[Senate Hearing 117-170]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 117-170
NOMINATION OF MARTY WALSH
TO SERVE AS
SECRETARY OF LABOR
=======================================================================
HEARING
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON HEALTH, EDUCATION,
LABOR, AND PENSIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
ON
EXAMINING THE NOMINATION OF MARTIN JOSEPH WALSH, OF MASSACHUSETTS, TO
BE SECRETARY OF LABOR
__________
FEBRUARY 4, 2021
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and
Pensions
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
46-750 PDF WASHINGTON : 2022
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
COMMITTEE ON HEALTH, EDUCATION, LABOR, AND PENSIONS
PATTY MURRAY, Washington Chair
BERNIE SANDERS (I), Vermont RICHARD BURR, North Carolina
ROBERT P. CASEY, JR., Pennsylvania Ranking Member
TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin RAND PAUL, M.D., Kentucky
CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, Connecticut SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine
TIM KAINE, Virginia BILL CASSIDY, M.D., Louisiana
MAGGIE HASSAN, New Hampshire LISA MURKOWSKI, Alaska
TINA SMITH, Minnesota MIKE BRAUN, Indiana
JACKY ROSEN, Nevada ROGER MARSHALL, M.D., Kansas
BEN RAY LUJAN, New Mexico TIM SCOTT, South Carolina
JOHN HICKENLOOPER, Colorado MITT ROMNEY, Utah
TOMMY TUBERVILLE, Alabama
JERRY MORAN, Kansas
Evan T. Schatz, Staff Director
David P. Cleary, Republican Staff Director
John Righter, Deputy Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
----------
STATEMENTS
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 2021
Page
Committee Members
Murray, Hon. Patty, Chair, Committee on Health, Education, Labor,
and Pensions, Opening statement................................ 1
Burr, Hon. Richard, Ranking Member, a U.S. Senator from the State
of North Carolina, Opening statement........................... 4
Witnesses
Walsh, Hon. Martin, J., Boston, MA............................... 7
Prepared statement........................................... 9
ADDITIONAL MATERIAL
Statements, articles, publications, letters, etc.
Murray, Hon. Patty:
Letters of support........................................... 46
NOMINATION OF MARTY WALSH
TO SERVE AS
SECRETARY OF LABOR
----------
Thursday, February 4, 2021
U.S. Senate
Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
Washington, DC.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:02 a.m., in
room SD-430, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Patty Murray,
The Chair of the Committee, presiding.
Present: Senators Murray [presiding], Sanders, Casey,
Baldwin, Murphy, Kaine, Hassan, Smith, Rosen, Lujan,
Hickenlooper, Warren, Burr, Paul, Collins, Cassidy, Murkowski,
Braun, Marshall, Scott, Romney, Tuberville, and Moran.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR MURRAY
The Chair. This hearing of the Senate Committee on Health,
Education, Labor, and Pensions will please come to order.
Today, we are holding a hearing on the nomination of Mayor
Marty Walsh to be Secretary of Labor. Senator Burr and I will
each have an opening statement and then I will recognize
Senator Warren to introduce Mayor Walsh. After Mayor Walsh
gives his testimony, Senators will have five minutes each for a
round of questions. And I am happy to stay for a second round
if Senators have any remaining questions.
Before we begin, I also want to walk through the COVID-19
safety protocols we have in place. We will follow the advice of
the Attending Physician and the Sergeant at Arms in conducting
this hearing. Committee Members and our witnesses are seated at
least six feet apart. That means we are unable to have the
public or the media attend in person. But the hearing is
available on our Committee website at www.help.senate.gov. Some
Senators, including myself, are participating by video
conference. We are all very grateful to the Sergeant at Arms,
the Capitol Police, the Architect of the Capitol, the Press
Gallery, the Rules Committee, and our Committee staff for all
of their hard work to keep us all safe and healthy.
Joining us today, we have all of our new Committee Members
that I am very, very pleased to welcome our new Senators Lujan,
Hickenlooper, Moran, Marshall, and Tuberville to the Committee,
and I look forward to working with all of you. Mayor Walsh,
thank you for joining us today, and I am pleased to welcome
your partner, Lori, as well. While we haven't had the chance to
meet in person yet, I do look forward to meeting you soon and I
know we will be working together a lot, both virtually for the
time being and in person hopefully soon. President Biden
announced his intent to nominate Mayor Walsh on January 7th.
His formal nomination arrived on January 20th. The Committee
received Mayor Walsh's Office of Government Ethics paperwork,
including his public financial disclosures and ethics
agreement, on January 22nd, and his Committee paperwork on
January 25th. Mayor Walsh, I look forward to hearing about how
you and the Biden administration will work with us to fight for
workers across our country, and I hope we will be able to
confirm you quickly because we do not have a minute to delay.
We have lost 140,000 jobs in the last month. All of the net
job loss was among women and it was disproportionately among
women of color. Unemployment is twice as high as it was a year
ago, and as usual, it is unfortunately even higher among women,
people with disabilities, and people of color. And I have heard
from so many families back in Washington State who are hurting.
This pandemic has laid bare the painful fact that while our
economy might work for the biggest corporations and wealthiest
individuals, it doesn't work for families. And it is working
against women, people of color, people with disabilities, and
many others. Since the beginning of this pandemic, our health
and homecare workers, grocery store clerks, delivery people,
fast food workers, farm workers, bus drivers and so many others
have kept this country going, showing more clearly than ever
before that workers are the backbone of our economy. Democrats
and Republicans alike have joined together in rightly calling
our essential workers heroes. But despite their tireless work
and the risk of COVID exposure, too many of these workers are
paid wages so low they can't even afford to meet their basic
needs.
One in nine workers in our country makes poverty level
wages, and the current Federal minimum wage has left millions
of working people desperately in need of a raise, a quarter of
Latino workers, a third of Black workers, 60 percent of women,
over 32 million people in all are currently paid as little as
$7.25 an hour or $2.13 an hour for tipped workers, pennies on
the dollar to workers with disabilities and the pandemic has
only made it harder for workers to make ends meet. It is making
their wages even more deeply unfair. Women are paid only $0.82
for every $1.00 paid to men, and that drops to $0.63 for Black
and Pacific Islander women, $0.60 for many Native American
women, and only $0.55 for Latino women. And a new report
projects the wage gap will likely widen by 5 percent because of
this pandemic. And these problems are exacerbated by our
insufficient pay equity protections, our lack of guaranteed
paid sick days, and national paid family and medical leave
policy, and our lack of--the worsening childcare crisis. Amid
all the pressures of this pandemic, one in four women now say
they are considering downshifting their careers or leaving the
workforce. And for so many workers, the conditions aren't just
unfair, they are also unsafe.
The largest meatpacking plant in my home State of
Washington had a COVID-19 outbreak last year that infected
hundreds of people. And we have seen the same thing in other
workplaces across the country. Thousands of workers have died
from COVID-19, including over 100 grocery store workers, more
than 275 meatpacking plant workers, and nearly 3,000 health
care workers. It has never been more important to have a
Department of Labor that fights for workers. Unfortunately, we
didn't have that last year. We had the Trump administration.
Under former President Trump, the Department of Labor attacked
workers' rights at every turn and protected the wealthiest
corporations at the expense of working families. They denied
millions of workers overtime pay. They made it easier for
employers to steal workers' tips. They weakened workplace
discrimination, enforcement and protections for LGBTQ workers,
and more. Despite the urgency of this pandemic, the Trump
administration refused to have OSHA issue an emergency
temporary standard protecting workers from COVID, a tragic
failure that I am glad President Biden is already working
toward correcting. The Trump administration even tried to
restrict the bipartisan emergency paid leave policy Congress
did pass to help fight the pandemic.
After four years of the Trump administration's attack on
working families and a pandemic that continues to push them to
the brink, we desperately need a Secretary of Labor like Mayor
Walsh who will fight for workers not against them. Mayor Walsh
will bring an important perspective to the Department as the
first union leader to head it in decades. And just as
importantly, he will bring a long track record as a
collaborative leader who has worked across coalitions with
labor groups and the business community, as a state
representative, and as Mayor of Boston, to rebuild the middle
class and create a more inclusive, resilient economy for all
workers. Under his leadership, 135,000 new jobs have been
created in the city, and he has fought for a $15.00 minimum
wage and paid leave policies will help ensure women, workers of
color, workers with disabilities can succeed in the workforce
and get the pay they deserve.
During this pandemic, Mayor Walsh has also continued to
show a deep commitment to our frontline workers who have kept
this country running by providing funding for emergency
childcare and other resources essential workers need to weather
this pandemic. It is clear Mayor Walsh has the right
experience, leadership, and priorities to protect workers
during this critical moment. And I look forward to working with
him, President Biden, and Vice President Harris to see our
country through this pandemic and rebuild an economy that is
stronger and fair for all workers, one that promises regardless
of age, race or ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation or
disability, every worker can earn a livable wage, which is why
we need to pass the Raise the Wage Act and establish a national
minimum wage of $15.00 an hour without exceptions across jobs,
pass the Paycheck Fairness Act, and promise that every woman
will receive equal pay for equal work, and have a Department of
Labor that protects workers' paychecks against wage theft.
We need leaders who ensure that every worker is safe from
pandemics. We need laws like my Be Heard Act to make sure
workers are protected against discrimination and harassment.
And we need to hold every employer accountable for ensuring
safe working conditions. Building an economy for working
families also means ensuring that every person has paid sick
days and leave so they can put the health and well-being of
themselves and their loved ones first and every parent has
access to quality, affordable childcare, two other critical
pieces of President Biden's COVID plan. It means ensuring that
every person has access to a retirement plan and the resources
that they need to plan for their future and protecting those
plans against threats like unscrupulous financial advisers or
the multiemployer pension crisis that could strip millions of
people the benefits they have earned. And last but not least,
it means protecting and strengthening every worker's right to
join a union and collectively bargain for safer working
conditions, or better pay, or a secure retirement. Which is why
I am so proud to be introducing the PRO Act later today with
Majority Leader Schumer and Congressman Scott.
Even before this pandemic and even before President Trump's
four years crusade against workers, we had a long road ahead to
build a truly fair, inclusive economy that works for working
families. But now not only is the road longer, but the clock is
ticking. Workers who are the backbone of our economy are being
pushed to the brink. They need us to acknowledge that this
crisis is far from over and pass additional relief as soon as
possible. And they need a Secretary of Labor like Mayor Walsh,
who will act quickly to keep workers safe, to defend and expand
workers' rights, and be a partner in helping our economy come
back stronger and fairer for all workers. I hope all of my
colleagues agree. We need a Secretary of Labor we can trust to
stand up for workers, not huge corporations, at this critical
time. And we will prove it by working with me to get Mayor
Walsh confirmed without delay.
Finally, I now ask for UC to enter into the record 25
letters of support from Mayor Walsh's nomination for Labor
Secretary, signed by over 29 individuals and groups
representing labor, trade unions, financial and medical
institutions, and a bipartisan group of Mayors from across the
country. So ordered.
[The information referred to can be found on page 46.]
The Chair. With that, I will recognize Ranking Member Burr
for his opening remarks.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR BURR
Senator Burr. Well, good morning, Madam Chair, and thank
you. I want to thank you for scheduling this hearing with Mayor
Marty Walsh to be Secretary of Labor. I want to at this time,
welcome on my side of the aisle, three new Members, Senator
Marshall, Coach Tuberville. Tommy played college football. You
will always be Coach. And Senator Moran. Mayor Walsh, welcome.
You have been a Mayor, state representative, union leader. You,
quite frankly, have the experience and the qualifications to be
considered for this position.
I believe you are here, though, because in your career, you
have called balls and strikes, and I think that is important in
the position of Secretary of Labor. So I want to congratulate
you on your nomination. I want to welcome you today. I also
want to welcome Lori because I noticed that she was not in your
statement that you are going to make, and it is just important
to have her here. The Department of Labor serves an immensely
important role in our economy and the lives of the American
people. Our Nation can never afford to have a labor Secretary
that will ever be accused of being in cahoots with union bosses
or beholding to management. This is a job that requires a labor
Secretary who is willing to make a commitment to confront both
when necessary for the protection of the rank and file
individual workers, especially in the midst of a pandemic with
unemployment at 6.7 percent and 12.6 million people unemployed.
This is a job that needs to be filled today.
That is why I agreed with Senator Murray to begin the
process of your nomination as soon as institutionally possible
without unnecessary delays and roadblocks, and I hope we will
do the same with your confirmation vote. Not all nominees in
other circumstances, in other administrations have received
that consideration. You will get that consideration from me. I
don't know if you would consider this the biggest job interview
of your life, but I guess it is up near the top. The President
has nominated you in the Senate and now has the opportunity to
give advice and consent. I am going to commit to giving you my
best advice today, my best well-intentioned advice in the days
ahead and in the future. I hope you can commit to doing the job
the right way and I think you can. The people who work in
Washington, DC. need to come in to serve all the Americans from
coast to coast and in the middle, Democrats and Republican,
management and labor.
No matter what pressure comes from the extremes of the
President's party, we cannot open the door of the Labor
Department up to people who want to make enemies of job
creators and the Department's job is not to make trial lawyers
richer at a time when many businesses are struggling just to
keep their doors open for the benefit of their workers. The
problem with slaughtering the golden goose is that it no longer
lays eggs. America is in the midst of an immense domestic and
international challenge. We have health challenges with
coronavirus pandemic. We have challenges with international
competition with China and others. We should be able to work
together to address these challenges. We need a skilled
workforce. We need to encourage more women and minorities into
science, technology, engineering, and math. We need to ensure
that management and labor never conspire to construct another
unfunded pension plan again.
We need to ensure America that Government is here to
assist, not to hinder, the reopening of our economy and the
list goes on. Bipartisan solutions exist to all these problems.
And if you commit to working together in a bipartisan manner
with us, I am sure the Senate will work with you. I am
particularly concerned about the unprecedented firing of the
NLRB's General Counsel. No President, no President has ever
taken such action in recent memory, not Trump, not Obama, not
Bush, not Clinton and Bush, not Reagan or others before them,
and it is a disturbing signal from an administration preaching
the need for bipartisan unity.
I would caution you and the Administration that might
doesn't always make right and that you should be mindful that
lurch to the left will be bad for a growing economy and getting
people back to work. At one point in our history, the
Department of Labor and the Department of Commerce existed
together. Theodore Roosevelt knew that the interest of commerce
and labor were ultimately aligned. Somehow, over the years, we
have lost our way in that regard. Our largest economic
challenges are external. As chairman of the Intelligence
Committee, I learned our competitors just don't play fair. We
need to be on the same team.
