Fox News reports on the growing opposition to the nomination of Craig Becker, union attorney, to the National Labor Relations Board, “McCain Puts Hold on Senate Confirmation of Obama’s Labor Board Nominee“:

[McCain] and a slew of business groups are raising questions over articles and academic journals written by Becker on the very labor law he would work to interpret if confirmed to the board. Critics say Becker’s writings reflect views that support restricting employers’ free speech rights and limiting the ability of employers to converse with their employees during union representation campaigns.

“Mr. Becker is on the record supporting suppression of employer free speech,” McCain spokeswoman Brook Buchanan said in an interview with Foxnews.com on Thursday. Buchanan said McCain is calling for an on-the-record hearing to “give Mr. Becker the opportunity to clarify some of these views and opinions.”

Before the Senate HELP Committee markup session Wednesday, in which Becker was voted out by a 15-8 vote, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) released a statement requesting a full hearing on his nomination and calling Becker, “the most radical nominee to the NLRB in my experience in the Senate.”

Senator Hatch offers a substantive critique, including many direct citations of Becker’s writing. He concludes:

[Knowing] what I read from Mr. Becker’s own writings about his views on labor law and the NLRB, and based upon his written responses to the questions that I and others on this Committee submitted to him about those views, as well as his conduct in drafting the President’s labor Executive Orders while employed by the SEIU to benefit his employer, which is directly contrary to the President’s promise not to allow such conduct on his Transition Teams, I’m afraid that I cannot support his nomination for a five-year term on the NLRB.

For the sake of completeness, here’s Chairman Tom Harkin’s statement on the nominees considered Wednesday.

President Obama’s nominee to the National Labor Relations Board, SEIU counsel Craig Becker, was voted out of the Senate HELP Committee yesterday by a 15-8 vote, despite his never having to go through a committee hearing. Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) has placed a hold on his nomination.

In a letter to Committee Chairman Tom Harkin (D-IA) before the committee session Wednesday, McCain wrote:

While it is the President’s prerogative to nominate who he wishes, it is our duty in the U.S. Senate to review all of the Administration’s nominees. I have concerns regarding Mr. Becker’s written views, which indicate that he would prevent employers from having a role in union representation elections in their workplaces by doing away with requiring fair, secret ballot union elections when requested by an employer and I would like the opportunity to question Mr. Becker about these positions in person and in public.

More …

• WSJ Washington Wire, “NLRB Nominee Gets Mixed News From Senators“
• Washington Examiner, Bill Wilson op-ed, “Why did Obama appoint Gary Becker to the NLRB?“
• Workforce Management, McCain Delays Vote on Labor Board Nominee“:

With a bill that would make it easier for workers to form unions stalled in the Senate, many observers say that it is possible for a Democratic-majority NLRB to implement changes that would benefit labor in organizing campaigns.

“They could achieve through decision-making a lot of the facets that the Employee Free Choice Act in its current form proposes,” said John Bowen, a partner at Ford & Harrison in Minneapolis.

But he cautioned that major policy changes made by the board would be ephemeral.

“You’d be flipping back and forth depending on who’s in the White House,” Bowen said.

Ephemeral employment policy is bad, too.

As noted in previous posts on Mr. Becker, the NAM sent a letter to the HELP Committee members opposing his confirmation.