Acting Labor Sec. Named While Solis Awaits Vote

President Obama has named an acting Labor secretary while his nominee for the post, Rep. Hilda Solis (D-Calif.), waits for the Senate to confirm her.

Obama on Monday tapped Ed Hugler, a career Labor employee and the deputy assistant secretary for operations, to serve as acting secretary, a Labor Department official told The Hill.

Solis’s nomination has been held up by an anonymous senator. She appeared before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee last month, but the committee has yet to vote on her nomination.

Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.) has questioned whether Solis had done lobbying work while she was both a House member and an official at a pro-labor group, American Rights at Work. Solis said she didn’t do any lobbying and hasn’t violated any rules. Republicans have also criticized her for failing to give specifics during her confirmation hearing last month about her views on the Employee Free Choice Act, a union-backed bill strongly opposed by Republicans and businesses.

A spokesman for Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, told the Associated Press that the committee could vote on Solis’s nomination as early as Wednesday.