We need to battle for our economy, for our fellow citizens,
not for philosophy. Samuel Gompers, the founder of the American
Federation of Labor, once said that a man who dwells on
socialism forgets his union card. He told his socialist
opponents, ``economically, you are unsound, socially, you are
wrong, industrially, you are impossible.'' These sorts of
unsound, impossible political agendas he spoke of don't help
the working people. They present the biggest standing threat to
America's competitiveness. I implore you, do not be a party to
that. As Teamster's President Jimmy Hoffa pointed out, the
political decision by President Biden to cancel the completion
of the construction of the Keystone pipeline resulted in the
loss of 8,000 union jobs and the loss of members' retirements
and health care benefits.
I hope that when confirmed, you will be the voice in the
room reigning in this type of politically motivated chaos.
Chaos in that specific example which cuts jobs and
counterproductively increases, increases greenhouse gas
emissions. I hope you can help us move beyond a class struggle
mentally of 100 years ago and help us build a workforce for
2021 and beyond. We can no longer afford to operate as a labor
team and a management team. We must be in this together. Tom
Brady has proven that a Massachusetts guy can hop on I-95, go
south, and do good things. If doing good things is your goal,
and I think it is, you will have an ally in me. But you have
got to be willing to stand up to the agenda activists to get
that goal. I will join you Sunday. Rooting for Tampa Bay. Not
trying to suck up to the next Secretary of Labor, but because
at my age I root for the old guy, and that is where Brady is
these days. I plan to conduct rigorous oversight, especially of
the pandemic--of the response to COVID-19.
I will ask fair, difficult, and probing questions on the
decisions you make and the way the agency operates. I would
expect honest, complete and timely answers. I hope you can
commit to working with me on that. Despite the fact that as
Mayor, you out recruited my State of North Carolina for many of
the jobs that should have come our way and they ended up in
Boston, I expect by the end of this hearing I will be able to
support your nomination, and I will encourage my colleagues on
the side of the aisle to support you as well.
I look forward to this confirmation hearing. I thank the
Chair. I yield back.
The Chair. Thank you very much, Senator Burr. I will now
turn to you, Senator Warren, to introduce me to Mayor Walsh.
Senator Warren.
Senator Warren. Thank you very much, Madam Chair Murray and
Ranking Member Burr. And welcome, Marty and Lori. I am here to
introduce Mayor Walsh, the Mayor of Boston, Massachusetts, who
has been nominated to be our next Secretary of the Department
of Labor. And I am really happy to be here. After four years of
a Trump Labor Department that did its best to undermine
workers, Marty will be a Secretary of Labor who actually
supports labor.
Marty grew up in a hardworking family in Dorchester,
Massachusetts. His mom and dad immigrated from Ireland and
worked hard in America to give their children more
opportunities. His family's story tells of a deep-seated
commitment to building opportunity for the next generation. It
is one of the many reasons that I trust Marty to look out for
everyone looking for a good job, a decent wage, and a chance
for their kids and their grandkids to succeed. Marty's dad
worked in the building trades. Marty followed him into this
work as a member of Laborers Local Union 223. Marty was smart,
creative and relentless, and his fellow workers eventually
elected him their union president. He later served as head of
the Boston Buildings and Construction Trades Council,
representing tens of thousands of workers in the region and
then on to the state legislature and eventually Mayor of
Boston.
I trust Marty to look out for America's working men and
women because he has a strong record of having done exactly
that. As Mayor, he fought for a $15.00 an hour minimum wage and
paid sick and family leave. He prioritized racial and gender
equity, creating an Office of Women's Advancement and an Office
of Diversity to address disparities in pay and leadership and
in opportunity. And he established a new cabinet level position
for a chief of equity to center equity and inclusive
opportunity throughout all of city policy. Marty's response to
the COVID-19 pandemic exemplifies his leadership.
His administration worked to get PPE to frontline workers
and to set up a field hospital in Boston's convention center.
But Marty didn't stop there. He provided emergency childcare to
first responders and health care workers. And he worked to
create the Boston Resiliency Fund to meet the needs of hard-
pressed communities, including programs to hire laid off
workers. Given his record on fighting for workers, it is not
surprising that Marty's nomination has earned the support of so
many unions and worker organizations as a long-time union
leader. Marty knows what it is like to fight for fair pay,
meaningful benefits, and safe conditions in your workplace. And
I say this as someone who has worked with Marty for years.
Deep down, he is a good man who believes that Government
can and should serve the people, and he lives by that belief
every day. Welcome, Mayor Walsh. We are pleased to have you
here. And I look forward to your nomination and your service to
our Nation.
The Chair. Thank you very much, Senator Warren. Mayor
Walsh, welcome. Thank you for being here today. We are looking
forward to hearing from you and you can now begin your
testimony.
STATEMENT OF HON. MARTY WALSH, BOSTON, MA TO BE SECRETARY OF
LABOR
Mr. Walsh. Thank you. Thank you very much, Madam Chair
Murray. I appreciate your introduction. Ranking Member Burr as
well. I want to thank you, however--. Sorry about that. Thank
you very much, Senator Murray, for your introduction.
Appreciate it. Ranking Member Burr, thank you as well. I am not
sure how much you help me out there today with Senator Marshall
when you were talking about Tom Brady. He was looking at me. So
we will have to work on that one later on as the hearing goes
on.
I want to thank you also Senator Warren, my friend, for
that kind introduction. I also want to acknowledge Senator
Hassan, my neighbor and partner from New Hampshire. Senator
Romney, whose administration I worked with when he was Governor
of Massachusetts. I want to thank all the Members of this
Committee for inviting me to speak today. I want to welcome the
new Members of this Committee to your hearing today for the
first time. And to the Members that I have had opportunities to
talk to, I have enjoyed our conversations over the last couple
of weeks and look forward to talking to all the Members of this
Committee and getting to know you on a personal level. I want
to thank President Biden and Vice President Harris for the
honor of this nomination.
I share their commitment to the health and safety of the
working people carrying our country through this pandemic, this
very difficult time. I share their commitment to building back
better with an economy that works for every single American
worker. In many ways, that has been my life's work. As Senator
Warren mentioned, my mother and father emigrated from Ireland
in the 1950's. They both worked hard but our American dream did
not take shape until my father had the opportunity to join the
Laborers Union Local 223 in Boston. That union was my family's
way into the middle class. It meant a fair wage so we could
have security. It meant safety on the job site, so we didn't
have to live in fear of accidents derailing our lives. It meant
a pension so my parents could retire with dignity, and that
meant health insurance.
At the age of seven years old I was diagnosed with
Burkitt's Lymphoma, a form of cancer. It was every parent's
worst nightmare, but with health care treatment and great
treatment by doctors and nurses at Boston Children's Hospital
and Dana Farber Cancer Institute and the prayers from nuns and
priests on both sides of the Atlantic, I recovered. And I have
had an amazing experience on my life's journey. As a young man,
I followed my father into that union into construction. I saw
firsthand the sacrifices that working men and women make for
their families each and every day.
In my 20's, because of the same benefits that enabled my
cancer treatment as a child, I went to treatment for
alcoholism. I am a proud member of the recovery community
today. Later on, as a full-time legislator, I went back to
college, earned my degree from Boston College at the age of 42
years old. I share these personal details because they helped
shape my understanding of struggling working people and
families the problems they face each and every day, and they
inform my deep beliefs in the work of the Department of Labor.
Workers' protection, equal access to good jobs, the right to
join a union, continuing education and job training, access to
mental health and substance use treatment, these are not just
policies to me, these are--I live them.
Millions of American families right now need them. I have
spent my entire career, different levels fighting for them. As
a state representative for 16 years, I worked on economic
development and worker protections in collaboration with four
Republican Governors and one Democratic Governor. As general
agent of the Metropolitan Building Trades Council, I worked
with developers and contractors to secure good jobs and major
investments. I also helped create a program called Building
Pathways. It provides pre apprenticeship training for union
careers for people of color and women so their families can
join the middle class the way that my family did. I believe
everyone, including veterans, LGBTQ Americans, immigrants, and
people with disabilities must have full access to economic
opportunities and fair treatment in the workplace.
For the past seven years, I have had the honor of serving
as Mayor of my hometown, Boston, Massachusetts. We have proven
that we can create a world class economy that works for working
people. We secured a $15.00 an hour minimum wage. We expanded
workplace training. We created groundbreaking policies to close
gender wage gap and increase racial equity. And businesses
thrived as well. We attracted $43 billion of investment. We
grew the base of jobs as an American major city by nearly 20
percent. We managed public resources responsibly, earning a
triple AAA bond rating for each of the seven-years for the
first time that has ever been done in Boston's history. And
when COVID struck, we were ready to meet the needs of working
people. We were the first city in America to pause
construction.
We worked with employers and labor on strong COVID product
protocols. That allowed us to restock safely and build the
homes and businesses and infrastructures of a strong recovery.
Throughout my career, I have led by listening, collaborating
and building partnerships. That is how, if confirmed, I will
lead the Department of Labor. Right now, we are depending on
workers, men and women to keep us going as they always have
done, and we are always depending on them. I believe we must
act with urgency to meet this moment with determination to
empower our workforce and rebuild.
If confirmed, I pledge to lead this work in partnership
with workers in businesses, states, cities and tribal
territories, employees in every single agency of the Department
of Labor, the Administration, Members of Congress from all
parties, and Members of this Committee. Thank you, and I look
forward to hearing your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Walsh follows.]
prepared statement of martin j. walsh
Thank you Madam Chair Murray and Ranking Member Burr. Thank you to
all the Members of the Committee, for inviting me to speak today, and
for our conversations in recent days.
I want to thank President Biden and Vice President Harris for the
honor of this nomination. I share their commitment to the health and
safety of the working people who are carrying our country through this
pandemic. I share their commitment to build back better--with an
economy that works for every single American worker.
In many ways, this has been my life's work. I want to start by
telling you why the mission of the Department of Labor is so important
to me. My father and mother emigrated from Ireland in the 1950's. They
both worked hard but our American Dream did not take shape until my
father joined the Laborers Union, Local 223 in Boston. The union was
our way into the middle class. It meant a fair wage, so we could have a
home, and give back to our community. It meant safety on the job, so we
didn't have to live in fear of an accident derailing our lives. It
meant a pension, so my parents could retire with dignity. And it meant
health insurance.
At the age of seven, I was diagnosed with a form of cancer called
Burkitt's Lymphoma. It was my parent's worst nightmare and every
parent's worst nightmare. But with health insurance, with great
treatment by doctors and nurses at Boston Children's Hospital and Dana
Farber Cancer Institute, and the prayers of nuns and priests on both
sides of the Atlantic; I recovered and I've had amazing experiences on
my life's journey.
As a young man, I followed my father into construction and joined
the same union that he joined when he came over from Ireland. I worked
on job sites all over Boston and saw the sacrifices working men and
women make for their families every single day. In my 20's, because of
the same benefits that enabled my cancer treatment as a child, I was
able to seek treatment for my alcoholism. I am a proud member of the
recovery community. Later on, as a full-time legislator, I went back to
school and earned my degree from Boston College at the age of 42.
I share these personal details, because they shape my understanding
of the struggles working people and families face each and every day.
And, they inform my deep belief in the work of the Department of Labor:
Protecting all workers: with fair pay, healthcare and
unemployment benefits, safety in the workplace, and a secure
retirement.
Ensuring equal access to good jobs--and the right to join a
union and engage in collective bargaining.
Continuing education and job training.
Access to mental health and substance use treatment.
These are not just policies to me. I've lived them. Millions of
American families right now need them. And I've spent my entire career
fighting for them.
As a State Representative for 16 years, I fought for good jobs and
the rights of working people. I worked in collaboration with one
Democratic Governor and four Republican Governors including Senator
Romney, whose Administration I worked with to reform public
construction.
As General Agent for the Metro Boston Building Trades Council, I
advocated for 35,000 union members. I worked with developers and
contractors to secure good jobs and brought new housing, small
businesses, and infrastructure to communities across Greater Boston. I
also created a program called Building Pathways that provides pre-
apprenticeship training and union careers for people of color and women
so their families can join the middle class, the way my family did.
I am committed to making sure that everyone--including veterans,
LGBTQ Americans, immigrants, and people with disabilities--gets full
access to economic opportunity and fair treatment in the workplace.
For the last seven years, I have had the honor of serving as Mayor
of my hometown, Boston. In that time, we proved that you can create a
dynamic, competitive economy that works for working people. We secured
a $15 minimum wage, paid sick leave, and paid parental leave. We
expanded workforce training--in partnership with businesses, community
colleges, unions, and the U.S. Department of Labor. We created
groundbreaking policies to close the gender wage gap, and increase
racial equity. We invested in affordable housing, clean energy, and
resilient infrastructure.
During my administration, business thrived, attracting $43 billion
of investment and creating 77 million square feet of new development.
We became a global leader in fields from robotics to athletic
shoes. Small businesses grew in every neighborhood. And we expanded the
job base of a major American city by nearly 20 percent.
We also showed that investing in working people is fiscally smart.
As the City's chief executive, I lead a workforce of 18,000 employees,
represented by 41 unions. We worked together as partners to put our
pensions on track to be fully funded by 2024. And we earned AAA bond
ratings for 7 consecutive years--which has never been done before in
Boston.
When COVID struck, we were ready to meet the needs of working
people. We were the first city to pause construction. We worked with
employers and labor on strong COVID protocols that allowed us to
restart with confidence.
Throughout my career, I've led by listening, collaborating, and
building partnerships. That's how, if confirmed, I will lead the
Department of Labor.
Right now, this work is critical to the future of our economy, our
communities, and our families. We are depending on working men and
women all across this country to keep us going--as they always have
done. They are depending on us.
I believe we must act with urgency to meet this moment to
strengthen and empower our workforce as we rebuild. If confirmed, I
pledge to lead this work in partnership with workers and businesses;
states, cities, and tribal territories; employees in every agency of
the Department of Labor; the Administration and Members of Congress
from all parties; and all the Members of this Committee.
Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.
