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Jan. 9, 2013 – 6:41 p.m.

Solis Departure Could Set Up Tough Fight Over Her Successor

By Lauren Smith, CQ Roll Call

Labor Secretary Hilda L. Solis resigned from her Cabinet position Wednesday, setting up a potential nomination battle over her successor in a Congress that has been deeply divided over union organizing and other workplace issues.

“Over the last four years, Secretary Solis has been a critical member of my economic team as we have worked to recover from the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression and strengthen the economy for the middle class,” President Barack Obama said in a statement Wednesday. “Her efforts have helped train workers for the jobs of the future, protect workers’ health and safety, and put millions of Americans back to work.”

Before becoming Labor secretary, the 55-year-old daughter of immigrants served four terms in the House. Solis was the first Hispanic woman to serve as a Cabinet member and the first Hispanic secretary of labor.

“Growing up in a large Mexican-American family in La Puente, California, I never imagined that I would have the opportunity to serve in a president’s Cabinet,” Solis said Wednesday.

Her legacy drew cheers from union officials, who saw in Solis a champion for their ambitious legislative agenda, but it concerned Republicans and the business community.

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said Solis brought “urgently needed change” to the department. “Secretary Solis’s Department of Labor talks tough and acts tough on enforcement, workplace safety, wage and hour violations and so many other vital services,” he said. “Secretary Solis never lost sight of her own working-class roots, and she always put the values of working families at the center of everything she did.”

Solis was sworn in to office on Feb. 24, 2009, after Republicans placed a two month-long hold on her nomination. Her liberal record stood in contrast to many of Obama’s other more centrist Cabinet choices.

Although the president gave no indication of who he might choose as a successor, a nomination fight could be on the horizon on Capitol Hill, where numerous partisan battles have erupted over labor issues. During the 112th Congress, Republicans in both chambers pursued unsuccessful efforts to restrict the authority of the National Labor Relations Board. For instance, the Senate last April blocked consideration of a GOP-sponsored resolution disapproving of an NLRB rule that would speed votes by workers to form or join unions.

Republicans were livid after Obama last January made three recess appointments to the NLRB, and the Senate GOP in September filed an amicus brief challenging those recess appointments in court. Controversy also surrounded Terence F. Flynn, a Republican NLRB member who resigned in May after the agency’s inspector general found that he had violated ethical rules.

Senate Democrats, meanwhile, were unable in June to win sufficient support to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act, which would forbid employers from offering different wages based on an employee’s sex. The debate played out amid heated presidential campaign rhetoric over the Republicans’ supposed “war on women.”

In the new Congress, House Education and the Workforce Chairman John Kline, R-Minn., has expressed interest in updating the National Labor Relations Act (PL 74-198), the 77-year-old law governing workplace organizing. Congress also might tackle a long-overdue reauthorization of federal job-training programs.

One business industry group on Wednesday urged Obama to nominate a consensus successor.

“The president has an opportunity to send a signal to employees and employers alike that he is committed to achieving sustained economic growth and greater prosperity for all Americans,” said the Workforce Fairness Institute. “We’re hopeful that the next Labor Secretary will focus on creating jobs, not just unionizing them.”

Solis Departure Could Set Up Tough Fight Over Her Successor

Congratulatory remarks and well wishes for Solis poured in late Wednesday afternoon from Democrats.

“Secretary Solis has been an exemplary public servant and a fierce champion for workers’ rights,” said Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Chairman Tom Harkin, D-Iowa. “She served as a strong voice at the Department of Labor during a particularly challenging time for our nation’s economy and for our middle class. I am grateful for her service to our country, and wish her all the best in the next step in her career.”

Rep. George Miller of California, the top Democrat on the Education and the Workforce Committee, said that Solis will be remembered for her “critical efforts in helping millions of Americans return to work after the Great Recession, strengthening enforcement of the nation’s labor laws, especially for the most vulnerable workers, and improving Americans’ health care and retirement security.”

The Congressional Hispanic Caucus praised Solis’ term.

“Secretary Solis has been a strong advocate for the Hispanic community and for all American workers,” said Rep. Rubén Hinojosa, D-Texas, chairman of the caucus.

It’s unclear exactly where Solis is headed or whether she will remain with the administration in some other capacity. She reportedly is mulling a bid for a seat on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

“I have decided to begin a new future, and return to the people and places I love and that have inspired and shaped my life,” she wrote in her resignation letter.

David Harrison contributed to this story.

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