[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 71 (Monday, May 20, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3604-S3605]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            PEREZ NOMINATION

  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. President, I rise today to reiterate my strong 
support for Tom Perez, a man eminently qualified to serve our country 
as the next Secretary of Labor.
  I am pleased that the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions 
Committee voted last Thursday to favorably report Mr. Perez's 
nomination to the full Senate. But we must remember this step forward 
came only after weeks of delay.
  This is the week we should have been on this floor debating and 
voting on the confirmation of Tom Perez, but we are not. Instead, 
delaying tactics on this and other nominees have now needlessly, 
pointlessly pushed this debate into next month.
  Let me state for the record that the obstruction we have seen thus 
far in the confirmation process is completely unacceptable and, for the 
sake of the American people, for the sake of good governance, it must 
end.
  It does not stop at the Department of Labor. Republicans have refused 
to take up nominees at the National Labor Relations Board, threatening 
the operation of this critical agency. It appears any agency that 
stands up for workers' rights is under attack. Let's just do the job 
the American people sent us here to do.
  Tom Perez is a quintessential public servant, but apparently that is 
not enough for my colleagues on the other side. He is a consensus 
builder, but that is not enough. As secretary of labor in Maryland, he 
brought together the chamber of commerce and Maryland labor unions to 
make sure that workers received the level of wages and benefits they 
deserved and that businesses had the skilled workforce they needed, but 
that experience of bringing both sides together is not enough. It is 
not enough that he is the Assistant Attorney General for the Civil 
Rights Division of the Department of Justice, where he increased 
prosecutions of human trafficking by 40 percent, won $50 million for 
armed services members whose homes were improperly foreclosed on while 
they served, and settled the three largest fair lending cases in the 
history of the Fair Housing Act, recovering more money for victims in 
2012 than in the previous 23 years combined. But none of those 
accomplishments on human trafficking, on servicemembers, on people who 
were abused in fair housing--that is not enough. It is not enough that 
he spent his entire career in public service. It is not enough to be a 
Brown University graduate or have a master's in public policy from the 
Kennedy School or a juris doctorate from Harvard Law.
  The truth is that my friends on the other side are looking to block 
his nomination because Tom Perez is not enough of a Republican to pass 
muster. He is too much of an advocate for people with disabilities, 
achieving the largest ever disability-based housing discrimination 
settlement. He is too much of a civil rights champion. He obtained the 
first convictions under the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Hate Crimes 
Prevention Act. He has been a strong supporter of ending discrimination 
on the basis of sexual orientation. They seem to hate the Civil Rights 
Division, but who could deny the importance of their work?
  Tom Perez is just too much for my friends on the other side who want 
to block this nominee and insist on obstructing, obfuscating, and 
politicizing everything that comes before the Congress. The fact is 
that this is not even about Tom Perez. It is about rendering government 
helpless and standing in the way of any effort to govern.
  Tom Perez is a good man. He is qualified and competent. He is a 
professional public servant nominated by the President and already 
confirmed by the Senate to the post he holds today. I endorsed Tom 
Perez after meeting him. I continue to stand firmly by him as a 
nominee. But what I will not stand for is Republicans blocking his 
nomination for no valid reason, without any real objection, only an 
ideological objection to allowing this President or this Congress to 
govern or to at least select a Cabinet that will help us do so, and in 
this case particularly the Department of Labor that stands for working 
men and women of this country.
  I said, when the President nominated him, he was an outstanding 
nominee to be the Secretary of Labor. He has ``dedicated his career to 
championing the rights of workers and all Americans, and I am confident 
he will continue to do the same if confirmed.''
  I also marvel that I listen to all the election postmortem about how 
the Republican Party has to reach out to Hispanic Americans in this 
country, how they have to do a better job of engaging them and selling 
their vision of America. This is the President's first nominee for this 
second term of a Hispanic American who is eminently qualified.
  To try to stop this nominee is reverting back to the same old failed 
political strategies during the last election. It is unfortunate that 
the President's first Hispanic choice for his second-term Cabinet comes 
under such attack, no valid attack. It does not have to be that way. 
Mr. Perez deserves an up-or-down vote, and he deserves to be swiftly 
confirmed as the next Secretary of Labor.
  To my friends on the other side, I would say to you it is time to 
stop the obstructionism. I would say to you the empty rhetoric and 
baseless objections to Tom Perez's nomination are not going to serve 
you well in the Hispanic community. You should allow, as I have heard 
so many times--give us an up-or-down vote--an up-or-down vote. Working 
families in this country, those who depend upon the Labor Department to 
have a sense of fairness and justice, deserve an up-or-down vote. 
Hispanic Americans who want to see someone from that community 
represented in the President's Cabinet want to see an up-or-down vote. 
That is what justice would be all about.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
  Mrs. BOXER. Before my friend from New Jersey leaves the floor, I wish 
to thank him for leading a letter regarding this important nomination. 
We need a Secretary of Labor. We had a wonderful Secretary of Labor, 
Hilda Solis. The reason it is so essential is we

[[Page S3605]]

now see that the middle class is essentially collapsing, even though we 
are coming out of the worst recession since the Great Depression 
because of the leadership of our President and those of us who tried to 
help him. We need a head of the Department of Labor to make sure 
everybody gets a fair chance. I wish to thank my friend. He makes a 
very important point about Republican obstructionism.
  After the election, they sat around, all of them, and said: Oh, my 
goodness. We have to do better with Hispanics. We have to do better 
with women.
  Who are the two people they are holding up with all their might at 
this point--and I hope they end it--Mr. Perez and Gina McCarthy, a 
woman who deserves a promotion just as Mr. Perez deserves a promotion. 
They can say all they want that they are reaching out to minorities and 
women, but then they are blocking promotions of people who are 
outstanding Americans. I wished to say that before my friend left the 
floor.

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