______
The Chair. Thank you very much, Mayor Walsh. We will now
begin a round of 5 minute questions. I would ask my colleagues
to please keep track of the clock and stay within those 5
minutes. I am very happy to stay if anyone would like
additional questions in a second round. So Mayor Walsh, I will
begin. In my opening remarks, I noted the unprecedented
challenges that workers face in today's economy. The economic
impact of this pandemic has been especially severe for women
and in particular women of color.
While we work to address the challenges posed by the
pandemic to workers, we also need to address systemic issues
that have been swept under the rug for far too long. And even
before this pandemic, women were paid less than men for the
same work and were more likely to struggle to find affordable
childcare or be able to take time off to care for a sick family
member. In the past few years, we saw the me too movement raise
awareness of the harassment many workers face on the job
because of their gender, race, sexual orientation, gender
identity, disability or religion. I introduced the Be Heard in
the Workplace Act to address harassment, including sexual
assaults in the workplace, and I hope working with Members of
this Committee on both sides of the aisle can make some
progress on that issue.
Building an inclusive economy means taking into account the
needs of all workers and removing barriers that hold too many
people back. So, Mayor Walsh, as Secretary of Labor, I expect
you would use the full authority at your disposal to respond to
the impact the pandemic has had on women and workers of color
and to deal with the longstanding barriers to create an equal
opportunity in the workplace. Can you give us some examples of
how you approach those issues during your time as Mayor in
Boston?
Mr. Walsh. Thank you very much, Madam Chair Murray, for
your comments and your question. I am proud of the work that we
were able to accomplish in the city of Boston through our
Office of Women's Advancement and also the newly created Office
of Equity in the city of Boston. COVID-19 has really shown all
of us in Boston, throughout this country, the shortfalls that
we have in our American economy right now. One of the things
that we did in the city of Boston previously to COVID was we
saw that there was a pay equity gap that was growing in the
city of Boston.
I worked with 200 of the largest employers in the city of
Boston to give us data anonymously. That data allowed us to
look at the numbers to inform us what we already knew, men were
paid more than women. And when you look at women, white women
were paid more than Black women and Latina women and we had an
issue there. So we created a program which was called Salary
Negotiation Workshops, where we helped over 20,000 women be
able to negotiate their own salaries to increase their wages to
be able to get more money into the economy, more money into
their families, more money on the table, something that was
really important for us. And during this pandemic, one of the
things you said in your opening statement and many of the
meetings that I have had with Senators is the need for
childcare, the need for getting women back into the economy.
The last month, the large majority of the folks that have
lost their job are women. Many of those folks lost their job,
quite honestly, because they didn't have adequate childcare. So
we need to work collectively as a Federal Government to
increase opportunities for women and people of color. We need
to close economic gaps. We need to close racial gaps. And that
is the work that I have been doing for the last seven years as
Mayor of the city of Boston. And I look forward to working with
people not just here in this community, but the entire
administration, the Biden administration.
The one thing that I find that was really interesting in
all of my conversations with the Senators, both Democrats and
Republicans, each and every one of you spoke about the need for
job training. Each and every one of you spoke about the need
for preparing workers for the economy of the future. A big part
of that economy of the future are women and people of color. So
I find it will be one of my top priorities, if confirmed, when
I get to the Department of Labor is to work with each and every
one of you to make sure that every American worker gets the
opportunity to be successful.
The Chair. Okay, thank you. And the mission of the
Department of Labor is to ``foster, promote, and develop the
welfare of the wage earners, job seekers, and retirees in the
United States, improving working conditions, advance
opportunities for profitable employment and ensure worker
related benefits and rights.'' Unfortunately, the previous
administration's Department of Labor did the opposite and too
often put profits over people.
I really think it is time to have a Department of Labor
that gets back to his job on behalf of our workers, creating
enforceable health and safety standards to protect workers from
COVID-19 during this pandemic, protecting workers from wage
theft, particularly during this economic crisis, closing the
wage gap and more.
Mayor Walsh, if you are confirmed as Secretary, can workers
rely upon you to make the Department of Labor a place that has
their backs and enforces their rights to ensure that they are
protected during this pandemic and beyond?
Mr. Walsh. The short answer is absolutely, and the second
part of that is, if I didn't feel that I could make a
difference and the President felt that I couldn't make a
difference, I probably wouldn't be sitting here right now.
The Chair. Thank you very much, Mayor.
I will turn it over to Senator Burr for his round of
questions.
Senator Burr. Thank you, Madam Chair. Mayor, the Department
of Labor's office of Inspector found that between 2013 and
2016, OSHA did not establish or follow appropriate procedures
for issuing guidance. And as a result, OSHA risked issuing
guidance in violation of laws requiring public notice and
comment that could impact the efficiency and effectiveness of
the programs to protect the rights of workers.
The OIG recommended that the Department improve procedures
and monitor compliance with procedures and trained officials
and staff as necessary. In response to these findings, OSHA
agreed in 2019 to take the steps necessary to ensure guidance
follows the proper procedures. Will you commit to adhere to
these recommendations made by the OIG?
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Ranking Member Burr. That is an area
that I want to work with you on. I find it very important, when
we talk about OSHA and as I have been prepping for this
interview today or this hearing today and as I have been
talking to people, OSHA should not be an us versus them. OSHA
is a part of an agency that should be there to protect workers
on the job site. We have seen, and I have seen personally in
the city of Boston, many instances where unsafe conditions have
led to serious injury to workers, in some cases throughout this
country, death. And I find that rather than have discussions on
what should OSHA be doing and not be doing, we should be
working with OSHA and working with the Administration and
working with the Members of this Committee to talk about the
importance of bringing OSHA back as an agency that is an agency
that is there to help workers and help employers and not be put
in the middle of both.
Senator Burr. One of your priorities as Mayor was to
support free community college for graduates of Boston public
schools. What role do community colleges play in the workforce
system?
Mr. Walsh. Community colleges play, in my opinion, a very
big role. And I think that not only--when we created our
program in Boston in 2015, we were creating it off of a very
prosperous building boom in the city of Boston. And we had
additional revenue and we put money into making sure that we
put young people in high schools on pathways to college and a
career. In one of those pathways to college was through
community college, couldn't afford to get into a big school,
couldn't afford to pay. And we created opportunity for young
people to get into community college to put them on a pathway.
I feel that we have a real opportunity right now in the
21st century and at this point with COVID is not just to have
college credits, but also create workforce opportunities,
training opportunities. And I think that we need to do more
with colleges, community colleges all across America, to help
train the workforce of the future. Not every young person is
cut out to go to college. You are looking at somebody that once
a year and a half of college after high school. I dropped out
of college. I went into the trades.
I was fortunate enough to get back into college and
eventually graduate. But at the time, I was not right for that.
But creating opportunities through these pathways is really
important, and I think community college can be a real asset to
the American workforce and can be a real answer, quite
honestly, to companies as well. When, as I said, we created
community colleges in the city of Boston, businesses loved it
because we are partnering some of our community colleges with
different industries so they can train their workforce as well.
Senator Burr. Does that mean you believe that community
colleges should be free for every American?
Mr. Walsh. If we could, I think it would be great. I think
it is something that we should be planning for and trying to
get to. I know that when we brought it into Boston, a lot of
the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is looking at that now,
trying to have free community college through different pieces
of legislation. I think if we can make community college free
for kids in our systems, I think absolutely that is a goal we
should be trying to do.
Senator Burr. If we Federally mandated free college, what
would that do to city budgets like Boston and state budgets
like Massachusetts?
Mr. Walsh. Well, I don't know if you Federally mandated. I
think what you talk about is not everyone is cutoff for
community college either, and I think we have to put more
resources and revenue into job training programs, not just what
we do here in the Federal Government, but also throughout
cities and states across the country as well with employers.
And I think that, again, there is no clear pathway for anyone.
Everyone has a different path in life. And not everyone is
going to take advantage of a college or community college, and
that is why I think it is important for us to really focus on
job training programs and strengthening those job training
programs to make sure that we have real outcomes, so when you
send somebody to a workforce training program or community
college, that there is an outcome there. We have to make sure
that we are setting these young people, and people who go
through them, up for some success. And that means a job, a job
that gets them to the middle class.
Senator Burr. The 2019 report from the Government
Accountability Office identified 43 Federally supported
employment and training programs across 9 different agencies.
This includes 19 programs at the Department of Labor. What do
you believe is the role of the Department of Labor in
coordinating training programs across the Federal Government?
Mr. Walsh. Well, after talking to a lot of the Senators the
last couple of weeks, that is a lot. There has been--like I
said, every single Senator has brought up some sort of job
training program in their areas or in their territories that
they represent. So I look forward to--one of the areas that I
really have done a lot of work with job training in the city of
Boston. And we also added another component to financial
empowerment, where we help people understand how to build
credit, how to pay their debt down.
There is a lot more--I know my time is up almost. There is
a lot more to this conversation I would love to have with you.
It is something that obviously I am passionate about. You can
tell. And it really, it is an opportunity for us to really--
when we think about the economy and the American worker, if we
truly want to get people into the middle class, we have to help
them get into middle class. And job training, community
college, and many other programs that are out there are ways
and pathways in. And that is what we have to continue to build
those pathways into the middle class.
Senator Burr. Thank you, Mayor.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you.
Senator Burr. Thank you, Madam Chair.
The Chair. Thank you, Senator Burr.
We will turn to Senator Sanders.
Senator Sanders. Thank you. Can you hear me, Madam Chair?
The Chair. Yes, yes, we can.
Senator Sanders. Okay. Mr. Mayor, welcome. Congratulations
on your excellent work in Boston. And let me begin by telling
you what you already know, and that is that there are tens of
millions of workers in this country who are working at
starvation wages. The gap between the very, very rich and
everybody else is growing wider. Half of our people are living
paycheck to paycheck. You mentioned that in the city of Boston.
You have a $15.00 minimum wage. I gather and understand that in
the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, you are moving toward a
$15.00 an hour minimum wage. How has that worked for the people
in Boston, in Massachusetts? And is that a concept that you are
sympathetic to?
Mr. Walsh. It is working. I think it is helping people be
able to put a little more money in their pocket as a minimum
wage. In the city of Boston we actually have something else
called the living wage, which is higher than the minimum wage.
And we work on city contracts to try and push that. When I
think about the minimum wage on a Federal level, it has been 11
years since we have raised the minimum wage. The average family
on a current minimum wage salary with the Federal Government is
roughly $15,000 a year. It is impossible to raise a family of
one on that, never mind a family of two or three or four. So I
definitely support raising the minimum wage. I know the
President Biden has made that part of his economic plan as
well.
Senator Sanders. Good. You are a union guy and I think have
a lifetime 100 percent pro union voting record. And I believe
that if we are going to create a strong middle class in this
country, we need to have a strong union movement. We need to
make it impossible for employers to act illegally to prevent
people from joining unions. Or can you tell us what you, as
Secretary of Labor, will do to allow working people in this
country to exercise their constitutional right to join unions?
Mr. Walsh. Well, I know that--thank you, Senator, for that
question. I know that Madam Chair Murray mentioned today about
the PRO Act that is going to be filed with her and Leader
Schumer. That is one step toward helping union people to
organize freely. I do believe in the right of organizing. I do
believe in the right of people being able to join a union if
they choose to join--if they want to join a union. So I
certainly support that.
Senator Sanders. Okay. In the midst of so many of our
people struggling economically, it is no great secret as
Senator Murray mentioned, that women and people of color are
often struggling even harder. Do you have some specific ideas
as to how we can make real progress in combating systemic
racism and sexism and make sure that all of our people,
regardless of their gender or the color of their skin, are able
to advance economically?
Mr. Walsh. No, absolutely. I think, first and foremost, we
have to have more conversations around the country. I don't
think there is enough conversations going on. And I know that
in the beginning of the COVID crisis in Boston, one of the
things that we saw in health care was that people of color,
particularly the Black community, was testing at a higher rate
of positivity cases in COVID-19. We put together a health
inequities task force. That health inequities task force led to
having conversations around hospitalization and the ability for
lack of access to hospitalization and care. That task force
state is still in existence today and still moving forward. We
are working now through--across departments, whether it is our
Office of Equity, our Office of Economic Development, the
Boston Planning and Development Agency, about creating
opportunities, whether it is in private development or it is in
public development. It is about creating opportunities. And we
have to close those gaps.
Our country, and I will speak for Boston, our country, but
Boston, we are dealing with a system of systemic racism that we
have to continue to address. It is not simply just being,
throwing fancy words out there in policies, but it is actually
doing the work, rolling up our sleeves. And in our city, I have
worked with different organizations and we have a women's task
force groups. We have all kinds of different organizations
working with the NAACP, working with the Urban League, working
with employers. I have seen it happen in Boston where we all
get to the table and there really is very little disagreement
at the table. The issue is how do we move agendas forward?
As I mentioned in my opening statement, I am a proud
collaborator, and I don't like top-down pushing on something. I
would rather have a conversation about having everyone
understand the importance of the issue, whether that is pay
equity, whether that is discrimination, whether that is
workplace violence. How do we address those issues? So I look
forward to working with you, Senator, and the entire Senate,
quite honestly, in Congress. But Members of this Committee and
how we can advance some of the concerns that I am going to hear
today.
Senator Sanders. Well, Mr. Mayor, thank you very much. I
look forward to working with you as well. Thank you.
The Chair. Thank you very much, Senator Sanders.
We will go to Senator Marshall.
Senator Marshall. Alright. Madam Chair, again, thanks for
having me, Ranking Member Burr. It is good to be back here
again. And, Mayor, welcome. We will talk about minimum wage for
just a second. Boston, Massachusetts. What is the last cup of
coffee you paid for? What did it cost?
Mr. Walsh. Last cup of coffee paid for in Boston was
probably at Doughboy Donuts, and I think it was $1.75.
Senator Marshall. Well, that is a good deal. That is a good
bargain. You believe in Kansas where I live, some of the gas
stations will give you a cup of coffee if you fill your truck
up with gas and, certainly calmly getting it for less than a
dollar. As I look at cost of living. Median house in Boston,
$600,000. The median house in my hometown of Great Bend is
$83,000. The cost-of-living index in Boston is literally 2.2, a
multiple of 2.2 from where I live. You have a minimum wage
right now of $12.00?
Mr. Walsh. At least $12.70.
