Earlier today, the U.S. Senate voted to confirm Thomas Perez as Secretary of the Department of Labor, filling the vacancy left by Hilda Solis’ resignation earlier this year. As we foreshadowed, Perez’s nomination was the subject of pointed scrutiny and his confirmation today was not without controversy as the party-line vote to confirm Perez was the result of recent negotiations to end filibusters of executive-branch nominees.
Now that the Secretary of Labor position has been filled, OFCCP may move forward more quickly with its proposed veteran and disabled individual regulations. Speculation is the Agency was waiting until a new Secretary was confirmed to get input before sending the regulations on to OMB for approval. Stay tuned for more as there is no guarantee this is the case, but filling this position was certainly one of the hurdles OFCCP faced in getting its regulations finalized.