Biden renominates Julie Su for labor secretary after prior confirmation bumps

Nominees for Senate-confirmed government positions often prepare for hearings by undertaking “murder board” sessions, with White House aides playing lawmakers asking tough and adversarial questions.

There’s no real need to hold another practice session for labor secretary nominee Julie Su, whom President Joe Biden has indicated that he plans on renominating for the Cabinet post. Su already has plenty of experience testifying before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, or HELP, Committee. The panel last year considered her nomination but returned it to the White House without a vote, rejecting what critics called a far-left “social justice” activist record, among other concerns.

SINEMA’S ROLE AS BIPARTISAN DEAL-MAKER TESTED IN BORDER TALKS: ‘SHE IS AT THE EPICENTER’

“Since Ms. Su failed to receive a floor vote, President Biden will have to renominate her in 2024 or nominate a new candidate,” said Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA), ranking member on the HELP Committee, in a Dec. 20 statement. “Ms. Su’s nomination lasted 281 days, the longest a cabinet-level nominee has waited without a floor vote when the same party controls the White House and the Senate.”

Cassidy urged Biden to find a different labor secretary nominee after she endured criticism not only from a unified block of Senate HELP Committee Republicans but also from some Democratic members.

Opposition from centrist figures such as Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) stems from Su’s tenure at California’s Labor and Workforce Development Agency. She drew controversy for pushing the state’s AB 5 legislation that attempted to restrict independent contracting. The Department of Labor is considering a similar rule at the federal level.

As Cassidy noted, the White House, which has to resubmit nominations the Senate did not approve in the calendar year, sent papers to the Senate on Jan. 3, followed by renomination papers on Jan. 8.

Biden needs only a simple majority in the Senate to get Su confirmed, but with Republicans and some centrist Democrats opposed, he has used a loophole to keep her on indefinitely. Su has been serving as acting labor secretary since last March, when then-Labor Secretary Marty Walsh resigned to become executive director of the NHL Players’ Association.

Su’s extended tenure as acting labor secretary has drawn some Republican criticism, though it’s an extension, if an extreme one, of executive branch tactics used during the Trump administration. The Washington Post reported on Feb. 21, 2020, “To this point in his presidency, Trump has kept acting officials in charge of top agencies and departments so much that they’ve accounted for 1 out of every 9 days in those positions. Across 22 Cabinet-level jobs, acting officials have served a total of 2,736 days — more than seven years of combined time.”

Sohn-Rise, Sohn-Set for a Past Repeat Biden Administration Nominee
The Biden White House plans to renominate Su for labor secretary as its political operation, to the degree there’s a difference, kicks into high gear for the 2024 campaign and an expected rematch against former President Donald Trump. Labor unions are key to Democratic voter turnout operations, so the Su renomination holds important symbolic, along with substantive policy value for the party.

Secretary of labor is one of the most politically sensitive jobs in the Democratic universe. West Wing President Jed Bartlet’s White House chief of staff, Leo McGarry, was previously labor secretary in a previous fictional Democratic administration.

In real life, though, the Biden administration has a mixed record on how hard it is to push for nominees who meet Senate headwinds.

Neera Tanden in 2021 had to withdraw her nomination to head the Office of Management and Budget after concerns were raised about her partisan rhetoric, leadership style, and corporate donor ties as the longtime president and CEO of the Center of American Progress.

She instead became staff secretary, a White House role whose pedantic-sounding title belies its importance, as it involves directing paper flow to the president on nominations, treaties, memos, etc., which has profound policy and political implications. Tanden later became White House domestic policy adviser, a position that, like staff secretary, isn’t Senate confirmable.

The Biden White House has sometimes fought hard for administration nominees, even if the battle was ultimately futile.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

It waged a nearly year-and-a-half battle to get public interest advocate Gigi Sohn confirmed as one of five members of the Federal Communications Commission. Republicans criticized her activism for Democratic causes, online inflammatory remarks, and partnerships with select left-leaning groups.

The Biden administration sent Sohn’s nomination to the Senate several times. But last March, she withdrew her nomination despite heavy pushback after unsuccessful lobbying by the Biden administration to get her appointed as the FCC’s third Democratic commissioner. Manchin effectively put the political nail in Sohn’s nomination coffin by saying he would oppose her, making it difficult to win a majority in the narrowly divided Senate.