Penny Pritzker’s nomination by President Obama to serve as Secretary of Commerce is a slap in the face to the Labor Movement. Maybe the stinging blow will serve as a wakeup to the Administration’s hypocritical stand on labor issues.
Penny Pritzker is a billionaire heir to the Pritzker family fortunes and businesses which include the Hyatt Hotels. Check the AFL-CIO Boycotts on our website. You will find that UNITE/HERE is conducting a global against them.
Some Republicans are inveighing against Pritzker because of her tax avoidance, offshore assets, and connection to a major bank failure related to subprime lending. Of course, the Republicans are only too happy to thwart the ambition of Obama’s chief fundraiser.
Nevertheless, the Pritzker record contains enough disquieting information to provoke bipartisan concern.
As for the Labor Movement, when the potential Secretary of Commerce comes from a corporation with an anti-union bias (she sits on the Pritzker board of directors) danger signs rise up. Why is an Administration that we helped elect two times presenting her nomination? Why is an Administration that promised to keep K Street lobbyists and big bucks donor out of policy-making now breaking its promise?
Maybe with the second election out the way, the Obama Administration can do what it wants. Actually, if you look back , Pritzker was nearly nominated by Obama for the same post in 2008. She pulled her name because of the scandals and a reluctance to come clean about them.
Hyatt Hotels are on the AFL-CIO Boycott List for the gamut of anti-worker, anti-union offenses. At the least, Penny Pritzker, the Obama Administration’s nominee for Secretary of Commerce, ought to disavow her company’s anti-labor policies. The Obama Administration ought to explain why it backed away from its campaign commitments and from the friends who helped it win office.
