Issues of the Day

Floor Speech

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Mr. KILEY. Madam Speaker, I rise to encourage President Biden to withdraw the nomination of Julie Su for Secretary of Labor. At this pivotal moment for the American workforce, we need a Secretary of Labor who is on the side of workers.

With Ms. Su's nomination stalled, the Biden administration is currently going to extraordinary lengths to try to save it.

In a story headlined, ``Pressure Mounts to Confirm Julie Su to be Labor Secretary,'' The Washington Post reports that the White House is engaged in a full-court press to confirm Su and has launched a daily war room call to strategize on how to get her confirmed.

The Bloomberg headline reads, ``White House Prods Senate Holdouts to End Stalemate Over DOL's Su,'' reporting that White House officials are launching a final lobbying push to convince undecided Senators to vote for President Biden's embattled Labor Secretary nominee.

Politico's headline reads, ``Biden World Goes to the Mat to Get Julie Su Confirmed,'' reporting that the Biden White House is ramping up its pressure on Senate Democrats and deploying some big guns to get her nomination over the line, saying a full-court press is on for the Labor nominee as confirmation remains in doubt.

Madam Speaker, if this were a qualified nominee, there would be no need for a full-court press, a war room, or a lobbying push. There would be no need for prodding, ramping up pressure, or going to the mat.

Even at this late hour, we are receiving additional information that further disqualifies Ms. Su from being confirmed. In addition to her track record of gross mismanagement and attacking workers, she has also demonstrated a disrespect for the rule of law.

At a recent hearing I chaired of the Education and the Workforce Subcommittee on Workforce Protections, a former administrator of the Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division, Tammy McCutchen, testified that the Department of Labor, which is currently led by Acting Secretary Su, is ignoring current law when it comes to classifying independent contractors. Even though the courts have determined that the Trump administration's legal standard, which protects independent contracting, is still the law, this standard, she testified, is nowhere to be found on DOL's website, which instead contains a different set of factors that isn't the law, but that Acting Secretary Su would prefer to enforce because they are designed to deprive freelancers of their livelihoods. Ms. McCutchen testified, ``The DOL's website is providing erroneous information and misleading the public,'' and she further testified that enforcement activity appears to ignore current law as well.

This disregard for the law was a hallmark of Julie Su's tenure in California, where she served as Governor Gavin Newsom's secretary of labor. For instance, a memo recently released by the agency she headed in California shows that Su directed her staff to obstruct U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials who visited state labor offices. This memo was only obtained, by the way, directly from the California agency after Su repeatedly ignored and refused requests to provide it as part of the confirmation process.

In the memo, Ms. Su provided instructions to her staff for obstructing Federal immigration authorities, writing, ``Labor commissioner staff should not voluntarily permit a Federal immigration agent to enter any part of our office. Staff should ask the agent to leave our office, including the waiting room, and inform the agent that the labor commissioner does not consent to entry or search of any part of our office. Doors that lead to the inner office suite, and office doors that are generally locked or shut, should not be voluntarily opened for the agent.''

In addition to obstructing immigration enforcement in her role as California labor secretary, Ms. Su also defied the will of Congress. At our recent hearing of the Workforce Protections Subcommittee, witness Karen Anderson, a leader of independent contractors in California, testified how during the COVID shutdowns, Secretary Su withheld benefits from independent contractors that Congress had provided under the CARES Act.

Ms. Anderson testified that Ms. Su tried to entrap independent contractors into applying for regular State unemployment benefits even though they weren't qualified for them. This was a ploy designed to get independent contractors to characterize their clients as employers, thereby triggering an audit of their businesses under the State's notorious AB 5 law, which Ms. Su was an architect of. This not only placed an additional burden on these small businesses, which were already in many cases on their last legs because of the lockdowns, but it delayed independent workers from receiving the benefits that Congress had authorized and that they were entitled to by law. Even California Congressman Adam Schiff wrote a letter to Su at the time, instructing her to release the benefits as Congress had intended.

Madam Speaker, it is beyond doubt that if confirmed Julie Su would not be a partner of this Congress. She would readily defy the will of Congress and defy the law when it suited her or the administration's purposes. She is manifestly unqualified to lead the United States Department of Labor, and I urge the President to withdraw her nomination.

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