Media: Donald Trump’s Labor Department Nominee to Withdraw Before Senate Rejection

Andrew Puzder, President Donald Trump’s nominee to run the Department of Labor, is expected to withdraw before an expected defeat in the Senate.

CNN reported Feb. 15 that “senior Republicans” say at least four GOP Senators, and perhaps 12 Senators, plan to vote against nominee Andrew Puzder, the CEO of two restaurant chains.

CBS’s Major Garrett Tweeted a report that Puzder is expected to withdraw.

NBC also says Puzder is withdrawing.

Puzder was expected to face a nomination hearing Thursday, Feb. 16, at the Senate’s Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee, where at least three of 12 Republicans have announced they have yet to decide if they will support or oppose Puzder.

The committee has 12 Republicans and 11 Democrats, so any loss of support means that the nominee would be rejected by the oversight committee.

If Puzder is rejected by the committee, top GOP leaders can still hold a floor vote in the full Senate for Puzder, but he’s unlikely to win that vote.

Puzder has faced a series of obstacles in his path to confirmation — conservatives don’t like his support for large-scale immigration and left-wing Democrats don’t like his support for productivity-boosting workplace automation. He’s also been hit with by resurrected charges that he abused his wife in the late 1980s, and by new charges that he employed an illegal immigrant and owed money to a bank which does business with federal pensions managed by the labor department.

One of the most difficult issues for GOP Senators is the decades-old charge of domestic abuse, which was aired on a 1990 Oprah Winfrey TV show. If a GOP Senator votes for Puzder, future Democratic campaign rivals will likely air TV ads charging them with aiding a domestic abuser.