Senator Marshall. $12.00. The minimum wage in Great Bend is
$7.25. So a $7.00 an hour job in Great Bend would be like a
$16.00 job in Boston, Massachusetts. I guess, I am trying to
get at is how can we have a nationwide minimum wage of $15.00
which frankly would kill a lot of jobs in Kansas? So how--I
mean, I am all for if you want $15.00 an hour in Boston, knock
your socks off. But in Kansas, that would be a pretty big
wage--a job killing wage.
Mr. Walsh. Well, thank you, Senator. I think the issue
around minimum wage is actually going to be debated on the
Senate floor in the U.S. Congress floor. President Biden has
stressed that he has support of a $15.00 minimum wage, a Nation
wage, national wage. I support him in that, a $15.00 minimum
wage. And I think that there is going to be many conversations
from now until something passes the Senate and the House,
around conversations about how that--if, in fact, it passes.
How does that $15.00 minimum wage gets instituted--
implementing.
Senator Marshall. Thank you for that answer. I want to talk
about, please, for a second. My father was a police officer for
almost 30 years, and it is certainly an issue close to my heart
and it is my understanding that you reallocated $12 million
from the Boston Police Department's overtime budget to,
basically defund the police. I am very happy that President
Biden during this campaign said that he was opposed to efforts
to defund the police. And of course, I am very sensitive and
proud of my police officers, including those among the unions
across the country. As a supporter of unions, how do you
reconcile your actions to defund the department with your
responsibility to protect officers and keep them safe?
Mr. Walsh. Thank you. I love my Boston Police Department.
And if you had a chance to talk to any of the members of my
police department, they will tell you the support that I have
shown them all along as my time as Mayor and prior to that
being Mayor. That was not a defund movement. What we did there
was we shifted $12 million from the police budget into programs
such as mental health counseling, trauma counseling to deal
with the issues that we are dealing with in the city of Boston.
In my Boston Police Department, officers have not lost 1 hour
of overtime from the beginning of this budget cycle.
Senator Marshall. Okay. Let's talk just a second about
right to work Kansas, is a right to work state since our
constitutional amendment in 1975 and the President's
administration proposed eliminating right to work laws in all
28 states that have them, some going back to decades. Do you
believe it brings the country together to upend state
constitutions? And do you believe that individual workers
should have the right to decide whether they belong to a union?
Mr. Walsh. Yes, I believe--I think that we need to continue
to strengthen the American worker here. My role, if confirmed,
as Secretary of Labor would be to work to strengthen the
American worker. I think the worker has every right to choose
what they believe, and I always have believed that. I think
that, people have different opinions of unions and different
opinions of business and different opinions of corporation. And
I see my role, quite honestly, as a Secretary of Labor as
bringing different ideas and different thought processes
together and try and come up with some common understandings
and support.
Senator Marshall. Alright. Thank you, Mayor. I yield back.
Mr. Walsh. Thanks, Senator. Good luck on Sunday.
Senator Marshall. Thank you.
The Chair. Thank you very much, Senator Marshall.
We will turn to Senator Casey.
Senator Casey. Thank you, Madam Chair. I really appreciate
the opportunity to be with Mayor Walsh. I am grateful for your
nomination. And I want to commend and salute your public
service to the city of Boston, your work in the--as a state
representative and your work as a union official. And we are
grateful you are willing to do more public service for the
Nation as Secretary of Labor. And I am grateful for your
willingness to take on some tough issues. I wanted to try to
get to maybe two or three issues. But first one I will start
with is an issue that relates to people with disabilities in
employment.
We know that in order to rebuild the economy and help
millions of unemployed Americans return to not just employment
but safe employment, it is critical that we make sure that
workers with disabilities aren't left behind. Despite the
passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act now 30 years
ago, we have made--and also advances we have made in assistive
technology, job coaching, and other support, good employment
opportunities for people with disabilities remain far too
limited. In 2020, only about 34 percent of people with
disabilities between the ages of 16 and 64 were in the labor
force, compared to about 76 percent of people without
disabilities. So 34 percent versus 76. We can do a hell of a
lot better than that.
I am concerned that as our economy recovers from the
pandemic, people with disabilities will have a particularly
difficult time finding work or returning to work, as they did
in the aftermath of the Great Recession. So, Mayor Walsh, what
are some of the steps you believe the Department of Labor can
take to ensure that people with disabilities are not left
behind by the recovery and the steps you can take to promote
competitive, integrated employment opportunities?
Mr. Walsh. Thank you very much, Senator Casey. And I
enjoyed our conversation the other day. And I look forward to
talking to you more about a whole host of issues. I know the
issue of disability is also very important to Senator Hassan.
We have spent some time talking about that. I know that there
is an Office of--the Office of Disability and Employment Policy
at DOL. It is a small but mighty office. And I look forward to
working to strengthen that office, as well as within my own
office now currently as Mayor of the city, my Office of
Disabilities, which we have been--I have been very engaged with
to really create opportunities for people, not just job
opportunities, but other opportunities that we need. We have a
great program in Boston. It is called Work Incorporated. And
Work Inc. is in Dorchester, and it is a job placement training
program for people with disabilities.
One of the ways that I think that we can strengthen the
opportunity for people is to get organizations like Work Inc.
and give them the support that they need, whether it is the
workforce development grants and training, but also continue to
expand those opportunities. We also have to sit down, in my
opinion, with employers to create opportunities for folks with
disabilities at different job sites and opportunities. We have
been able to do that in the city of Boston. And I think that we
can take that model nationwide. I know that in your home state
you have done it, up in New Hampshire, we have done it. In
different places.
This is an area, one of the areas that I would like to
spend a lot of time and attention on creating real pathways for
folks with disabilities. People with disabilities should not be
treated as second class citizens. People with disabilities
should not be treated as if they are invisible. People with
disabilities are human beings. There our brothers and sisters,
and we need to treat them with the respect that they deserve.
Senator Casey. Mayor, thanks very much. I wanted to talk
finally about miner safety. In your opening remarks, you noted
that one of the most important jobs in the Department is
keeping workers safe on the job. The men and women working in
America's mines rely upon MSHA, the Mine Safety and Health
Administration, to enforce safety laws and regulations to keep
them safe. We need an MSHA that is going to keep those workers
safe. And also an MSHA that will strengthen the silica exposure
standards to better protect those miners. My grandfather on my
father's side, Alphonsus Lagory Casey, worked in the mines as a
kid from 1905 to 1910. Later went on to become a lawyer in his
early 30's. But like a lot of kids in Northeastern
Pennsylvania, he was not given the protections of it as a
child, nor were the adults working in the mines. We need to
make sure MSHA is enforcing the rules. And I just want to get
your thoughts on that as we wrap up.
Mr. Walsh. No, I mean, I agree with you 100 percent on the
safety. We don't have, as I said to you on the phone the other
day, we don't have any mines in the city of Boston. But what we
have done is we have built tunnels and we have a lot of
dangerous work in the city of Boston. And we need to make sure
that when our workers, whether they are going to a mine or a
tunnel or on a construction site or wherever they go, that they
have all the protections that they need and deserve. And I
certainly look forward to working with you more--a lot closer
when it comes to mine safety.
Senator Casey. Mayor, thanks. We look forward to your
confirmation. Thank you, Madam Chair.
The Chair. Thank you, Senator Casey.
Senator Collins.
Senator Collins. Thank you very much. Welcome, Mayor. It is
great to have a fellow New Englander nominated for this
important post. I want to bring up an issue that affected us in
the State of Maine, which is that we experienced widespread
unemployment compensation fraud last spring as we were plussing
up the payments for people who, through no fault of their own,
were unemployed as a result of the pandemic. And what we saw
were these criminal enterprises ruthlessly exploiting gaps in
systems in states all over the country.
At the height of the pandemic, the State of Maine had to
cancel more than 100,000 initial claims and weekly
certifications that were determined to be fraudulent. And this
obviously slows the system for Mainers who legitimately need
the additional unemployment compensation to get by. Do you
support Federal funding to help states upgrade their systems?
Because part of the problems is, we have these legacy systems
that simply cannot handle increased volumes that are slow to
adjust for changing results and that cannot easily catch fraud.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator Collins, and thank you for
our conversation the other day. I look forward to visiting your
home state. Not only do I support the Federal Government
helping, it is a necessary step. Unemployment insurance--first
of all, the money that goes to unemployed workers is taxpayers'
dollars. So we need to make sure that every single dollar gets
to an unemployed worker because we are helping them. We have
never seen a time in our history, country's history, like we
are experiencing right now with the mass loss of jobs from the
beginning of COVID in probably I would say mid-March through
last week. The unemployment system needs to be brought into the
21st century as far as technology. I know that in my own home
State of Massachusetts, we had, hundreds of thousands of
workers unemployed overnight.
The city of Boston worked with the state, with my Governor,
Governor Baker, to help them be able to process some claims. We
were able to assist and train up some folks. But it is about
technology. We are in the 21st century and some of these
systems that our states are working on are antiquated. We need
to change the system, not only change it in the sense of
bringing the systems up, but we also have to make it easier for
workers that are unemployed to access unemployment benefits and
easier for workers that are unemployed when they go back to
work to be able to let the states know that they are back to
work. So I absolutely would look forward to working with you
and this Committee, but the entire Congress to talk about how
do we make those investments, as well as Ranking Member Burr
mentioned in his opening statement about the need of commerce
and labor at one point working together.
I commit to this Committee today, I commit to the President
of the United States of America today that Commerce and Labor
will work together. We will work hand in hand with each other
as we move forward. One of the issues will be unemployment
insurance. And there are many other issues that we are going to
have. But I promise you, we are going to work together for the
American worker and for the American economy.
Senator Collins. Thank you. And one of those things we
discussed is the importance of the H2B program to the State of
Maine. It helps to preserve Maine jobs because during our
tourism season in an ordinary year, we will have four times the
population of the entire state come to the great State of
Maine. And our tourism industry is extremely seasonal. So it is
not that the businesses aren't trying to find Maine workers,
there is simply not enough. We had a great deal of difficulty
in working with the previous administration on this issue, and
I suspect it is an issue in the State of Alaska as well, and
perhaps North Carolina too. And I just want to ask for a
commitment from you to work with us to ensure that the H2B
program has sufficient returning workers, foreign workers to
meet the needs of our seasonal businesses.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator. And, that is an issue that
we spoke about and Senator Murkowski as well when I spoke to
her. Absolutely, you have my commitment to work with you on
this issue. It will certainly bring smiles to the faces of
people in Massachusetts just down 93, a little bit down Route
three to Cape Cod. So I think they will be happy as well.
Senator Collins. Thank you.
The Chair. Thank you, Senator Collins.
We will turn to Senator Baldwin.
Senator Baldwin. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Mr.
Walsh, for joining us today and for your willingness to
continue that service by leading the Department of Labor. I am
looking forward to your swift confirmation and working with you
to help address the many challenges facing our Nation's
workers, families, and businesses. So, as we know, millions of
essential health care workers, food service workers, grocery
store workers and others have been on the front lines of this
pandemic since it began. And it is about time, I think, that
Washington steps up to put those workers health and safety
first. Do you believe protecting worker health is central to
protecting public health in general and combating the spread of
this pandemic? And if so, how do you plan to lead the
Department of Labor in this effort?
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator. Let me just say that while I
have this microphone for a moment, on a nationwide level, I
thank all of our grocery store workers, our first responders,
our ambulance drivers, our nurses, our custodians, the people
on the front line. In the city of Boston when the pandemic hit
us the hardest, those are the folks that went to work every
single day. In the very beginning, if you remember, very little
PPE. We were all going after it, fighting each other to try and
get PPE in our states and our cities. And these folks went to
work every single day and kept our economy moving forward. The
Department of Labor, Secretary of Labor, if I don't protect
those workers and we don't protect those workers, then I don't
have a right to be sitting in that seat.
Those are my people. Those are the people that through
snowstorms, through tragedies, through a pandemic, they are
constantly there for us day in and day out. And we need to do
everything we can to support those workers because they support
us on a daily basis. So I look forward to continuing the
conversation with you, Senator, but also really, doing some
legislative stuff to support workers. But we don't need the
legislation to support workers that take care of us every day.
And again, I want to just personally thank all of those first
responders, thank those grocery store workers, and all those
folks who you have been working tirelessly, that if confirmed,
you will have the Secretary of Labor that understands and cares
and loves you and loves the work that you do every single day.
Senator Baldwin. Well, I appreciate that. I have been
calling on OSHA to implement an emergency temporary standard
for months, and this is really long overdue. So I would urge
you to make a swift decision and move forward on an enforceable
safety standard immediately if that hasn't already begun to
happen by the time you are confirmed. I want to sort of add on
to the call for OSHA to issue an enforceable standard. Included
in the Biden administration's January 21st Executive Order on
Protecting Worker Health and Safety, President Biden asked
Congress to pass legislation that strengthens and expands
OSHA's authority as provisions in my COVID-19 every Worker
Protection Act of 2021 would do.
We--I think that OSHA's emergency temporary standard, if
and when issued, is extremely important, but it still won't
reach all workers, which is why we do have to act
legislatively. Why do you think these expanded safety
protections are needed, and how will workers be left
unprotected if Congress fails to act?
Mr. Walsh. Yes. First and foremost, I also--just a side
note for a second. President Biden also wants to increase the
number of inspectors that OSHA. It is down over 500 over the
last 4 years. And so if we increase standards and don't
increase inspectors then we really don't protect the American
worker. I find it really important that as we think about these
standards, again, as I said in the earlier part of the
conversation here, OSHA should not be looked at by business and
saying, oh, my God, this is terrible. Let's not do that. This
is about protecting their workforce, about protecting their
companies, is about protecting their products. And I do think
that I look forward to working with the Biden administration,
and I look forward to working with the Department of Labor, and
on a closer basis, when confirmed, to make sure that OSHA is
one of the first top priorities that I will address and tackle,
if confirmed.
Senator Baldwin. Thank you.
The Chair. Thank you, Senator Baldwin.
Senator Cassidy.
Senator Cassidy. Hi, Mayor Walsh. Thank you for being here.
I enjoyed our conversation. And as I told you, I have a brother
who lives in Randolph, so it is kind of nice to have a
connection with my beloved brother. Senator Burr spoke to this.
I would like to return to it. Quoting Jimmy Hoffa regarding the
cancelation of the Keystone XL pipeline, ``the Teamsters
strongly oppose. This Executive Order doesn't just affect US
Teamsters, it hurts our Canadian brothers and sisters as well.
It reduces good paying union jobs that allow workers to provide
a middle-class standard of living to their families.'' Now, I
am trying to represent that perspective.
