Houston, We Have A Fox-Chicken Problem…

September 20, 2017

While the new headlines are all about Hurricanes, health care, North Korea and tax “reform,” chickens around the country are getting more and more nervous as the foxes quietly move into the government agencies that are supposed to be protecting them.

Over at the Labor Department, Justin Miller in the American Prospect writes about how Labor Secretary Alex Acosta’s appointees all have one thing in common: A long history of representing business interests over workers. Pat Pizzella, who, along with Jack Abramoff, defended worker abuse in the Northern Mariana Islands, is slated to be Deputy Secretary, the number two position at Labor. We’ve already written about retired coal company executive David Zatezalo, Trump’s nominee to head MSHA.

Trump Stacks Labor Department with Friends of Big Business

JUSTIN MILLER SEPTEMBER 19, 2017

His appointees made their bones on the management side of the table.

When, amid scandal and scrutiny, the bombastic fast-food CEO Andy Puzder withdrew himself as President Trump’s nominee for secretary of labor back in February, worker advocates—who’d run an aggressive campaign to oppose him—let out a collective sigh of relief. As a vocal opponent of higher minimum wages and stronger labor laws, Puzder seemed the very antithesis of the Department of Labor’s mission of protecting workers.

Puzder has since moved on, frequenting cable news shows as a Trump booster, and is reportedly writing a book that attacks progressive policies and labor unions. Trump’s second choice, Alex Acosta, a relatively unknown conservative labor lawyer, was seen as a much milder alternative. Since confirmed, even with the fate of several major Obama-era labor regulations in the air, Acosta has maintained a low profile. But all that could soon change. Until now, Trump’s Labor Department staff has been skeletal, the consequence of the administration’s slowness in designating nominees, and the Republican-controlled Senate’s foot-dragging in holding confirmation hearings. But with the Senate now back in session and Trump finally naming nominees to fill out Labor’s roster, the department will likely kick into high gear soon—and once again become a source of anxiety for workers and their advocates.

If the people Trump has tapped for such key positions as overseeing mining safety, enforcing wage-and-hour laws, and guiding the department’s regulatory policy are any indication, the department will enthusiastically embrace industry priorities. Despite Trump’s campaign rhetoric that promised to bring a voice for workers into the White House, he is filling the DOL with lobbyists, anti-union activists, industry executives, and management-side lawyers who appear hell-bent on erasing the work of Obama’s Labor Department.