Minutes ago, the US Senate confirmed Hilda Solis by an 80-17 vote to be the Secretary of Labor. This is a big victory for progressives to fight conservative obstructionism and get a real friend to the labor movement in a top position in Barack Obama's cabinet. It was an unnecessarily long fight, but this is a great resolution. In addition, with Solis having authored the Green Jobs Act, she will undoubtedly be a force for making sure jobs in the alternative energy sector are good union jobs that pay a living wage.
This also means that there will shortly, perhaps as soon as tomorrow, be a vacancy in the 32nd District seat. There are three main candidates for the seat thus far, all of whom have already begun campaigning.
Judy Chu is currently on the Board of Equalization. While a Chinese-American running for a seat that is majority Latino, Chu has the support of the California Federation of Labor, which typically cleans up in these kinds of special elections. That alone makes her the favorite IMO.
Gil Cedillo is a State Senator in the adjoining district, and so he represents very few of these constituents. He has been strong on issues around immigration in particular, and will certainly be formidable in this race.
Emanuel Pleitez worked in the Obama transition team on the Treasury Department. The fact that Treasury has practically no senior officers staffing it save for Tim Geithner, over a month after the inauguration, doesn't really speak well to Pleitez' transition capabilities. But he apparently has the most robust campaign apparatus in the district thus far (with 17 volunteer full-time staff members), and he was born and raised in the district.
We invite every single one of them to interact with us on Calitics.
The most likely scenario is that either the primary or the general election gets folded into the May 19 special election. Gov. Schwarzenegger has 14 calendar days to set the schedule.
It was a long struggle with a somewhat anti-climactic resolution, but Hilda Solis was approved by the Senate HELP Committee (Health, Education, Labor and Pensions) on a voice vote. Today over 20,000 petition signatures were delivered to the leaders of the HELP Committee by SEIU, UFW, UFCW, Change to Win and the Courage Campaign, and those voices were heard.
Now the confirmation moves to the full Senate for a vote, where it will hopefully be approved in short order. Sometimes we win one.
After waiting and waiting, labor groups are finally demanding that Hilda Solis be confirmed as the Secretary of Labor. Andy Stern of the SEIU made a short video:
"Enough is enough, the gloves are coming off on Friday," said one official with the AFL-CIO, outraged over the delays. "Labor, women's groups, Hispanic groups are opening fire. We worked with Republicans in good faith. Hilda Solis has answered all their questions but they continue to oppose her for partisan ideological reasons."
With Solis's nomination stalled again on Thursday after revelations that her husband had just settled $6,400 in tax leins against his business, unions are no longer willing to hold their breath for the sake of fewer dramatics.
"Our full efforts are being mobilized to fight back," the union official said. "Earned media and field campaign to generate calls, letters, and emails coming tomorrow. Depending on how things move paid media will be added on top of these efforts."
Good to see. Progressive groups like MoveOn should get Hilda's back, too.
UPDATE: Our old friend Hans von Spakovsky, vote suppressor extraordinaire, is writing anti-Solis screeds in places like The Weekly Standard.
UPDATE II: MoveOn jumps in with a letter to the editor tool.
Hilda Solis's confirmation in the Senate HELP Committee was abruptly cancelled today after a report surfaced about her husband paying $6,400 to remove a tax lien on his business.
The report, by USA Today, came just before the Senate's Health Education Labor and Pensions Committee was slated to meet to consider Solis's nomination, which had been delayed by questions over her role on the board of the pro-labor organization American Rights at Work. A source said that committee members did not learn about the tax issue until today.
"Today's executive session was postponed to allow members additional time to review the documentation submitted in support of Representative Solis's nomination to serve in the important position of Labor Secretary," read a joint statement issued by Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), the panel's chairman, and Mike Enzi (Wyoming), the committee's ranking Republican. "There are no holds on her nomination and members on both sides of the aisle remain committed to giving her nomination the fair and thorough consideration that she deserves. We will continue to work together to move this nomination forward as soon as possible."
No new date has been set for the hearing. The disclosure about Solis's husband comes after tax problems caused trouble for three of Obama's top appointees, leading two of them -- HHS-nominee Tom Daschle and Nancy Killefer, who was to be chief performance officer -- to withdraw.
Senate Republicans have been slow-walking this nomination for weeks, and this revelation gave them another reason to do so. To be clear, we're talking about her husband's business. Given that she's in Congress and is in Washington most of the time, I doubt very highly that she has anything to do with it. In addition, by paying the taxes, Solis and her entire family are adhering to Obama's ethical standards, not subverting them.
So this is the latest in a months-long obstructionism. The LA Times reported today that some GOP members were trying to put a gag order on Solis:
Underscoring the bitter debate over a proposal to make it easier for workers to form unions, Republican senators are suggesting that President Obama's pick for Labor secretary must recuse herself from lobbying for the bill's passage.
