America's jobs policy shifts into neutral at a really bad time.
What I learned from a visit to the Senate for Lori-Chavez DeRemer's confirmation hearing to be Labor Secretary.
Once you get past the intra-GOP political cobra fight over maybe being friends with labor, the Democratic concerns about the richest man in the world and his 19-year-old sidekicks looking at your personal information and his competitors’ employment investigation records, Josh Hawley’s big charts, Bernie Sanders’ concerns about economic justice, Lisa Murkowski’s breakdown of the unique labor needs of the Alaskan seafood industry, Andy Kim’s worries about the cost of living for workers, the idea of whether the Secretary of Labor will tell the president he’s doing illegal things, whether everyone still likes apprenticeship (they do), whether sponsoring a major labor reform law is just a phase people go through in the House of Representatives, and Markwayne Mullin abruptly and repeatedly insisting you know what happens when an Oklahoma senator and the head of the Teamsters stop fighting and fall in love, here is the line you should take away from Lori Chavez-DeRemer’s Wednesday confirmation hearing to be Secretary of Labor:
“My priority has been clear,” said the former Oregon congresswoman, “to fight for the American worker and the businesses driving the economy.”
After four years of explicitly pro-worker, pro-union policy, and four years of courting big business before that, the Department of Labor under President Donald Trump is shifting into neutral.1
DOL is going to rally for the workers… so long as the businesses don’t hate it too much. Maybe. In both directions.