Department of Labor

Labor Secretary Admits Union Bias

by Vincent Vernuccio on March 1, 2011 · 1 comment

in Features, Labor, Zeitgeist

Post image for Labor Secretary Admits Union Bias

Speaking to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) Winter Meeting in Washington, D.C., over the weekend, Labor Secretary Hilda Solis admitted she was biased toward unions. Unions only account for 11.9 percent of the workforce, but Solis’ favoritism puts them ahead of the other 88 percent of the American workers.

From the Washington Examiner:

President Obama is staying mostly quiet about the union battle going on in Wisconsin. His labor secretary, Hilda Solis, is not.

“The fight is on!” Solis told a cheering crowd at the Democratic National Committee’s winter meeting over the weekend in Washington. Giving her support to “our brothers and sisters in public employee unions,” Solis pledged aid to unionized workers who are “under assault” in Wisconsin and elsewhere.

It’s no surprise Solis sympathizes with the unions against Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s budget reform proposal. After all, Solis often tells audiences how proud she is that her father was a Teamsters shop steward and her mother belonged to the United Steelworkers union. “Admittedly, I am a little biased,” she told the DNC, “because … I come from a union household.”

But is it the role of the secretary of labor to take sides in a fight that pits public employee union members against workers and taxpayers who support Walker’s reforms? After all, the Labor Department mission statement says its purpose is “to foster, promote, and develop the welfare of the wage earners, job seekers, and retirees of the United States.” It doesn’t say anything about unionized wage earners, job seekers, and retirees.

“The Labor Department should not represent only that part of the work force that is unionized,” says Elaine Chao, labor secretary under George W. Bush. “It should be responsible for the overall welfare of the entire American work force.”

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Obama’s Labor Department Again Pushes Forced Unionism

by Russ Brown on November 11, 2010

in Labor, Regulation

You are at work one day and a couple of police vehicles pull up. They go into the administrative office area and the next thing you know, your CEO is escorted out in handcuffs. While the local news crews are capturing the moment permanently, a buzz quickly circulates through the company that the union had him arrested for egregious corporate corruption. The “perp walk” is reserved for hardened criminals in order to give our law enforcement agencies an opportunity to showcase their abilities to protect the public. Always gaining headlines are white-collar arrests where  CEOs get put on display. Think Madoff or Lay. Company leaders beware! Thanks to the Department of Labor (DOL), unions may soon have a new tool to coerce your company into forced unionism — and it may mean you go to jail. The kicker under the new rules proposed by the DOL: this can take place all because of a water-cooler conversation of which the CEO is unaware.

On election day while everyone else was watching the results, the DOL began the process of reinterpreting rules from the Labor Management Disclosure and Reporting Act concerning persuader activity. It seems that the Solis DOL has decided that the current practice is overly broad and wants to narrow the scope. The reinterpretation will require more reporting for companies, their lawyers, and consultants.

The Labor Management Disclosure and Reporting, also known as Landrum-Griffin Act (1959) came as a result of wide spread corruption throughout union leadership ranks. Remember seeing old black-and-white clips of Jimmy Hoffa, Sr. — then president of the Teamsters Union — pleading the Fifth Amendment more than a hundred times during congressional hearings? As a result, Congress passed the above legislation forcing unions to start reporting how they spend the money they receive from member dues. In addition, it also required companies, law firms, and consultants to report their activities and expenditures used to persuade employees to vote against a union in a campaign. The latter is covered under section 203 of the LMDRA, and this is the section that the Solis Department of Labor is moving to reinterpret and/or make rule changes to cause the above scenario to take place.

Here is what Joe Brock, former Teamster organizer and local president, had to say about the proposed rule change:

Armed with this tool, I would use this threat to my fullest capability. Just as I used the Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) charge against employers when they would fire an employee, ANY employee with or without cause, I would be able to use this tool in such a fashion. However, this would be a much more effective deterrent as employers would soon fear any conversation with employees, no matter how innocuous.

It has long been a requirement for consultants and law firms who meet directly with employees during a union campaign for the purpose of influencing their vote against the petitioning union to report that time. This is called “Persuader Activity” and can be generalized as “if an employee hears it, reads it or sees it, it has to be reported per section 203(b) of the LMDRA.”  There are some advice exemptions, however, that may change in this reinterpretation and or rule change as well. The problem with the advice exemption change is this could force law firms to report all advice to all of the firm’s clients no matter if it falls within the campaign that is relative or not. These new requirement simply thumbs its nose at attorney-client privilege. For example if a law firm does labor law for 100 clients but only does persuader work for one. The law firm would be responsible for reporting on all 100 clients.

