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Unions More Optimistic About Bush’s Second Labor Pick
With an unpopular candidate out of the running, CWA President Morton Bahr and other labor leaders reacted with cautious optimism in January to the nomination of Elaine Chao as U.S. labor secretary.
Leaders said Chao is less hostile to workers’ concerns than George W. Bush’s first nominee, Linda Chavez, a hard-line conservative who opposes affirmative action, federal minimum wage increases and bilingual education, among other controversial stands.
Chavez faced a tough fight from labor unions and civil rights groups, whose leaders vowed to defeat her nomination. She angrily stepped down Jan. 9 when it was revealed that she paid an undocumented worker living in her house to do household chores, a violation of federal law.
Chao, past head of the Peace Corps and United Way, is being praised for her integrity and experience. Bahr, who served on the selection committee that chose her as United Way’s president in 1992, said she has strong leadership skills and is able to “bring together diverse interests.”
“I believe she will be responsive to the needs of working families,” he said in a public statement. “We look forward to working with her.”
That wasn’t the case with Chavez, whose nomination drew widespread fire from every quarter except business groups, which supported her eagerly.
“We’re very concerned about her appointment to a position that entrusts her with enforcing federal laws that protect the interests, rights and safety of American workers,” Bahr said, after Bush nominated her in early January.
AFL-CIO President John Sweeney said Chavez’s selection was “an insult” to workers. “Taken together with the nominations of John Ashcroft (attorney general) and Gale Norton (Interior secretary), the tapping of Chavez sounds a noisy alarm about President-elect Bush’s intended stewardship of civil rights, women’s rights, workers’ rights and the environment,” he said.
Chavez, a syndicated newspaper columnist, decried the 1996 federal minimum wage increase as “bad policy,” even though the value of the minimum wage was at a 40-year low. She supports allowing states to “opt-out” of future federal increases.
She also has criticized the Labor Depart-ment for requiring states to ensure that welfare recipients get the equivalent of the minimum wage when they work in community service programs in exchange for benefits.
She opposes overtime protections, supporting a Republican proposal to eliminate the 40-hour workweek. She fought against the Family and Medical Leave Act, claiming it would “devastate” the economy, and has attacked the Americans with Disabilities Act, calling it a “haven for everyone from scam artists to disgruntled workers.”
Unions are another favorite target. Writing about the American Medical Association’s vote to consider organizing, she said it “ought to strike fear in the heart of every American. The last time … a group of ‘professionals’ decided to form a union (the National Education Association), they nearly wrecked their profession.”
At a news conference to withdraw her name, Chavez claimed she was a victim of “the politics of personal destruction” and said she “would have made a great secretary of labor.”
Chao doesn’t carry the same type of baggage as Chavez, though she is clearly a conservative. She is married to Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), whose voting record on worker and working-family issues is strictly pro-business. An AFL-CIO chart of voting records lists him as earning straight W’s — as in “wrong” — over the last four years.
Chao immigrated to the United States from Taiwan when she was eight years old. A Harvard graduate, she served in the senior Bush administration as deputy transportation secretary. Presently, she is a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think thank.
Publicly, Chao pledged to build on relationships she has had for years with labor leaders. Among the first people she called after being nominated Jan. 11 were Sweeney and Bahr.
In accepting the nomination, Chao promised to “protect, nurture and develop our nation’s most precious resource, and that’s America’s working men and women.”
Leaders said Chao is less hostile to workers’ concerns than George W. Bush’s first nominee, Linda Chavez, a hard-line conservative who opposes affirmative action, federal minimum wage increases and bilingual education, among other controversial stands.
Chavez faced a tough fight from labor unions and civil rights groups, whose leaders vowed to defeat her nomination. She angrily stepped down Jan. 9 when it was revealed that she paid an undocumented worker living in her house to do household chores, a violation of federal law.
Chao, past head of the Peace Corps and United Way, is being praised for her integrity and experience. Bahr, who served on the selection committee that chose her as United Way’s president in 1992, said she has strong leadership skills and is able to “bring together diverse interests.”
“I believe she will be responsive to the needs of working families,” he said in a public statement. “We look forward to working with her.”
That wasn’t the case with Chavez, whose nomination drew widespread fire from every quarter except business groups, which supported her eagerly.
“We’re very concerned about her appointment to a position that entrusts her with enforcing federal laws that protect the interests, rights and safety of American workers,” Bahr said, after Bush nominated her in early January.
AFL-CIO President John Sweeney said Chavez’s selection was “an insult” to workers. “Taken together with the nominations of John Ashcroft (attorney general) and Gale Norton (Interior secretary), the tapping of Chavez sounds a noisy alarm about President-elect Bush’s intended stewardship of civil rights, women’s rights, workers’ rights and the environment,” he said.
Chavez, a syndicated newspaper columnist, decried the 1996 federal minimum wage increase as “bad policy,” even though the value of the minimum wage was at a 40-year low. She supports allowing states to “opt-out” of future federal increases.
She also has criticized the Labor Depart-ment for requiring states to ensure that welfare recipients get the equivalent of the minimum wage when they work in community service programs in exchange for benefits.
She opposes overtime protections, supporting a Republican proposal to eliminate the 40-hour workweek. She fought against the Family and Medical Leave Act, claiming it would “devastate” the economy, and has attacked the Americans with Disabilities Act, calling it a “haven for everyone from scam artists to disgruntled workers.”
Unions are another favorite target. Writing about the American Medical Association’s vote to consider organizing, she said it “ought to strike fear in the heart of every American. The last time … a group of ‘professionals’ decided to form a union (the National Education Association), they nearly wrecked their profession.”
At a news conference to withdraw her name, Chavez claimed she was a victim of “the politics of personal destruction” and said she “would have made a great secretary of labor.”
Chao doesn’t carry the same type of baggage as Chavez, though she is clearly a conservative. She is married to Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), whose voting record on worker and working-family issues is strictly pro-business. An AFL-CIO chart of voting records lists him as earning straight W’s — as in “wrong” — over the last four years.
Chao immigrated to the United States from Taiwan when she was eight years old. A Harvard graduate, she served in the senior Bush administration as deputy transportation secretary. Presently, she is a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think thank.
Publicly, Chao pledged to build on relationships she has had for years with labor leaders. Among the first people she called after being nominated Jan. 11 were Sweeney and Bahr.
In accepting the nomination, Chao promised to “protect, nurture and develop our nation’s most precious resource, and that’s America’s working men and women.”