by Owen Klinsky
Republican North Carolina Rep. Virginia Foxx wrote to Department of Labor (DOL) Acting Secretary Julie Su Monday to ensure the agency continues to perform casework during the remainder of President Joe Biden’s lame duck term.
During the 2016-2017 transition from former President Barack Obama to President-elect Donald Trump, the DOL slowed or ceased processing casework, creating a backlog of “hundreds of cases” and preventing everyday Americans from accessing needed assistance such as workers’ compensation, according to an oversight letter from the House Committee on Education and the Workforce obtained exclusively by the Daily Caller News Foundation. Now, Foxx is trying to prevent Biden’s DOL from engaging in similar obstructionist behavior, requesting the DOL provide weekly updates to the Office of Congressional and Intergovernmental Affairs from Dec. 6 until shortly before Inauguration Day.
“It is the Committee’s understanding that, under the Obama administration, DOL either significantly slowed or quit processing casework in 2016-2017, leaving the incoming Trump administration with a backlog of hundreds of cases,” Foxx wrote. “These avoidable and unconscionable delays hampered the incoming administration and delayed redress for hundreds of Americans.”
The letter argues the House Committee on Education and the Workforce retains the right to vet the status of DOL casework based on House Rule X, which stipulates the committee has the jurisdiction and responsibility to “review and study on a continuing basis … the application, administration, execution and effectiveness of laws and programs addressing subjects within its jurisdiction.”
Trump’s first presidency faced significant internal resistance from a variety of government bureaucrats, with Miles Taylor, then-chief of staff of the Department of Homeland Security, even going as far as publishing an anonymous New York Times op-ed vowing to “thwart part of [Trump’s] agenda and his worst inclinations.” Now, some members of Congress are attempting to avoid the strengthening of a second Trump resistance, with Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky and other lawmakers writing a letter to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management to try and prevent Biden political appointees from being converted to civil service positions — a process sometimes referred to as “burrowing in.”
“The Obama administration’s backlog of 2016-2017 must never be repeated,” Foxx’s letter states. “The outgoing Trump administration made a point not to follow the Obama administration’s example, instead continuing to process and finalize these cases in 2020-2021 until the transition was completed. I call on you to do the same.”
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Owen Klinsky is a reporter at Daily Caller News Foundation.
Photo “Re.p Virginia Foxx” by Rep. Virginia Foxx and “Julie Su” by US Department of Labor.
