Executive Calendar

Floor Speech

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Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to oppose in the strongest terms the nomination of Patrick Pizzella as Deputy Secretary of Labor.

With this nomination President Trump is once again breaking his promise to put workers first. Mr. Pizzella has a record that is time and again at odds with the goals of the very Department he would help to lead as Deputy Secretary. His track record is one of not merely failing workers but of failing to enforce laws to protect the health and safety of workers, seeking to diminish workers' rights and protections, and undermining the unions that represent and fight for them.

In fact, his record includes working with convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff on behalf of causes that are counter to the mission of the Department of Labor.

In the 1990s, Congress was moving to expand labor and immigration protections to the Northern Marianas Islands, a U.S. Territory, to end the operation of sweatshops that did not follow Federal labor laws. The law at the time let companies bring in foreign workers to toil under inhumane conditions. The workers were underpaid. They were forced to sign contracts signing away their rights to protest labor conditions, and some were even coerced to have abortions.

The companies operating under these inhumane conditions were able to print the words ``Made in the U.S.A.'' on their products.

While Congress was looking to take action to change the law so we could better protect workers, Pizzella was working with Abramoff to coordinate all-expense-paid trips for dozens of Republican lawmakers and staff and seeking to maintain the sweatshop status quo.

Patrick Pizzella chose not to work for workers but for corporations. These efforts are not just counter to the mission of the Department of Labor, they are counter to our national values.

The rest of Mr. Pizzella's record shows that he has taken equally extreme positions throughout his career. Take, for example, his radical record as the sole employee of the Conservative Action Project, a far- right group funded by billionaire donors like the DeVos family, or his record when he last served in the Department of Labor. Under his leadership, the Department of Labor cut its budget in part by cutting down its own employees' collective bargaining rights and decreasing official time.

Then there is his long record championing anti-union policies and arguing to limit collective bargaining rights.

At the Federal Labor Relations Authority, Pizzella not only ruled consistently against workers and unions, but he repeatedly broke with longstanding policy by calling out the names of individual workers in his decisions. He chose to call out defendants by name and put them in the public spotlight. The pattern of Mr. Pizzella's anti-worker ideology is clearly unchanged today. Throughout his career, Mr. Pizzella's record has been alarmingly consistent. From his years serving as the right hand to Jack Abramoff until now, he has shown that he is not going to fight for workers. He will fight against them.

It would be irresponsible to put a man with such a strong track record of anti-worker conviction a tweet away from leading the Department of Labor. It is unconscionable that someone of Mr. Pizzella's background would be the No. 2 leader at the Department of Labor. It is unacceptable that he could be in line to serve as Acting Secretary should Secretary Acosta leave the Department.

I strongly oppose his nomination. I will be voting against him, and I encourage our colleagues to do the same.

Thank you, Mr. President.

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