Republicans and Democrats may have sat next to each other during President Obama’s State of the Union address, and Obama has made visible overtures to meet business groups halfway, but now it’s back to traditional battle lines as the political adversaries spar over Obama’s renomination of Craig Becker to a seat on the National Labor Relations Board.
Becker currently serves on the NLRB under a recess appointment, which means his appointment expires at the end of 2011. To keep him on the Board for a full term, Obama renominated him recently. To get a full term, Becker will have to submit to a Senate vote again. The first time he did that, the Republicans filibustered, so the full body never got to conduct an up-or-down vote on his nomination.
With more Republicans now in the Senate, odds of a successful filibuster grow even stronger.
And if the GOP pursues this course, they will have an ally in the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which vowed last week to fight the nomination just as it did in 2009 and 2010. The problem with Becker, according to the chamber, are his pro-union views, which in the chamber’s view, have led to pro-union rulings by the Board. Unions, of course, see these rulings are merely restoring a level playing field that had tilted too much toward management.
“We’ve now had a year to see what he [Becker] actually will do, and I think that kind of confirms some of our issues with this nominee,” said Glenn Spencer, an executive director for the chamber.
Yes, this is the same Chamber of Commerce that Obama has reached out to with more business-friendly moves, like the appointment of William Daley as chief of staff, extension of the Bush-era tax cuts, and other actions.
But nominations to federal positions are where many ideological battles are fought out these days, so don’t expect the Chamber or the Democrats to back down on this one.
