was also disagreement about how to deal with certain higher-skilled construction jobs, such as electricians and welders, and it appears those will be excluded from the deal, said Geoff Burr, vice president of federal affairs at Associated Builders and Contractors. Burr said his group opposes such an exclusion because, even though unemployment in the construction industry is high right now, at times when it is low there can be labor shortages in high-skilled trades and contractors want to be able to bring in foreign workers. But unions pressed for the exclusion, Burr said.

The low-skilled worker issue had loomed for weeks as perhaps the toughest matter to settle in monthslong closed-door talks on immigration among Schumer and seven other senators, including Republicans John McCain of Arizona and Marco Rubio of Florida. The issue helped sink the last major attempt at immigration reform in 2007, when the legislation foundered on the Senate floor after an amendment was added to end a temporary worker program after five years, threatening a key priority of the business community.

The amendment passed by just one vote, 49-48. President Barack Obama, a senator at the time, joined in the narrow majority voting to end the program after five years.

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Community, Environmental And Labor Coalition Applaud Missouri Attorney General For Legal Action Against Republic Services

Residents' and Workers' Health and Safety Must Be Protected; Cost of Dealing with Effects of Bridgeton Landfill Fire, Radioactive Wastes and Remediation Should Not Fall on Missouri Taxpayers

ST. LOUIS, Mo., March 28, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Teamsters Joint Council 13 in St. Louis, Missouri Jobs with Justice and Missouri Coalition for the Environment, applauded Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster for taking legal action against Republic Services [NYSE: RSG] yesterday for the ongoing environmental health and safety crisis at the Bridgeton/Westlake landfill.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20100127/IBTLOGO)

Republic's Bridgeton landfill has been in the news recently due to citizen complaints about persistent stench, the expanding underground fire, a recent explosion, and the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) investigation of radiation levels and groundwater contamination. The landfill is part of the West Lake Landfill Superfund Site where radioactive nuclear weapons wastes are buried.

According to the Missouri Office of the Attorney General, the lawsuit (docket number: 13SL-CC01088) seeks to force Republic to address the odor problems and correct the environmental violations, as well as to provide remedies to help local residents and businesses deal with the ongoing effects of the burning waste. The lawsuit also seeks to ensure that Republic, rather than taxpayers, pays for the costs of experts hired by the Missouri Department of Natural Resources (DNR) to perform ongoing, intensive environmental testing.

The DNR had officially requested the attorney general bring legal action against Republic Services just last Thursday.

"We commend the Attorney General for taking on Republic Services," said Marvin Kropp, President of Teamsters Joint Council 13. "We also commend the Department of Natural Resources for referring Republic to the AG's office due to its egregious failures.

"Less than two weeks ago our coalition sponsored a briefing, during which independent experts talked with public officials about their assessment of the risks posed by the fire and the nuclear weapons wastes at the site. We have already contacted the Occupational Safety and Health Administration in this regard. Should the landfill fire reach the radioactive wastes it would be catastrophic.

"The families who live, and work around this landfill should not be exposed to these risks for one minute longer. The attorney general's office should also see to it that the full present and future cost of dealing with the Bridgeton landfill fire and its remediation fall squarely on Republic, and not on Missouri taxpayers, local businesses or residents," Kropp said.

"Workers and residents in North Saint Louis County and St. Charles must be protected from Republic's negligence. This is not the first environmental disaster at a Republic-owned landfill - for the past nine years a major uncontrolled underground fire has been raging at Republic's Countywide Landfill in Ohio," said Joan Suarez of Missouri Jobs with Justice. "The company just settled an 800-plaintiff lawsuit there, but the site is still a disaster. We encourage the Office of the Attorney General to do everything in its power to force Republic Services to clean up this site for good."

"Communities around the landfill have long smelled the stench coming from Republic's landfill, but the problem could be much bigger than that," said Ed Smith of the Missouri Coalition for the Environment. "The EPA detected radioactivity in the air when it flew its anti-terrorism ASPECT plane over the landfill, we want EPA to disclose its data and infrared readings, and fully characterize the wastes and the site.  Assurances that the landfill fire and radioactive wastes will not become one big problem have not been adequately backed up by data being made available to the public.  Full disclosure is needed."

SOURCE International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Missouri Jobs with Justice, and Missouri Coalition for the Environment

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