One picture I love, or loved--it was just so poignant--I
don't know if love is the right word, in USA Today, of the guy
in Arkansas standing in front of a partially completed home,
had been told to lay off 11 of his workers, and kind of the
story was how is he going to pay for his home? Do you agree or
disagree with Mr. Hoffa as regards the impact of that Executive
Order?
Mr. Walsh. Senator, thank you for your conversation. It was
great to talk to you today and I look forward to continuing.
Maybe actually when you come to Massachusetts, well I may be
down here so we can--we will take you to dinner in Boston, at
some point we will go back. I am a laborer. I am a member of
Laborers Local 223, international union LIUNA. When that
Executive Order was signed by President Biden, many of the
workers on that job site were labor union members, laborers,
same union book in my pocket that they have. But also in the
American recovery plan, there is an opportunity that we have to
build back better by creating hundreds of thousands of green
jobs----
Senator Cassidy. Mayor, if I can, because my time is
limited, will those jobs be available tomorrow?
Mr. Walsh. They--again, the quicker we can get the American
Recovery Plan Act----
Senator Cassidy. But my point being, because I think you
are talking past me. Because the Keystone XL jobs are going
today, actually last week. The jobs you are describing are in
the by and by, hopefully within a year or more likely longer
than that. Mr. Hoffa also said, aside 8,000 union workers
losing their work, this impacted their ability to pay into
their pension and their retirement. Is that a correct statement
by Mr. Hoffa?
Mr. Walsh. Yes. Well, Mr. Hoffa, if you don't work in that
industry, you do not get pension credit. You do not get health
care credit. That is absolutely--.
Senator Cassidy. The Executive Order, and I grant that the
Administration has high hopes that sometime from now, maybe
even six months, probably more like one or two or three or four
years, there will be jobs which will replace these on the
ledger sheet, because the pipefitter may not get a job at
making solar panels because that is a different set of
training. The pipefitter may be 55, etcetera. The impact on
that pipefitter, the guy in front of the half-completed house,
will that be made up tomorrow by everything the Administration
is planning on their American Recovery Act?
Mr. Walsh. The jobs that were lost during Keystone will be
more than made up with the American Recovery Act.
Senator Cassidy. For that individual worker?
Mr. Walsh. That pipefitter will be connecting steam. That
pipefitter will have opportunities in that economy. That
ironworker will have opportunities in that economy. That
laborer, that operator, that Teamster, that carpenter, that
plumber, all of those different trades and skills that people
have in this country will have great opportunity in this new
economy as we move forward.
Senator Cassidy. Is there a sense of when the first of
those jobs would come out knowing that the money is not even
been appropriated yet and it is got to filter its way through
the system and there has to be bids made and there has to be so
on. I think it is reasonable to say it will be quite some time,
but the guy has got a mortgage payment next month. And now, I
will just make parenthetically, we don't ask you to comment on
this. We had experts yesterday in the Energy committee,
bipartisan experts, and what they said is we are going to
continue to use oil and gas for decades around the world.
The United States uses the best, the highest environmental
standards. If we don't produce it, another country will, which
does not have our standards, which will increase global
greenhouse gas emissions. Not only do the jobs, they migrate to
another country, many making Russia's economy better, for
example, but we increase global greenhouse gas emissions. I
applaud the efforts to employ those tradesmen and women on
other types of activity, but we are being disingenuous if we
don't recognize the impact it has upon them right now. They
face poverty because of an Executive Order that will increase
global greenhouse gas emissions. With that, Mayor, I yield
back, and I thank you for your testimony. And I thank you for
offering yourself for service.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator.
The Chair. Thank you, Senator Cassidy.
We will go to Senator Murphy.
Senator Murphy. Thank you, Madam Chair. Great to see you,
Mayor. Thank you very much for the time this week and our
conversation. I enjoyed it. I wanted to try to squeeze in two
or three topics, if I can, in a short amount of time here. The
first is the issue of mental health. CDC reported that during
the pandemic there has been a really substantial increase in
emergency room visits for mental health and substance abuse, 24
percent for five to 11 year olds, for 12 to 17 year olds, 31
percent. This is particularly acute among children who are
experiencing lots of traumas because of the COVID epidemic.
Might seem like a strange topic to raise with the potential
Secretary of Labor, except for the fact that Labor actually
holds the enforcement powers with respect to mental health
parity laws. Senator Cassidy and I actually passed legislation
at the end of last year that gives the Department of Labor new
powers to do audits of insurance companies to make sure that
they are complying with the parity law.
Often what we find is that insurance companies put up all
sorts of bureaucratic hurdles to reimbursement for mental
health and substance abuse treatment that you don't find if you
are going for an orthopedic visit or for a cancer treatment.
And so I just want to ask you to make a commitment that you are
going to implement these new authorities and you will work with
us to make sure that the Department of Labor is an active
participant in making sure that the parity laws that have been
supported by Republicans and Democrats are working.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator. And one of the--when I was
mentioned as a potential nominee for this job, I went online,
and I was reading all the different areas of Department of
Labor. I knew obviously a lot of the kind of the bread and
butter of the Department of Labor. And when I got to the
section that talked about mental health and substance use, it
perked my attention to my personal story, but also for my time
in the legislature, I was Mayor or whatever it was. There isn't
a Member in this room today, not a person in this room today
that a family member or a close friend or one person removed
are dealing with the issue of mental health issue, mental
health problems or substance use problems, whether that is
drugs or alcohol. And it is something that, quite honestly, we
need to do a lot more for. Yes, COVID has put a big spotlight
on it. And we can see that mental health crisis are more and
more every day and they are going--people are going more, using
hospital access and treatment.
Substance use disorder. Obviously, it is no surprise that
the disease of substance use is a disease of isolation. And we
are in a period where we are telling people not to congregate
and don't see each other. So I will do everything I can. And
that is if--I don't really, personally don't mind if it bothers
people. I am going to do everything I can to make sure we have
parity for mental health and substance use disorder and that
people have access to treatment because that is a game changer
for people.
That is a game changer for families to have that type of
treatment accessible and available and not have to go through
all kinds of hoops. Because when somebody--you have a moment in
time. When somebody has a mental health issue and they are
willing to get help or somebody has a substance use disorder
and they want to get help, you have a moment. You have a moment
to make that happen. And you can't wait till next Tuesday or
next Thursday of next week or next month because that
opportunity is going to be gone. And there are other chances
that you lose that person. So my answer to you, my long answer
to you--my short answer is, yes, I do. I will work with you.
Senator Murphy. Great. And again, you will see that you
have new authorities granted you by Congress that you can use.
And I hope that you will be vigorous in using them. Let me ask
one more question, and that is about the work the Department of
Labor has done to help us buildup our workforce capacity in the
defense industrial area. In Connecticut, we are really proud of
something we call the Eastern Connecticut Manufacturing
Pipeline Initiative. It has gained national recognition because
it partners together Electric Boat, which makes our submarines
in eastern Connecticut, with our community colleges and our
workforce training programs in order to make sure that we are
supplying Electric Boat in this case and their supply chain
with the tens of thousands of workers that they are going to
need as we dramatically scale up submarine production. This was
made possible by a grant from the Department of Labor, but the
Trump administration ceased making these kinds of grants to
public, private partnerships. Can you--I know you have had
experience in this area. I just wanted your commitment to take
a look at that program and talk to us on both sides of the
aisle about potentially restarting. It is really important to
us in Connecticut.
Mr. Walsh. Yes, absolutely Senator.
Senator Murphy. Great. Thank you very much. Thank you,
Madam Chair.
The Chair. Thank you very much.
We will turn to Senator Murkowski.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you, Madam Chair. And Mayor, it
was good to talk with you the other day. Look forward to your
visit to Alaska. You had expressed a great deal of enthusiasm
about that. And we want to make sure that we show you the best.
We have got some interesting jobs up North, as I mentioned to
you. We have resources. We have oil, we have gas, we have
minerals, we have trees, we have fish. What we don't have is
manufacturing. We don't manufacture automobiles. We don't
produce pharmaceuticals.
As we look to this transition, the incoming administration,
the Biden administration has said we are going to be moving,
making this transition to these clean energy jobs. And we are
very proud of the way that we do produce our resources and try
to do them with a limited environmental footprint, working as
much as possible to make sure that we have reduced our
emissions and that we are accessing these resources in a
responsible way. But at the end of the day, whether you are the
automobile manufacturer or the pharmaceutical or the company
that is manufacturing the wind turbines here in America, we
want all of that, we have got to get the resources from
somewhere. And this is where States like Alaska have that
advantage, because we have that natural bounty, and we are
willing to be the producers so that we can provide for the rest
of the country.
To follow on Senator Kennedy's, excuse me, Cassidy's
comments about the impact of the Keystone pipeline and the
decision made there and real jobs, real energy jobs lost now, I
would ask that you look critically when you talk about the
energy jobs that are lost, that we are also thinking about our
critical minerals, the base resource that allows us to, again,
have an opportunity here in this country to be somewhat
independent. In the Energy Committee that Senator Cassidy
referenced yesterday, one of the other statements that was made
was that we, for a period of time, were energy vulnerable. We
were importing our oil. We turned that corner. We are an
exporter, but we are now showing greater vulnerability when it
comes to our mineral resources.
The analogy that was made was we have gone from
vulnerability from a liquid state to now a solid state, if you
will. I raise this because when we think about those jobs
around the country and how we transition to clean jobs, I think
we need to remember that there will be certain parts of the
country where you will need to continue to access these base
resources. So what we want to be able to do is do that in a way
that harnesses the strong technologies that allow us to do this
with reduced emissions. But don't kill the jobs. Don't send
those jobs overseas where the environmental practices are much
less responsible, where the labor practices are clearly less
responsible. There is not really a question there, Mayor, but I
wanted to just reinforce what Senator Cassidy has raised,
because I think this is one of the responsibilities that you
will have if confirmed as Secretary, which I assume you will
be, is ensuring that jobs across America continue and that they
are good jobs that can sustain families and even in high-cost
States like Alaska.
In our conversation, I also mentioned fish and the
significance of that to our state's economy. I want to just
reinforce what Senator Collins mentioned with the H2Bs,
recognizing that we are going to need your help with ensuring
that the systems are fair, that there is the ability to count
on these workers. So if we need legislation to change the
programs, we want to work with you to do just exactly that. I
do ask, though, that in addition to looking longer term for the
changes that will need to come, that you will help us with this
upcoming season in ensuring that we have the ability to bring
in these workers. Again, these are in areas that are as remote
as you will ever find.
There is not a lot of entertainment after work. It is a
pretty challenging environment. So we want to get you up to the
states so that you can see firsthand these good resource jobs
and jobs that Alaskans have come to rely on, and the country
has come to rely on what we produce. Madam Chair, I am sorry
there wasn't a question there, but I think the Mayor and I have
had a good chance to talk, and this was my five minutes to just
put it on the record with you. I look forward to hosting you.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator. I look forward to visiting
your state.
Senator Murkowski. Very good. Thank you.
The Chair. Alright. Thank you, Senator Murkowski.
We will turn to Senator Kaine.
Senator Kaine. Thank you, Madam Chair. Mr. Mayor, welcome.
I have got a soft spot for Irish Catholic Mayors who grew up in
pro union households. And I am very, very happy. And just I
will say I am so glad that President Biden has asked somebody
with a labor background to be in the cabinet. I, when I was
Governor, put a labor guy in as a Cabinet Secretary and my
legislature blocked him. First time that a legislature ever
blocked any cabinet nominee. I was able to then put him in
charge of the state's workforce programs, which wasn't
confirmable by my legislature. But they seemed very worried
that somebody from Labor would be sitting around the table. We
have had so many people in my state and in this country, who
had great business experience or Secretaries of Commerce or
heads of the Small Business Administration, and that is exactly
as it should be.
But we don't have a full picture, a full spectrum of views
around the table if we don't have labor represented right there
at the cabinet table. And so I am very, very happy that the
President has nominated you. Senator Baldwin, talking about the
idea of the OSHA temporary standard, and I don't want to
belabor it, but I am proud that Virginia was the first state to
adopt one. We adopted it in a special session last year. And I
think it is working well. By all accounts, it was very
responsive to the needs of people who are really worried about
what, whether they could safely go to work in the early stages
of this pandemic, whether there was a lot of information and
also misinformation about what safety was and wasn't and giving
clear guidance to employers and clear guidance to workers and
clear guidance to customers has been a positive.
Should you be confirmed, I hope you will take a look at the
standard that Virginia and now other states have followed, have
done as potential guidance for what OSHA might do. You are a
laborer. My dad ran a shop that was ironworker organized. We
need a lot of workers who are trained in these fields. I think
it is likely my view that President Biden might do an
infrastructure bill. But you can't do big infrastructure
investments if you don't have the people who are there to do
the job. Surveys of our workforce suggest that workers in
infrastructure industries are expected to retire at about 50
percent higher rate than the general workforce because of age
and the challenges of the job.
I hope that you will work with me and with Secretary
Cardona, who was before us yesterday and did a good job at his
hearing, because I think these are kind of crosscutting issues.
I hope you will work with the Committee. And I know you have
talked with the Madam Chair about this on the community college
side, to really focus on ways that we can build the workforce
that will be needed if we are going to make a commitment to
broadband everybody or make a commitment to the green energy
economy. As we work toward passing infrastructure, just talk a
little bit about what you see DOL's role in your role as
Secretary and making sure that we are preparing folks to do
those important jobs.
Mr. Walsh. Yes. First and foremost and I thank. I was
looking--doing some research. And so what your state did at the
beginning of the pandemic and save lives--quite honestly, the
work that was done to save lives. I think that the work of the
DOL, quite honestly, can do the same in many different areas.
We can save lives when it comes to standards and working with
OSHA. We can enhance opportunities when it comes to green jobs
and technology. We can work with--we can enhance opportunities
and deal with pay equity when it comes to women and people of
color. There are lots of areas. We can expand mental health and
substance use treatment.
There is lots of areas within the Department of Labor that
is--we talked about of being pro worker, but it is pro economy.