Under section 203(e) of the LMDRA it clearly states that officers and supervisors of a company do not have to report their persuader activities during a union campaign. This is the change that triggers the above scenario. The change will require companies to report all conversations that management has with employees about the unions. Dave Bego, President of Executive Management Service and author of the book Devil at My Doorstep, states, “If the Department of Labor makes this rule change unions will use it to entrap companies and force neutrality agreements.” Bego is very familiar with neutrality agreements (forced unionism), as the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) laid siege to his company during a three-year corporate campaign trying to coerce his company into a union shop.

Another aspect of this rule change that not many have connected the dots to is the Sarbanes-Oxley Act 2002. As you recall, Sarbanes-Oxley was enacted in the wake of the Enron implosion, when Congress tightened accounting regulations. Where it applies here is that publicly traded companies must report on their 10K filings to the Securities Exchange Commission any potential criminal liabilities. With the statements of the former union organizer, we would speculate that publicly traded companies will be regulated into more liability. Essentially, this makes every company that is non-union responsible to report potential criminal claims based on unfounded allegations.

This move by the DOL is another example of the current administration attempting to make good on their payback promise to the unions — pushing through regulation what they could not through legislation. These particular changes will have adverse consequence the nations businesses, small and large, and the workers they employ.

An Unpaid Internship at the White House

by Brian McGraw on September 27, 2010 · 2 comments

in Labor, Regulation

@whitehouse on Twitter alerted me this morning that applications for internships at the White House are due by October 3. I couldn’t help but look at the details, all the while reminded by a quote from the satirical stuffwhitepeoplelike.com:

White people view the internship as their foot into the door to such high-profile low-paying career fields as journalism, film, politics, art, non-profits, and anything associated with a museum. Any white person who takes an internship outside of these industries is either the wrong type of white person or a law student. There are no exceptions.

If all goes according to plan, an internship will end with an offer of a job that pays $24,000 per year and will consist entirely of the same tasks they were recently doing for free. In fact, the transition to full time status results in the addition of only one new responsibility: feeling superior to the new interns.

When all is said and done, the internship process serves the white community in many ways. First, it helps to train the next generation of freelance writers, museum curators, and director’s assistants. But more importantly, internships teach white children how to complain about being poor.

I really went to check the internship to see if it was paid. The government support of unpaid (or underpaid) internships, of which many thousands come through government offices every year, makes a mockery of minimum wage laws. I was not disappointed, the internship is full-time and unpaid.

Earlier this year, there was a small uproar over the increase in unpaid internships. Naturally, with firms struggling to stay afloat, they were more than willing to allow recent college graduates to work for them, gaining much needed experience — but not much money.

The Department of Labor released a statement on the legality of unpaid internships. It speaks for itself:

The following six criteria must be applied when making this determination:

  1. The internship, even though it includes actual operation of the facilities of the employer, is similar to training which would be given in an educational environment;
  2. The internship experience is for the benefit of the intern;
  3. The intern does not displace regular employees, but works under close supervision of existing staff;
  4. The employer that provides the training derives no immediate advantage from the activities of the intern; and on occasion its operations may actually be impeded;
  5. The intern is not necessarily entitled to a job at the conclusion of the internship; and
  6. The employer and the intern understand that the intern is not entitled to wages for the time spent in the internship.

For an internship to be compliant with the DoL, the intern must not add any actual value to the company, and interns are encouraged at times to get in the way.

Unfortunately, a little note at the bottom states that this doesn’t apply to non-profits or the public sector. The demonization of the “for-profit” side of society continues, and the White House is safe from the legal wrath of the Department of Labor.

But seriously, with the amount of money you guys spend each year, you couldn’t even scrape together a small stipend?

More Questions about Solis

by Ivan Osorio on February 6, 2009 · 2 comments

in Economy, Labor, Politics as Usual

Today’s Washington Examiner proposes some questions which Senators should ask Obama Labor Secretary nominee Hilda Solis.

Solis is treasurer and a member of the board of directors of American Rights at Work (ARW), the 501c4, non-profit group that has received at least $1 million in contributions from labor unions. ARW spent more than $230,000 in 2007 and 2008 lobbying Congress on two bills Solis actively co-sponsored – the Employee Free Choice Act and the Public Safety Employer/Employee Cooperation Act. Both bills are top priorities for labor bosses who spent in excess of $300 million electing Democrats to Congress in 2008. Solis failed to note her role as ARW treasurer on her congressional disclosure reports, as she is required to do under House rules. As treasurer, she was required by IRS rules to account for all spending by the group, so her role was hardly ceremonial or passive, as claimed by her supporters.

But ARW also spent thousands of dollars on television spots described by the group in its report to the FEC as “electioneering communications.” Since as treasurer, Solis is required to approve all ARW spending, she must have signed off on the spots. This may well put her and ARW in violation of the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act of 2002. Among the Republicans targeted by ARW were incumbents Norm Coleman, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, Gordon Smith, and John Sununu.

