Coalition Keeps Fighting to Fix the Broken Senate and Ensure Confirmation of Democratic NLRB Members

Finally, there was action in the U.S. Senate this week on nominations to several important executive branch positions.

First up was Richard Cordray, who, after a two-year wait, was confirmed as director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau by a 66-32 vote.

Today, the Senate voted to confirm Tom Perez as Secretary of Labor by a 54-46 vote.

The Republican minority has blocked confirmations of Cordray, the administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency, the Secretary of Labor and the head of the Export-Import Bank, among others, but its strongest attack was waged against Democratic nominees to the National Labor Relations Board.

Majority Leader Harry Reid won agreement from the Republican minority that nominations to the NLRB will get to the Senate next Thursday, July 25, and that a full, functional Board will be confirmed before the Senate leaves for its August recess.

The White House has put forward two new Democratic nominees, to replace Sharon Block and Richard Griffin. CWA President Larry Cohen praised Block and Griffin as extremely qualified and criticized the relentless attack waged against them by Republicans for no reason other than "they answered President Obama's call to serve."

Cohen said that the Senate's action "does raise the question of the seven nominations: why were two nominees to the National Labor Relations Board singled out?"

Senator Lindsay Graham, one of the loudest opponents of the NLRB, has said he will likely vote to confirm the new NLRB nominees.

"President Obama will nominate two good candidates to the NLRB who will stand up for the workplace rights of 80 million working Americans. We also commend Majority Leader Reid and most of the Senate Democratic majority for standing with President Obama and working to move all these nominations forward," Cohen said.

"Our main goal was to move all these nominations forward, and this agreement encourages us that we can move toward a 21st century democracy when we build a broad coalition like Fix the Senate Now to mobilize Americans and make sure their voices are heard."

Listen to President Cohen on the Ed Schultz radio show.