And, I was thinking about it last night as I was preparing for
today, thinking about my role as the Secretary of Labor. And it
went back to home base for me. I thought about my uncle and my
father talking at the kitchen table on Sundays about fighting
for the rights of workers, about making sure the jobs were
there so people wouldn't be unemployed, making sure that they
didn't have the benefit dances to support union brothers and
sisters because their kids were sick, or somebody died. I
thought about the employers I work with as the Mayor of the
city of Boston that I want to build things, want to grow, want
to attract, tech companies and sneaker companies and financial
service companies in the city of Boston. That is not a
competing--that is not competing with the American worker. That
is enhancing the American worker. And, what you see is what you
get. And there is an opportunity for us to really--I keep
hearing stories about, the past administration and what they
didn't do in the one before that, what they didn't do, what
they didn't do. We have an opportunity, and I can't do a thing
about the past.
All I can talk about is the future. All I can talk about is
that, if confirmed, you and the American people are going to
get 100 percent out of me each and every day. And the American
people are made up of workers, of businesses, of industry. So I
know I am a little off what you asked me, but to bring it back
home is, yes, I am going to do everything I can as the head of
the Department of Labor, if confirmed, to be able to advance
workers' rights and to move our economy forward. When I see
advance workers' rights, if it means being safe on the job
site, it means being safe on the job site. Somebody had to come
into this room today and set it up. And somebody had to come
into this room yesterday after the hearing and clean it up. So
we need to make sure we continue to make sure that we advance--
if we advance the American worker, we are advancing the
American economy.
Senator Kaine. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Mr. Chair--
thanks, Madam Chair. Thanks, Madam Chair.
The Chair. I know who you meant. Thank you, Senator Kaine.
We will turn to Senator Braun.
Senator Braun. Thank you, Madam Chair. First of all, really
enjoyed our conversation a week ago. I think it may be exceeded
a half an hour and it was so much we were talking about. I come
from the world of small business. Was lucky over time that my
15-employee enterprise ended up turning into a national
company. Three of my four kids, a great young executive team,
run it. I would like to talk about where we were pre-COVID.
To me, it was the hottest economy that I have ever been a
part of. The policies that were different from the prior
administration, to me I think had a lot to do with it. And I
will cite a few of them. We had finally started to move wages
and I have been a proponent because I treat my employees like
family, raising wages is as important as your return on equity.
It is part of what almost all small businesses would have as
the highest priority. Were we making progress? And I will say
that it was happening through the private sector in the
marketplace. What was wrong with that? And why do we want to
fix something if it is not broken?
Mr. Walsh. I enjoyed our conversation as well, and I look
forward to having many more with you in. Your story of starting
a small business is the American dream in a lot of ways. We
have many small businesses in Boston. Some of those small
businesses turn into big corporations, which is God bless them,
and that is a good thing to see. I think that the economy--I
mean, talking to my colleagues, U.S. Conference of Mayors, the
Mayors around the country, we were doing really well in urban
areas and not necessarily in rural areas of the country over
the last 4 or 5, 10, 15 years.
I do think that there is an opportunity to continue to
build back an economy. COVID just stopped everything in its
tracks. We know that. I mean, I saw what it has done in the
city of Boston to restaurants, small businesses, to the
workforce, to everything. If we didn't have COVID, we wouldn't
be talking about unemployment insurance. We wouldn't be talking
about fraud. We wouldn't be talking about, the American rescue
plan. We wouldn't be talking about all that stuff. We would be
talking about how do we move our economy forward. We need to
get back to that point. We need to get back. But we also need
to think back.
President Biden talks about building back better. He is
talking about that for all Americans across the board. So I
agree with you, raising wages is important, and thank you for
mentioning that, but I also think that we have to start making
sure that it is every single city and town in the United States
of America that benefits from a good economy, not just places
like Boston, Massachusetts, or, Dallas, Texas or Chicago or
wherever.
Senator Braun. I agree with that as well, because it is
different across the country. Places that have higher costs of
living generally have higher wages--places like Indiana, where
I think it is a sweet spot in the United States with high
incomes and low cost of living. I want to segway into this, and
it is the minimum wage. Almost any small business, mine
included, proud that we have one of the highest starting wages
and the lowest unemployment county or one of them in Indiana,
due to that extent, because they want to keep their employees,
they want them to have a good living out of the business that
the employees and the owners of small business are more
interactive, than any other place in the economy, especially
big corporations and their employees. So tipped wage income.
Among restaurants that have been most devastated, and I
would differ a little bit that when you start getting
bureaucratic about essential workers and not, in my downtown
every small business was shut down and they could have
practiced the distancing and wearing masks better than some of
the places that were considered essential. Putting that aside,
focusing on minimum wage, speaking to our restaurant
association and an owner telling me how his tipped wage
employees were making between $15.00 and $25.00 bucks an hour.
By taking that away to the sector most devastated, you would
then be putting them into almost a different paradigm if you
push forward with a comprehensive minimum wage of $15.00 bucks.
In this case, I think you need to look at it the way you
reflect the differences between places and that you don't have
a one size fits all, which maybe was the way we went wrong with
handling the pandemic in the first place. We needed to treat it
with respect. But it should have been maybe a little more
careful on what we did bureaucratically. Tell me what you would
do on that particular part with restaurants most devastated,
taking away their tipped wage plan that actually exceeds the
minimum wage in almost all places.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you. So two things. One is, I think
President Biden has been very clear on the minimum wage as a
whole. He would like to have bipartisan support to move a piece
of legislation forward to support increasing the minimum wage.
He has been clear on that and it has been reported in the news
for the last several days. On the second part of your question,
ironically, yesterday, I was talking to a restaurant owner in
Boston who owns restaurants around the country. And this issue
came up. And we talked about this particular issue because he
is like, this is going to be--he is mad at me that I am
potentially leaving as Mayor, but he is happy I am going to be
here now because we started talking about the wage piece of it.
What I said to him was, we talked back and forth about his
restaurant and the concerns I don't have with him, but the
concerns around the country. And he said we have to do--we have
to do a better job of talking to my colleagues around the
country to treating their workers with respect so that this
doesn't become an issue of the tip wage. What I am looking
forward to is working with the Administration, working with
you, Senator, and I will continue this conversation, we have 40
seconds left here, on this on how we move forward here.
If confirmed, I will be--if I don't get confirmed, before I
get confirmed, I would love to talk to you more about this
offline to see how we come up with some resolutions.
Senator Braun. Thank you. And representing small business
as a Senator most recently of, out of the trenches, I want to
work with you and listen to what small businesses do. I think
they have got the same thing in mind that all of us want to do,
raise wages and a good job.
Mr. Walsh. I love--I love my small businesses in Boston. I
support them. We supported them throughout the pandemic. Going
to continue to support them. So, thank you.
Senator Braun. Thank you.
The Chair. Thank you, Senator Braun.
We will turn to Senator Hassan.
Senator Hassan. Well, thank you, Madam Chair Murray. And
thank you, Ranking Member Burr. And thank you, Mr. Walsh, for
being here today. I want to thank you and Lori for being
willing to continue service because it takes everybody around
you to make this possible, and we are really grateful. I also
want to thank you for mentioning to Senator Casey the interest
that you and I have talked about around workers with
disabilities. And I just want to note how proud I am of the
people of New Hampshire and the businesses of New Hampshire for
being the first state in the country to outlaw the sub-minimum
wage while I was Governor. And that was really because business
leaders stepped forward and said, we value these workers. They
do great work. Why the heck don't they get the same wages as
everybody else?
I look forward to continuing to work with you on that
issue. I want to turn to an issue we have talked a lot about
this morning which is how particularly in the wake of this
pandemic we help workers who have lost their jobs get the
skills that they need. And obviously, it is not just about post
pandemic economics, it is about workforce training generally.
And we have had a lot of discussion this morning about it. I
just wanted to highlight that I have reintroduced the
bipartisan Gateway to Careers Act, something we talked about
when we spoke last week with Senators Young, Collins and Kaine.
That is one that would support opportunities for workers to
earn as they learn, as well as provide important supports to
workers who face barriers like transportation or childcare
assistance. I am particularly interested as we think about
this, and you have mentioned it a little bit, how the
Department of Labor can support these kinds of programs working
with the Department of Education, because I think there is a
lot of crossover there so you can expand learning opportunities
for workers who have lost their jobs.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator. And I look forward to
working with you as they have in the past. And it is great to
see you today. When it comes to job training, you have to work
across agency lines, you have to work with Commerce. We need to
work with Education. We need to work with higher education.
Higher education, education, schools across America have the
infrastructure to be able to help us really maximize the job
training opportunities and the efforts that we invest in job
training. In the city of Boston, I worked very closely with
schools like Bunker Hill Community College, Roxbury Community
College, MassBay Community College, and other community
colleges on training and job training opportunities for young
people who have worked on internships. In our high schools, we
have a very robust summer job program in the city of Boston.
Obviously, this year is different because of COVID, but
prior to that, about 11,000 young people were employed in the
tech industry, in the financial service industries, in
different industries in the city of Boston, which gives kids
from the inner city the opportunity to get be exposed to a
career they might otherwise never would have imagined. Having
the opportunity here is exciting in the Department of Labor.
Senator Murphy was talking about job training for specific
industries, but there really is opportunities here. And
having--those crossovers need to happen.
Job training is not a Republican or Democratic issue. It is
not progressive or conservative issue. There are people all
across the aisles, all over wherever they are, and they are
struggling right now. And having the ability to make an
immediate impact on their outcome or their family's outcome is
really important. So I think that, working with the Senate,
working with this Committee, first and foremost, because you
cover it all, you cover the labor, you have the education, we
have an opportunity here.
But I think that working in a fast manner once confirmed
over at DOL I think that is something that would be important
for me and a priority that I would want to work with you and
other folks on. And not forgetting, not forgetting the
communities that are forgotten, the disability community, the
recovery community and other communities.
Senator Hassan. Well, thank you. And you just mentioned one
of the other communities I wanted to talk to you about. We know
we have to expand opportunities for workers who are in recovery
from substance misuse, an issue that is huge in my state. I
know it is huge in Massachusetts. And so for so many of our
colleagues. We continue to grapple with the opioid epidemic,
often leaving individuals in recovery, struggling to find their
way back into the workforce. And I think there are employers
who want to be helpful but maybe don't have the tools to do it.
So what can we do to ensure that these workers receive the
necessary supports to reenter the workforce and stay in
recovery?
Mr. Walsh. I believe in second chances or I would not be
sitting here as the nominee for Secretary of Labor. A lot of
people that we talk when you talk about substance use disorder,
alcoholism, drugs, mental health, many of those people made
mistakes that are held against them for their entire life. We
have to do something about that. I have worked with employers
in the city of Boston that have been amazing, that have given
people opportunities, second chances. People have proven that
they are looking for and will work for a second chance. So I
think the stigma around this as well has to be addressed and
that we have to--don't have enough time to get deep into it but
I think stigma is something that we have to address as well.
Senator Hassan. I would agree with that wholeheartedly. I
am over time so I will submit a question to the record perhaps
about retirement issues. Obviously, we need to make sure our
workforce can retire with dignity and we have got a lot of work
to do there as well. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator.
The Chair. Thank you, Senator Hassan.
We will turn to Senator Scott.
Senator Scott. Thank you, Madam Chair. And Mayor Walsh,
thank you for your willingness to serve. Without question, you
and I both share the story of redemption, perhaps in different
areas, but certainly I appreciate your remarkable story of
miraculous recovery and the fact that you are very passionate
about the country that you live in. And that being a Mayor, I
spent 13 years in local Government, so I certainly appreciate
the commitment that it takes and the tenacity that it takes to
do what you have done. I thank you for doing it. I thank you
for your willingness to serve in the Department of Labor as the
Secretary. I know that you and I will find some common ground
perhaps on workforce development.
There are other areas where we will have passionate
disagreements. And you have already stated your support for the
PRO Act and the Recovery Plan and those are two areas that we
are going to have passion disagreements. I come from a state
like 27 other states in this Nation that have right to work
laws. After we became a right to work state in 1954, we have
thousands upon thousands of employees who are members of
unions. It is their right in South Carolina. We protect their
right to unionize. What I am very concerned about the Pro Act
is overnight those 27 states lose their ability to be right to
work states. That is devastating for the economic future of
this Nation, devastating for those employees within those
states, and frankly, a bad decision and a poor start for this
Administration, especially when you think about the fact from
2001 to 2016, right to work states saw somewhere around 27
percent of growth of jobs in their states, and I believe it was
somewhere near a 10-point increase in personal income in those
same states during the same time period.
At the same time, we were able to drive unemployment down
precipitously. So if you can have more jobs, making more money,
with low unemployment, that sounds like a recipe for this
Nation. Unfortunately, the PRO Act literally overnight squashes
the dreams of millions of people living in those 27 states. I
am a guy who believes that we can continue in the path of high-
tech manufacturing. That is what South Carolina has become a
champion of the of, five major tire companies all hold their
homes in South Carolina. BMW, Volvo, Mercedes, Boeing, all call
their homes in South Carolina. And that story is throughout the
Nation. So when we think about stopping the right of states to
be right to work, when we think about having contracts of
forced workers to pay union dues just to get a job, when we
think about undermining secret ballot elections and restoring
the Browning-Ferris standard for employers that will cause the
franchising sector $33 billion a year, hundreds of thousands of
jobs, the PRO Act is a place where you and I will have strong,
passionate disagreements.
My ask of you is to make sure that with a 50, 50 Senate,
nearly a 50 percent, 50 percent House, that you agree to talk
with both sides before moving forward and undermining the
rights of those states as well. I hope that you can--I would
love if you change your mind on the PRO Act but I don't think
you will. But I hope that you will come to both sides to have a
conversation about how to move forward with something that will
be devastating to states like my home State of South Carolina.
Is that something that you can commit to?
Mr. Walsh. Absolutely, Senator. That is something I am
proud to do. I am--I generally like to be a collaborator. I
absolutely will not surprise you. I would love to keep those
dialogs going. I have done that my whole entire career.
Senator Scott. I appreciate that, sir. And I know that you
and I will, as we look at the Recovery Plan, perhaps not agree
on the minimum wage either. But this is another example of bad
policy, perhaps with good intention. Raising the minimum wage
from where it is now to $15.00 an hour will shutter, kill,
destroy somewhere near 4 million jobs. CBO says upwards of 3.7
million jobs lost, and I think that translates into about $9
billion of personal income vanishes, vanishes. So increasing
the minimum wage actually destroys income and a net loss for
America. I hope we have an opportunity to recalibrate that. And
I heard your conversation on tipped wages. I will simply say I
have been visiting restaurants in South Carolina and in D.C.
