WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Democrats are unable to muscle through President Barack Obama's choice of a union attorney for the National Labor Relations Board, because one of their own has joined the Republicans to block the nomination.
The task for Democratic leaders, already made dicey by bad weather, turned more difficult when Sen. Ben Nelson, a conservative Nebraska Democrat, said Monday night he would join Republicans in opposing the lawyer, Craig Becker.
"Mr. Becker's previous statements strongly indicate that he would take an aggressive personal agenda to the NLRB, and that he would pursue a personal agenda there, rather than that of the administration," Nelson said in a statement.
"This is of great concern, considering that the board's main responsibility is to resolve labor disputes with an even and impartial hand. In addition, the nominee's statements fly in the face of Nebraska's Right to Work laws, which have been credited in part with our excellent business climate that has attracted employers and many good jobs to Nebraska," Nelson said.
Republicans have held up Becker's confirmation for months, saying they fear he would push an aggressive union agenda at the agency that referees labor disputes between unions and management.
Senate Democrats need 60 votes to clear a GOP procedural hurdle to advance Becker to final Senate confirmation. That's one more than the Democrats control since Republican Scott Brown of Massachusetts was sworn into office last week. That procedural vote had been scheduled for Monday, but was postponed until Tuesday because of the mid-Atlantic snowstorm over the weekend.
Late Tuesday, as another snowstorm loomed, Senate officials moved the vote earlier in the day so the few senators who had been able to get to the Capitol could cast their votes and leave.
The scuffle over Becker is part of a more heated conflict between business groups and unions over the Employee Free Choice Act or "card check" bill that would deny companies the right to demand an employee representation election before they have to recognize a union as a collective bargaining agent.
Becker, a lawyer for the AFL-CIO and the Service Employees International Union, has spoken favorably on card check. Some of his legal writings suggest that its goals could be accomplished by the NLRB without Congress having to pass the legislation.
Those writings alarmed the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which poured more than $1 million into television ads supporting Brown during the chaotic closing campaign days before Massachusetts' special election last month to fill the Senate seat of the late Edward M. Kennedy. The chamber is also allied with groups that launched an online petition urging Democratic leaders to postpone any votes until after Brown's swearing in.
Chamber executive vice president Bruce Josten called Becker's views "well outside the mainstream."
Becker and his supporters attempted last week to play down the writings as scholarly ruminations.
"I don't have any illusions that those important changes can somehow be accomplished administratively and neither does Craig Becker," said Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee.
For unions, Brown's surprise win in Massachusetts has been a frustrating setback.
"Republicans stalled Becker's nomination for five months and now accuse Democrats of trying to rush him through," said AFL-CIO legislative director Bill Samuel.
The tussle over Becker is also another setback for the NLRB, which has been waiting for more than two years with vacancies in three of its five seats. That has forced the agency to postpone hundreds of cases that could have a wider effect on the workplace.
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Associated Press writer Steve LeBlanc in Boston contributed to this report.
