Sam Hananel
The Associated Press
1/4/2012
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama named three members to the National Labor Relations Board on Wednesday, bypassing fierce opposition from Republicans who claim the agency has leaned too far in favor of unions.
The recess appointments came just hours after Obama used a similar move to install former Ohio Atty. Gen. Richard Cordray to head the new Consumer Financial Protection Agency.
Both moves infuriated GOP leaders, who threatened legal action and warned that Obama was setting a dangerous precedent by ignoring the will of Congress.
Obama appointed Deputy Labor Secretary Sharon Block, union lawyer Richard Griffin and NLRB counsel Terence Flynn to fill vacancies on the five-member board, giving it a full contingent for the first time in more than a year. Block and Griffin are Democrats, while Flynn is a Republican.
The board, which referees labor-management disputes and oversees union elections, has been a prime target for Republicans and business groups since it filed a controversial lawsuit last year that accused Boeing of illegally retaliating against union members…
The article continues at The Associated Press.
H/T Jared Law, The 9/12 Project Network
Related: By His Fruits Ye Shall Know Him: Obama’s Subversive Appointments, at American Thinker
Update: A Tyrannical Abuse of Power: Obama Attempts to Appoint Cordray to CFPB
Update 2: Republican Leader Senator Mitch McConnell issued a statement today following Obama’s latest power grab.
U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell issued the following statement today regarding the President’s unprecedented recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board:
“Just hours after he circumvented the American people by ‘recess’ appointing Richard Cordray to the CFPB, the President has upped the ante by making several additional recess appointments, this time to the NLRB. Although all of these appointments potentially raise legal and constitutional questions, the NLRB appointments are particularly egregious. Because the President waited to nominate Sharon Block and Richard Griffin until just two days before the Senate was scheduled to adjourn last month, neither has undergone a single confirmation hearing or a single day of debate by the representatives of the American people. Congress has a constitutional duty to examine presidential nominees, a responsibility that serves as a check on executive power. But what the President did today sets a terrible precedent that could allow any future President to completely cut the Senate out of the confirmation process, appointing his nominees immediately after sending their names up to Congress. This was surely not what the framers had in mind when they required the President to seek the advice and consent of the Senate in making appointments.”
H/T GatewayPundit
“The welfare of humanity is always the alibi of tyrants.” Albert Camus
Update 3: White House Blames Romney And Santorum For Obama’s Decision To Make Illegal “Recess” Appointments… Huh?
Update 4: Obama desperately seeks a crisis to take advantage of at Legal Insurrection.
Obama’s recess appointment of Richard Cordray to the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau correctly is portrayed as a naked power grab.
First, the Senate is not in recess. Harry Reid and other Democrats in the past treated the current Senate pro forma business status as not being in recess.
Second, the Dodd-Frank legislation which created the position Cordray will fill specifically requires Senate confirmation. A recess appointment is not confirmation under any scenario…
Update 5: One Republican Senator Supports Obama Recess Appointment of Cordray. And, for once, it’s not Olympia Snowe.