One thing that servers and bartenders have in common, they hate
the concept of losing their tips. Thank you, Madam Chair.
The Chair. Thank you very much, Senator Scott.
We will turn to Senator Smith.
Senator Smith. Thank you, Madam Chair, and also thank you,
Ranking Member, for this hearing. And Mayor Walsh,
congratulations. And I want to thank you for your service and
your willingness to take on this really important job. We had a
great conversation and I appreciate shared stories from City
Hall where I was chief of staff, and I joked that when you are
Mayor, there is no job that is too big or too small for a Mayor
to undertake. And also the best cliche is that potholes aren't
political. And I think that is true, though, that most issues
that you deal with in the Mayor's office aren't partisan.
I can hear in your answers today, in your responses to
folks across the aisle, that sort of problem-solving spirit
that I think Mayors tend to have, so I want to thank you. I
also am really interested and so glad for your background, your
family background. I mean, organized labor. I was 18. I joined
the union so that I could go and work on the Trans-Alaska
pipeline in order to help pay for college and I have seen
first-hand, as I know that you have in your family, that the
right to come together and organize collectively for better
working conditions, better wages, for safer workplaces is a
powerful, powerful thing. And it lifts everybody up. As my
mentor in Minnesota, Paul Wellstone, says, it makes it possible
so that when we all do better, we all do better.
With that spirit, I was thinking this weekend I visited the
picket line of Teamsters Local 120 who were picketing outside
of Marathon Oil, fighting as hard as they can for a safe
workplace, not only for themselves, but also for the
surrounding community and the families that live less than a
football field away from that refinery, a place that has the
potential to be just as dangerous as the Husky refinery that
exploded in Wisconsin. So your job here to help make sure that
we have safe workplaces feels so important to me and very, very
tangible and in the moment. I want to ask you a little bit
about that, Mayor Walsh.
We know that wage theft and unsafe working conditions
continue to plague working people in this country, and that too
often we don't treat wage theft the way we treat other kinds of
theft, even though it steals money out of the pockets of
working people every single day. And in 2013, this Committee,
an investigation by this Committee discovered that over a five-
year period, 42 workers were killed on the job because of
violations of worker safety laws by companies with Federal
contracts. And in that same period, 32 of the largest 100 wage
theft penalties were assessed against Federal contractors.
I think as Federal leaders, we have a responsibility to
address this. And I want to ask you, will you take steps to
hold Federal contractors accountable for dangerous work sites,
for stealing wages, or discrimination?
Mr. Walsh. Thank you very much, Senator. Let me just really
quickly address what you said earlier. No worker in this
country should have to take a go to a picket line, walk off the
job or quit because of safety regulations. Inside there
companies that should just not happen. And I think it is
important that, because we talked about--many of the Senators
today brought up OSHA and we had a little conversation about
OSHA, Federal contracted employee, Federal contracts that we
give out should follow the rules and regulations as well,
whether it is paying fair wages, whether it is respecting the
rights of workers, whether it is making sure that we have safe
working conditions today due to COVID but tomorrow due to other
situations.
Yes, I commit to working with you, but working with the
Department more importantly to make sure that these contracts
are properly carried out and workers' regulations are followed,
and rules are followed, and safety is followed and pay equity
followed, and everything that is important. Again, it is
taxpayer money in these contracts. We need to spend them the
best way we can spend them.
Senator Smith. Well, I really appreciate that, Mayor. I
couldn't agree with you more, and I look forward to working
with you on that. I have a bill to help make clear that
responsibility that we have. And I would love to work with you
on that. I want to also--I just got a couple of minutes left. I
want to mention to you that I look forward to working with you
on the great challenges we have with multiemployer pensions. I
think we spoke briefly about this when you and I spoke.
During my first weekend as Senator I traveled to Duluth to
talk with the Teamsters again about their deep worries about
losing their pensions. This is a worry not only for them, but
for the businesses that they work for. They did everything
right. They paid into their pensions only to find that now it
might not be there for them. And I will never forget Vicki, who
I met there, who said, Tina, I don't have a plan B if I lose my
pension. So this is something that I really believe that we can
work on together and I look forward to that.
I am just out of time, Madam Chair, but I want to also
mention quickly that in Minnesota we need your help to make
sure that high school students are eligible to access the
pandemic unemployment insurance program. They have been saving
money to help pay for their families. This is something that we
can do, and I would love to work with you on that as well,
Mayor Walsh.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator.
The Chair. Thank you, Senator Smith.
We will turn to Senator Tuberville.
Senator Tuberville. Thank you, Madam Chair. Mayor, welcome.
I have had several jobs in my lifetime and had to go through
this as a coach, so I know what you are going through, but
welcome. Most people have gone through all my questions. I just
want to reiterate some things that you said and get kind of
your response. Being in the education business for 40 years and
have been around kids going to college and coming out of high
school, as you said, a lot of these kids don't need to go to a
four-year school. They don't need to go. They need to go get a
job, but they need to go be trained for a job. And I have
learned over my career that just saying that we are going to go
to community college or going to a junior college doesn't work.
We are going to--we need to start in the high schools. We
need to start them in vocational areas in the high schools. I
know when I came through high school, I had vocation classes
and I got interested in electricity and learned a lot about
electricity over the years. Of course, I went into coaching and
did pretty well. But I just want to get your thoughts.
Being in education, of course, this is an education
question, but I hope when you finish your tenure in this new
job that people know your name. Know your name as somebody that
really got people into a business or a field that they wanted
to get into where they could raise a family and make money. And
that is all part of life. And I just want to ask you, what do
you think your goal is of really getting kids not just in
community college, but in high school, involved in a real job,
something to use their hands?
Mr. Walsh. No, thank you. Thank you for that. And thank you
for your comment. You saw in your lived experience young people
that played for you, that if they didn't have that desire for
the game, they probably wouldn't be in college. We need to get
that same type of desire in young people in the trades, like
you mentioned, about electricity or whatever it may be. We need
to do a lot better job, I think. I will speak for Boston
because I have seen it. We need to do a lot better job around
vocational training. We need to do a lot better job around
creating pathways and opportunities for young people. People
don't know what their passion is. When I was 17, I didn't
really know what my passion was. I ended up going to work in
labor because my father was a laborer. I went to labor with
him.
My father wanted me to put a suit and tie on when I got
older. So I agree with what you have lived, and you have seen
as an opportunity. How do we translate that into the work that
I have done into programs that we can put all across America
into every high school and community college? I think that is
what we need to. We have--there are millions and millions and
millions of young people right now that if we don't take action
soon, they are never going to get to the middle class. They are
never going to have an opportunity because they won't have a
chance to be helped and guidance on what they want to do.
How do I do that? I think we work collectively together
across the aisle. I think we listen to ideas and share best
practices. I think that we work with the Secretary of Education
to talk about policies that can be put into play during the
Department of Education. I think we talk to colleges across
this country as well because they are interested in this as
well. I think that we put together, maybe put together a task
force to talk about how do we create people for the American
21st century recovery, kind of as President Biden talks about
build back better.
Well, we build back better. Let's create something, build
back better for high schoolers right now so that as we are
building back better, they are part of the building.
Senator Tuberville. Education is key to freedom. And we
have got to get these kids away from these computers and
PlayStation games and get them to use their hands and really
understand they got to go to work for a living one of these
days. And appreciate your comments on that. In Alabama, we are
a right to work state. Next week, Amazon has got 6,000 people
voting on a proposal to whether unionize or not unionize. And
we have had several big manufacturing jobs in our state that
has turned it down. What advice would you give to them when
they go to vote next week? What can a union do for them that
hadn't done much in Alabama?
Mr. Walsh. I don't know if that is my place to be able to
say that, but I think you vote your heart. You listen to both
sides of the conversation. I think the key to the PRO Act is
that you have the right to organize and everyone has the right
to organize. Everyone should be able to, if they choose, to
organize, they organize, and the union that they organize with
will have the opportunity to go in and negotiate good salary,
good wages, good benefits and working conditions, all that
stuff. I think that, for the workers, I am not as familiar with
what is going on in Alabama with Amazon, but I know that the
workers, I know there has been a lot of interest in workers
wanting to be covered by a union because they felt some of the
disparities that they felt on the job site.
Senator Tuberville. I would just hope that in this job,
though, you wouldn't feel the need to put your hand on the
scale at all to convince people to do whatever. But because we
have been, we have had pretty good success with it. But Mayor,
good luck to you. And again, I hope people know your name quite
often in the next few years because this infrastructure bill
that is coming down the pipe, we are going to need people to
work. It is not going to happen with money. It is going to
happen with workers. And you are going to be a big part of
that. So thank you very much for your time. And thank you.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator.
The Chair. Thank you, Senator Tuberville.
We will turn to Senator Rosen.
Senator Rosen. Thank you, Madam Chair, Ranking Member Burr.
Appreciate the work here today. And Mayor Walsh, thank you for
being with us, for all of your answers, for your commitment to
serving your community and your Nation. I really appreciated
the productive meeting that we had. I look forward to learning
about your plans. We are going to support working families,
revive our Nation's economy, create jobs, and, of course, train
America's workforce, to everybody's point, because my State of
Nevada, working families, like every state, they are the
backbone of Nevada. Our strong labor unions are what made us a
middle-class hospitality center. Entertainment, our stages,
tourism, our tourism-based economy is all possible because of
our labor unions.
This global pandemic has just devastated our workforce. It
has led to record unemployment. I urge this Committee's swift
nomination of Mayor Walsh to get to work. But COVID-19 has
devastated communities across this country. It has strained the
system that we use to deliver relief to struggling families. My
home State of Nevada, we have seen one of the highest rates of
unemployment. December last year, 1.5 million initial
unemployment claims have been filed since the start of the
pandemic. Our state unemployment agency went from processing
20,000 claims a week and each week in February 2020, to more
than 300,000 by August. From 20,000 to 300,000. And so I am
grateful to all of our agency employees who work nights and
weekends to power through all of that to get the benefits out
to Nevadans.
But I am frustrated that it took so long to get that
financial support out. Our personnel had to use outdated
technology and without adequate Federal Government support. So,
Mr. Walsh, how can the Department of Labor really support our
state unemployment agencies for weathering this crisis? They
are going to continue to weather this so they can get the
workers the benefits they are entitled. How do we invest in
technology upgrades to make this happen across all 50 states?
Mr. Walsh. Thank you very much, Senator. And the first way
we do it is by working collaboratively together with the Senate
and the Congress to think about where the commitment is to
upgrading the technology system. I know that in Massachusetts
we are one of, I believe there are 30 states that have upgraded
the technology over the last decade for the UI system, but that
system, again, probably needs upgrading again. When I became
the Mayor of Boston in 2014, 2013--got elected, in 2014 became
the Mayor. We started to invest in technology and IT. We
started to invest on the capital side of IT. And, we made
investments in our--with the police and fire, with their radio
systems. We have made investments across the board. And really
what we have to do is make further investments as a Government
in technology.
UI is one of those areas that obviously there is a big
spotlight on today and shows one of the glaring shortfalls, if
you will, in technology for Government as a whole. But there
are many other areas where there is a shortfall as well in
technology for Government as a whole. I can't speak really
articulately about the Federal Government yet because I am not
here yet. But I am just making an assumption that with the
Federal Government's IT system is no further along than states
and cities all across this country. So I really think that we
have to work collaboratively together to fix a system that
needs upgrading. I know that this is a priority as well of the
President and the Vice President and certainly of all the
folks. We bring all these young people into work in Government,
and when they get here, they kind of--they laugh at the way we
are as far as technology is.
Maybe we should start listening to some of these young
people around us to understand how do we advance our technology
better. Ranking Member Burr is looking at me now shaking his
head. So the two of us, we are kind of on the same page, I
think right now.
Senator Rosen. I want to keep on the same because I am
actually a former computer programmer, systems analyst. So I
kind of make a joke. I was an applications programmer. I wrote
apps before they were called apps. But I am passionate about
improving IT and our STEM workforce and our cyber workforce.
There are good paying jobs. Right now they are available, more
than half a million at least across this country. And of
course, we see many cyber attacks that are crippling our
schools and hospitals.
I know you have seen that the ransomware attacks, the Solar
Winds attack. So again, working on this theme of IT and
security, I was hoping that you would commit to really helping
us build this technology workforce and cyber strength within
our Department of Labor to protect all of that. And so I was
hoping to commit to work on that with us as well.
Mr. Walsh. Absolutely, Senator. And that certainly will
make our agency more efficient, be able to carry out work on
behalf of workers more effectively. And for a moment there you
and I spoke the other day about technology. So certainly you
have a better knowledge than I do on this and that a lot of
people have on this. But I do think if we can become an agency
that is more effective both on the ground level with OSHA
requirements, but also with technology, it will only help and
advance the American worker and the American industry.
Senator Rosen. Well, I want to--just as I close, we are
going to try to get those apprenticeships, internships, return-
ships, all the things we talked about, to get people trained
into these great really good paying jobs that will move us
forward. So thank you. I have expired my time.
The Chair. Thank you, Senator Rosen.
We will turn to Senator Lujan.
Senator Lujan. Thank you so much, Madam Chair Murray, and
also Ranking Member Burr for holding this hearing today. And
thank you Mayor Walsh for joining us today, sir.
Congratulations on your nomination, and I look forward to
working with you to increase wages and expand apprenticeships
and technical training programs and strengthen worker
protections. Mayor Walsh, my father, my late father was a union
ironworker, my late grandfather a union carpenter, my brother
is IBW.
As you may guess, I am a strong supporter of Davis Beacon
protections, which provide workers with bare, family sustaining
wages. However, I have heard some concerns that the inclusion
of unnecessary laborers and craftsmen subcategories and the
Department of Labor's vocational service undermines the ability
to establish a fair wage. Mayor Walsh, if confirmed, will you
commit to working with me to address these issues in the wage
categories, take a look at them, and within the wage survey
process?
Mr. Walsh. No, absolutely, Senator. I would love to work
with you on that. To be honest, I don't have a lot of
information on it right now. So it is an area that obviously
right off the bat, if confirmed, love to get together sooner
rather than later.
Senator Lujan. Appreciate that Sir. What steps would you
take to ensure robust enforcement of Davis Bacon?
Mr. Walsh [continuing]. I missed the last part of that
question, sorry.
Senator Lujan. What steps would you take to ensure robust
enforcement of Davis Bacon?
