Bush recess appointment to labor board draws fire

President Bush's decision last month to grant a recess appointment to a Republican lawyer to sit on the governing body for federal labor-management disputes is drawing criticism.

Bush's decision leaves a Democratic slot on the panel unfilled.

The Federal Labor Relations Authority is an independent agency with three Senate-confirmed presidential appointees who set policies and adjudicate disputes between federal labor unions and agencies. By law, only two of the three slots can go to people with the same political affiliation.

But with Bush's Dec. 20 appointment of Wayne Beyer, a former administrative appeals judge at the Labor Department with a law degree from Georgetown University, FLRA is set to rule with two Republicans and no Democrats. Carol Pope, the only Democrat on FLRA, completed her five-year term at the end of the 109th congressional session.

In September, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., then ranking member of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and Sen. Daniel Akaka, D-Hawaii, then ranking member of its Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, the Federal Workforce and the District of Columbia, wrote Bush a letter asking for a Democratic nominee.

Democratic senators could have held up Beyer's approval until Bush nominated a Democrat, but the recess appointment precludes that maneuver. Akaka called the recess appointment "disappointing."

"A full complement of the FLRA helps ensure a well-functioning labor relations system," Akaka said. It "provides employees a process for bringing safety concerns and ideas to improve efficiency to management."

Colleen Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees Union, one of the largest federal unions in FLRA's jurisdiction, said she wanted the president to reappoint Pope.

"While NTEU is not advancing substantive objections to the Beyer nomination," Kelley said, "the union will oppose his confirmation to a full term as an FLRA member so long as the president continues to ignore his statutory responsibility to nominate a Democrat to this body."

Beyer joins Dale Cabaniss, former chief counsel for the Senate Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on the Civil Service under Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska. Cabaniss was confirmed by the Senate in October 2003.

Beyer's recess appointment will last one year, at which point he will need Senate confirmation.