Radical NLRB Nominee Blocked in Senate

But President Obama Refuses to Back Down, Threatens ‘End Run’

(Source: March 2010 NRTWC Newsletter)

Ever since April 2009, when President Barack Obama first announced his intention to put radical Service Employees International Union (SEIU) lawyer Craig Becker on the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the National Right to Work Committee has led the charge against the nomination.

Even before the Becker nomination was formally submitted to the U.S. Senate last July, the Committee had posted on its web site a video “Becker Alert” sounding the alarm about his extremist views.

Subsequently, several business and citizen groups, as well as congressional staff members, used this video as evidence for why the nomination should be opposed.

“The Committee strongly opposed the Becker nomination from the outset. A number of other major groups have since enlisted in the fight,” noted Committee Vice President Doug Stafford.

“And last month, on February 9, Right to Work supporters and their allies scored a significant victory with the defeat in the Senate of a Big Labor-backed ‘cloture’ motion that would have ended debate on the Becker nomination, paving the way for its quick approval.”

Craig Becker: Union Monopoly Should Be Mandated, Even if Most Workers Don’t Want It

“Unfortunately, 52 senators, including all but two of the Democrats who cast ballots, voted to rubber-stamp this nomination,” Mr. Stafford cautioned. “However, this was eight votes fewer than the 60 needed to cut off Right to Work debate and bring the Becker nomination up for final consideration.

“If the Senate had confirmed Mr. Becker as part of a package along with the two other pending nominees for the five-member panel, he would very frequently have been in a position to cast the deciding vote in NLRB cases.

“The NLRB interprets and administers labor laws covering over 90% of businesses and private-sector employees. It is no place for a forced-unionism extremist.

“And that is surely what Craig Becker is. Over the years, he has publicly acknowledged believing that any employee or employer efforts to resist unionization of a workplace are unacceptable.

“For example, in one ‘labor studies’ journal article, Mr. Becker dismissed the notion that workers should have any say whatsoever, whether as individuals or collectively by secret ballot or ‘card check,’ over whether or not they are unionized.

“Federal policy should not acknowledge employees’ ‘choice to remain unrepresented,’ contended Mr. Becker.

“Their only choice, he explained, should be over which set of union officials get ‘exclusive’ power to negotiate their wages, benefits, and work rules.”

Richard Trumka Lays Down the Law For Obama White House

Top union bosses are furious that, because of well-mobilized opposition to Craig Becker’s radicalism, Big Labor Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) failed to muster the 60 votes he needed to win approval of the Becker nomination.

Now Richard Trumka, chief of the AFL-CIO union conglomerate, is urging union officials and union militants nationwide to contact the White House, “demanding” that the President circumvent the Senate and install Craig Becker on the NLRB temporarily through a “recess” appointment.

And the White House has already suggested that, if the Senate does not submit to the President by bringing up the Becker nomination again and giving it the green light by the end of this month, Mr. Obama will in fact recess appoint Mr. Becker as soon as the Senate commences the break scheduled for March 29.

“In the past, Presidents have rarely granted recess appointments to nominees who have already come up for consideration in the Senate, and failed to be approved,” noted Mr. Stafford.

“But President Obama has already demonstrated he is extraordinarily eager to please Big Labor bosses. That’s why a recess appointment of Craig Becker is a strong possibility.”