Mr. Walsh. Yes, I think when it comes to Davis Bacon
prevailing wage, we have to make sure that we are, again, go
back to the statement I made earlier, these dollars that are in
Davis Bacon or a prevailing wage, this is Federal money that we
are paying to do contracting with. So we need to make sure if
we have regulation that says the money is going to pay the
worker and is going to, obviously do the project that they are
being paid for, it is important that we enforce that.
Davis Bacon, I mean my father was a laborer and my brother
is a laborer, my family are laborers. Many of the projects that
they worked on over the years, some of those projects have been
Davis Bacon, but there are parts of this country, I know there
is some concerns about the Davis Bacon not being enforced. So I
will do everything I can to make sure that Davis Bacon is
enforced. But also--it is also about protecting the American
workers' money because it is taxpayers' money.
Senator Lujan. I appreciate that, Mr. Mayor. And as you
know and you just eloquently shared and the questions that we
have had from other colleagues on the Committee, wage theft
impacts workers across all industries and it especially impacts
low wage workers. And I appreciate your background and that of
your family, and that is why I have great faith that you are
going to be a strong Secretary of Labor. And I know that you
appreciate the importance of protecting the wages of working
men and women. And I have really appreciated what I have
learned about your work as Mayor, where you did take steps to
ensure that the city contractors abided by a fair wage and hour
laws. And that is something you will bring to the Department of
Labor.
Mr. Mayor, one area that I wanted to raise that it matters
to us in New Mexico is a program with the acronym EEOICPA. 75
years ago, Mr. Mayor, the Trinity Test site in New Mexico
became ground zero for the detonation of the first atomic bomb.
While this day demonstrated America's scientific leadership, it
also marked the beginning of a history of illness and suffering
that has spanned generations due to radiation exposure.
That is why I have been a proud champion and really
appreciate the work of our Madam Chair, on these important
programs. Senator Udall, who succeeded in the Senate and his
father worked on an initiative called the Radiation Exposure
Compensation Act amendments to recognize and to compensate all
the downwinders and uranium miners for their participation in
America's national security. These are folks, Mr. Mayor, that
live in proximity to where that work and research took place,
and they were downwind.
Some counties in some states in America receive
protections, but others like New Mexico, where the bomb
actually went off, were left out. But it is also why I have
been a strong supporter of the Energy Employees Occupational
Illness Compensation Program Act, which protects the interests
of Federal energy researchers, workers, contractors who were
injured, became ill on the job, and many due to radiation
exposure. And that is why we lost my dad.
My dad got sick on the job because he didn't have those
protections. And I committed to him and to my mom that I would
do everything that I can to make sure other families don't have
to go through what he experienced. If confirmed. Mr. Mayor,
what will you do to strengthen the program's outreach efforts
to learn about it and to ensure timely determinations of
eligibility so that those who are made sick or died are
compensated?
Mr. Walsh. Yes, Senator the first thing I said quickly on
that is we have to put the safety protocols in place on the
front end and not the back end. You know my father as well.
When he passed away before he died, 25 percent of his lung was
not working because of working on job sites, breathing in
asbestos, and working with dirt and soot and everything else.
So my commitment to you first and foremost is to put rules and
regulations in place that actually protect the worker up front
so that when they become parents and grandparents, that then
they are not struggling. I will absolutely be willing, eager to
sit down with you and talk to you about what enforcement we can
do moving forward and how we can help not just the current
American worker, but the past worker as well.
Senator Lujan. Madam Chair Murray, as I yield back my time,
I also thank you for your leadership on this issue. It saves
people's lives, as you know, and helps families. So just thank
you, and appreciate your response, Mr. Mayor, and look forward
to working with all of you. Thank you so much.
The Chair. Thank you, Senator Lujan. I look forward to
working with you on that as well.
Senator Hickenlooper.
Senator Hickenlooper. Thank you, Madam Chair Murray. I
appreciate being allowed to participate in this. Ranking Member
Burr, appreciate your comments as well. Mayor Walsh, what a
pleasure to get to meet you, even if it is only virtually at
this moment. As you probably know, I am a small businessperson
myself, but I am also a former Mayor and I am very eager to see
you confirmed, and then you have to address that question that
so many Mayors get asked, was being Mayor the greatest job you
ever had in your life? I have two quick questions for you. I
started out as a geologist and got laid off in the mid 80's and
was out of work for a couple of years. And ended up opening one
of the first brew pubs in the country that evolved a number of
other ones. We had about 14. I told my wife that I had an
empire. It was very, very small empire but an empire,
nonetheless.
My older brother was an automobile mechanic most of his
life. My sister was a schoolteacher her whole life. I have I
think a sense of the needs of a small business and how so many
of these professions depend upon education. But they also,
especially small businesses, need to get support. And I think
in many cases, almost not just encouragement, but have
incentives line up properly so that they can compete with the
larger companies. A lot--there is a lot of discussion around
COVID with the DPA, Defense Production Act.
In that specifically, there are, there is language to
really promote small businesses to participate when DPA is
invoked and utilized. Are you looking at that? And do you have
any ideas about how to make sure that small businesses get
their share of those--of that work?
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator . Or maybe I should call you
Mr. Mayor, because when you are Mayor, you are always a Mayor
so thank you for that question, Mayor. What we have done in the
city of Boston during this time was in some places we did ease
regulations. We eased regulations to have outdoor dining for
restaurants. We worked with the city, through the city with
some grant programs to buy PPE. We created a program in the
city of Boston not too long ago to help small businesses with
their rent.
We are working with them in different ways, and I think
that as we think about moving forward here, people have
different definitions of small businesses, but when I am
talking about small business, I think what you are talking
about small businesses is the businesses that are on our main
streets right now all across America that are struggling. And
so I certainly look forward to working with economic
development, with you, with other folks on how do we create
opportunity so we can keep our small businesses alive.
Those small businesses employ lots and lots, millions and
millions of Americans. And if we don't do something to continue
to support our small businesses, I know in the American rescue
plan, there is a component in that, but if we don't do
something to support our small businesses or have those small
businesses come back during this COVID time and after COVID, we
are going to have bigger challenges in America to rebound our
economy.
Senator Hickenlooper. Thank you. We agree on that. Also, as
a former Mayor, we share the experience of working with
turnaround, the issues of workforce, and recognize worker
shortages, the ebb and flow of the workforce, and also the
importance of supporting senior citizens and keeping them in
their homes. And it seems like we could be addressing both of
these issues at the same time, if we can help reduce workforce
bias against seniors and help them find and stay in jobs that
offer them meaningful work. So as workforce demands ebb and
flow, do you have experiences as a Mayor or ideas about how to
kind of address this problem, address bias and help get and
keep seniors in the workforce?
Mr. Walsh. Yes, I think that one of the things we have to
do, and I don't have all the Federal rules and regulations, but
we have to look and see how do we create opportunities for
seniors to be able to do programs that can get benefits. So,
for example, in Boston, we have a program in the city of Boston
where seniors can do volunteering and we give them some credit
on their taxes. It doesn't impact their retirement. It doesn't
impact their Social Security. They have small hours they can
work. We should be looking at those opportunities. How can we
enhance opportunities for seniors to make some money, even
seniors that might be getting a very modest retirement or a
very modest Social Security check?
Because one of the problems I see every day is that seniors
have to make decisions whether to eat or pay prescription
drugs. That is a real thing. That is not just something that
the elected officials say. That is a real thing. I have seen it
up front and personal in the city of Boston. So I would love to
be, as the Department of Labor, workforce development, work
with all of you to be creative on what we can do to allow
opportunities for our seniors so that seniors that are sitting
in their home, maybe watching this today, that are struggling,
that aren't always talked about, we need to do more than talk
about it. We need to take action.
Senator Hickenlooper. Well, thank you. We agree and I look
forward to working with you on that. I think we are out of
time. But I will look forward to, in future time, to discuss a
partnership like Senator Tuberville mentioned, but also those
apprenticeships to start high school really are not just with
trade, but with every kind of job and profession. But that is a
future discussion.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator.
The Chair. Thank you very much, Senator Hickenlooper. That
does complete our first round of questions. So, Senator Burr, I
will turn to you for any additional questions or comments
before I do my final.
Senator Burr. Thank you, Madam Chair. I have just got a
little housekeeping to do. Mayor, thank you for being here
today. Thank you for either answering or attempting to answer
or promising to get back with Members on all their questions. I
am sure when you leave here today, you are going to think, is
it too late for me to back out. And to answer the question, it
is too late. You are too far.
I am going to ask you six questions. The answer to each of
them is yes, oversight is important function of Congress, and
hopefully that can be done in a bipartisan way. But if not, I
intend to exercise my oversight authority as Ranking Member of
this Committee, just as Senator Murray did, as Ranking Member.
Question one, would you commit to providing me and my staff
with the information that I or other minority Members of the
Committee request of the Department of Labor within the
requested timeframe?
Mr. Walsh. Yes.
Senator Burr. Do you commit to providing me and my staff
with the documents I or other minority Members of the Committee
request from the Department of Labor within the timeline?
Mr. Walsh. Yes.
Senator Burr. Do you commit to providing me and my staff or
other minority Members of the Committee with briefings requests
from you and your staff within the requested timeline?
Mr. Walsh. Yes.
Senator Burr. Do you commit to providing the Department of
Labor Inspector General and the General Accounting Office with
any information, briefings, and documents they might request?
Mr. Walsh. Yes.
Senator Burr. Do you commit to testifying when called
before a Congressional Committee?
Mr. Walsh. Absolutely. Any time.
Senator Burr. Mayor, thank you for being here. I look
forward to the Madam Chair expediting your confirmation and
look forward to supporting you.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you.
Senator Burr. Thank you, Madam Chair.
The Chair. Thank you very much, Senator. And I have a
couple of additional questions and comments. Mayor, thank you
again for all your willingness to be here today. Since the
beginning of the pandemic, we have seen at staggering levels of
unemployment, including 22 million jobs lost at the height of
the pandemic. While some jobs have returned, there are still 9
million fewer individuals working today than there was a year
ago. And those individuals are disproportionately workers of
color, immigrants, and workers with a high school diploma or
less. President Biden has pledged significant investments to
restart the economy and create quality jobs for individuals who
are still experiencing the unemployment and underemployment due
the pandemic.
As we make investments in our key sectors, we have to also
invest in workforce training programs that lead to quality
credentials, and we need to eliminate barriers to make sure
anyone who needs training opportunities to get them. So Mayor
Walsh, with respect to job training and apprenticeships, what
would be your priorities at the Department of Labor to support
an inclusive recovery so all types of workers experiencing
unemployment or underemployment have pathways to quality jobs?
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Senator, Madam Chair. That question
obviously, came up a few times today. I think it is really
important that we begin to continue to invest in recovery in
this country. President Biden's, his plan of building back
better is going to take significant investments on the
workforce development side of it. Many of those jobs that the
American people had previous to COVID might not be coming back
and we know that. We also have to look at how do we train older
American workers that might have been out of the workforce for
a while, but due to COVID have to come into the workforce or
working in an industry that is growing. So that needs to be a
priority of the Department as soon as, if confirmed, they get
there. And I know they are working on it now, but really put a
stronger emphasis on it now when I get there.
The Chair. Okay. Thank you. And I am also really deeply
worried about the multi-employer pension crisis in this
country. Nearly 1.5 million people rely on about 120
multiemployer pension plans that are in dire financial straits
and expected to go bankrupt very soon. On top of that, the
Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, which provides extra
security for retirees when plans go bankrupt, is also projected
to become insolvent by 2026.
If the PBGC fails, it will throw the financial security of
millions of workers and retirees into jeopardy. If those funds
fail, not only will millions of Americans face economic
devastation, but it will also be catastrophic for the thousands
of employers, particularly small businesses, who are trying to
do right by their workers. So this is an urgent crisis that
really needs a swift resolution. Mayor Walsh, I just wanted to
ask you, will you commit to working with me to address that
critical issue?
Mr. Walsh. Senator, I absolutely do commit to work with
you. And this is one of the largest crises of the moment. And I
feel that it is our obligation as a Government to protect
workers and protect their futures. And by protecting their
futures, meaning--means protecting their pensions, their hard
earned dollars earned that they have worked for to get at the
end of their work career.
The Chair. Thank you. And now, before we wrap up, I just
wanted to take this opportunity to talk about another
especially important issue, one that Mayor Walsh is very
familiar with, organizing collective bargaining and the
benefits of unionization. Union workers build the American
middle class. Joining a union empowers workers to bargain for
fair wages, better benefits and safe working conditions, all of
which are workplace issues of critical importance during this
COVID-19 pandemic.
Moreover, a union means workers are treated with the
respect and dignity that they are often denied. For decades,
unions have been under attack by corporate special interests,
which put margins over people, profit margins over people, and
the law that was meant to protect workers' rights, democracy,
and workplace, the National Labor Relations Act is in desperate
need of revision. The Protecting the Right to Organize Act,
called the PRO Act, would ensure workers' fundamental rights
are respected.
The PRO Act provides for fair union election procedures,
meaningful remedies when employers break the law, and other
updates to bring the NLRA into the 21st century. This law is
critical for every worker, but especially for women and workers
of color who disproportionately have jobs with lower wages and
fewer, if any, benefits. Passing the PRO Act is not just a
labor issue, it is an equity issue.
Mayor Walsh, I know from your own experience, you truly
know the full value of collective bargaining and what is meant
to work or to have a union by his or her side. And I look
forward to working with you in the Biden administration as true
partners in protecting the right to organize.
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Madam Chair Murray. I look forward to
work with you on that as well, and Members of this Committee,
and the entire House and Senate.
The Chair. Thank you. Thank you very much. We will end our
hearing for today, and I appreciate the participation of the
Members of this Committee. Mayor Walsh, thank you for answering
all of our questions and sharing your experience and your
insights with us. I look forward to working with you as we
tackle the immense challenges facing our workers, our retirees,
and our families across the country.
For any Senators who wish to ask additional questions of
the nominee, questions for the record will be due by Friday,
February 5th, at 5 p.m. The hearing record will remain open for
10 days for Members who wish to submit additional materials for
the record. It is my intention to schedule a vote in Committee
on Mayor Walsh's nomination as quickly as possible so we can
move his nomination forward and he can begin the important work
of leading the Department of Labor. This meeting is now
adjourned.
ADDITIONAL MATERIAL
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
[Whereupon, at 12:28 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
[all]