Hardly the kind of thing to make Republican Senators feel charitable toward her.

But ethics rules and possible conflicts of interest aside, Solis’s close involvement with ARW alone should make her ability to carry out her job in an impartial manner suspect (as I’ve noted previously).

For more on the Solis nomination, see here, here, here, and here.

For Obama, No Solace in Solis

by Ivan Osorio on February 5, 2009 · 1 comment

in Economy, Labor, Politics as Usual

This afternoon, the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee abruptly canceled a session to consider the nomination of Rep. Hilda Solis (D-Calif.) for Labor Secretary, after USA Today reported that her husband paid $6,400 to settle tax liens yesterday. As embarrassing as this is to the Obama administration, coming on the heels of two nominations being sunk over tax problems, Solis’s nomination should be of concern for other reasons. As The Washington Post‘s Michael Fletcher notes, her nomination “had been delayed by questions over her role on the board of the pro-labor organization American Rights at Work.”

American Rights at Work’s website still lists her as a board member. That is no small thing. Her membership on the board, combined with her voting record and campaign donation history, should raise serious doubts regarding her ability to consider disputes involving labor unions in an impartial fashion.

For more on the Solis nomination, see here, here, and here.

Apparent Hold on Solis Nomination

by Ivan Osorio on January 26, 2009 · 2 comments

in Deregulate to Stimulate, Economy, Labor

The confirmation of Rep. Hilda Solis (D-Calif.) as Labor Secretary has run into an unexpected delay, as an unidentified Republican senator appears to have placed a hold on her nomination. That may not prevent her nomination, since presidents get fairly wide latitude in cabinet appointments. Still, as a Las Vegas Review-Journal editorial notes today, Republican senators are right to ask more questions:

Sen. Mike Enzi of Wyoming, ranking Republican on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, has been outspoken in his criticism of Rep. Solis’ testimony in her confirmation hearing, focusing his criticism on her responses concerning the “card check” bill that would allow unions to bypass secret ballot elections in their attempts to win recognition as collective bargaining agents — a change which organized labor has made a high priority.

Asked Thursday whether he was satisfied with the answers given to date by Rep. Solis — who voted for the so-called Employee Free Choice Act in the House in 2007 — Sen. Enzi replied, “What answers? She doesn’t even recognize her own record when giving the answers.”

The Los Angles Times, in its story on Solis’s hearing, features video of her handling of the EFCA question. That Solis would support President Obama’s positions — which unions largely support — does not disqualify her from the position. But her record does put some burden on her to demonstrate that she will not act as a mere advocate for organized labor within the federal government. Moreover, as the Review-Journal‘s editors note, lawmakers should also ponder the consequences of the Obama labor agenda on the broader economy.

President Obama has said repeatedly that fast action is needed to shore up a teetering economy. Frankly, much that has been proposed — blocking asset transfers from failed firms to new entrepreneurs more likely to create productive, long-term jobs, instead seizing more private wealth to fund government make-work boondoggles — is as unwise now as it was in 1933.

But in this economic climate, with each week producing a new empty parking lot with plywood on the windows, do the geniuses in Washington really mean to create a situation where business owners already struggling to stay afloat can without warning be handed their “last straw” — a stack of cards adorned with the message, “You’re now a union shop; here are our demands”?

For more on card check, see here and here.

Solis: Could have been worse…but not much

by Ivan Osorio on December 18, 2008 · 1 comment

in Bailout Watch, Economy, International, Politics as Usual, Tech & Telecom

According to the Associated Press, President-elect Barack Obama is about to name Rep. Hilda Solis (D-Calif.) as Secretary of Labor. If Rep. Solis’s voting record is any guide to how she plans to run the Department, it is not encouraging — it consistently shows her voting in favor of greater government spending programs  favored by organized labor (including the auto maker bailout).

In addition, her apparent closeness to organized labor should be cause for concern. Labor unions, which she should be tasked with overseeing, are among her biggest campaign contributors. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, during the last election cycle, her top four donors — and 14 of her top 21 donors — were labor unions. Her relationships with union leaders are a legitimate topic that Senators should address in her confirmation hearing.

Rep. Solis’s voting record is ranked at:

So how could it have been worse? If Obama had actually named Mary Beth Maxwell, who heads the pro-union lobby group American Rights at Work, and whose name had been floated prior to today. Maxwell is a professional pro-union advocate whose organization agitates for the kind of labor regulation that has brought the Detroit Big Three (as well as some steel companies and airlines) to their current dire state — hardly what the American economy needs at this time.

So maybe the talk about Maxwell should make us thankful for small favors — very small favors. But American workers should hold on to their wallets just the same. If Rep. Solis’s labor allies were to have their way, more and more workers would be paying compulsory union dues — which then go on to support candidates the union leaders favor.