In a written exchange with Solis, Republican senators indicated they are wary of her ties to a tax-exempt group dedicated to helping workers unionize [...]
Solis' Cabinet nomination is in the crossfire. She was a co-sponsor of the bill in 2007 and has served for the last four years on the board of American Rights at Work. Solis receives no salary as a board member or treasurer [...]
In their questionnaire, the senators noted that American Rights at Work has lobbied for passage of the bill. They asked Solis whether she would seek a waiver from the Obama administration or avoid any role in passing the legislation.
Solis replied that she does not need a waiver and has no intention of stepping back. She said she was only a member of Congress exercising her powers.
"I am not a registered lobbyist, nor do I in any way meet the statutory requirements for registration as a lobbyist," she wrote.
The American Rights at Work thing is a complete red herring. She was a representative figure for those who supported Employee Free Choice in Congress. She is not a lobbyist. She supported a bill. And so denying her free-speech rights seems ridiculous to the extreme.
I don't know if a family member's tax issue is enough to sink this nomination (like the last Labor Secretary's spouse, one Mitch McConnell, has no ethical issues to speak of), but I for one think Solis should be confirmed. And as for the Employee Free Choice Act, the battle for a fair workplace goes on. Thousands of people are marching in the streets of Los Angeles today in support of free choice.
So after huffing and puffing for weeks, Arlen Specter got what he wanted out of the Eric Holder nomination hearings (his main potential primary opponent declined to run against him) and decided to back the Attorney General nominee. After all the talk of principle and judgment, it just took improved electoral prospects for Specter to have a change of heart. Funny how that goes.
But there's another nominee that is languishing, perhaps the only true progressive in Obama's cabinet, and many of us would like to know why. Greg Sargent at his new digs reports on Hilda Solis' nomination:
Why hasn't Hilda Solis been confirmed as Labor Secretary yet, and why haven't we heard from the unions or from the Obama administration about it?
Some top operatives in the labor movement are frustrated with the Obama administration for not giving them the go-ahead to publicly target Republicans who appear to be stalling Solis' confirmation, people in the labor movement familiar with the situation tell me.
The silence from Obama aides on Solis is ominous to some labor officials, because they view the Republican efforts to hold up Solis as a first shot in the larger coming war over the Employee Free Choice Act, a top labor priority. Some labor officials worry that the Obama administration's refusal to make an issue of the hold-up on Solis is a sign that the Obama team won't act aggressively on Employee Free Choice.
"The anonymous hold on Solis is a clear proxy fight for Employee Free Choice," says a top operative at a prominent union. "And from the Obama Adminisitration ... crickets."
I'm not really much for forcible identity politics, but some Latino leaders are making noises that a Hispanic ought to replace Bill Richardson (who withdrew his nomination) as the Secretary of Commerce, making the argument that the Latino population must maintain its representation in the Administration. I'd prefer the best man or woman for the job, but this is a case where there already is a Hispanic who Obama considered for a separate cabinet appointment who may be able to be persuaded into accepting this one. That would be Xavier Becerra.
An Obama transition team source said a veteran California congressman, Xavier Becerra, has emerged as the leading congressional candidate to replace Richardson, the Hispanic governor of New Mexico, as President-elect Barack Obama's choice for a job that will include overseeing the 2010 U.S. Census.
"Even though he turned down the trade representative slot, Becerra is not only Hispanic, but he has the skill, talent and experience to do the Commerce job," said the source, who was not authorized to speak for the president-elect.
"Xavier's name has gone to the top of the list of potential replacements in part because he is a member of the House leadership, he is well liked, he has very good credentials, and, of course, he was an early Obama backer," the source said.
It's all speculative at the moment, but I wouldn't be surprised if this happened. Becerra wanted a bigger role in the Administration than trade representative, and certainly the Commerce Department would give him a better opportunity to shape White House policy.
Obviously this would create another special election in an adjoining district to incoming Labor Secretary Hilda Solis' CA-32. Los Angeles County from Hollywood to points east would be ground zero for political wrangling this spring.
Xavier Becerra is not considering an appointment to become Secretary of Commerce and will remain in the House, his spokeswoman told Politico.
"The Congressman has already expressed that he is staying in Congress and looks forward to working with the Obama Administration from his position as House Democratic Vice Chair," said Fabiola Rodriguez.
One election is over, the next one is coming ever closer with one Presidential hopeful (or wannabe) announcing after another.
You may say it's way too premature to discuss a possible Democratic cabinet with more than two years to go. But hey: we have a tough and largely successful election behind us. Let's just have a little fun for now.
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