The Fox's Advocate Shall Be Put In Charge of Hen Security

The White House has announced its plans to recess appoint Paul DeCamp to be Administrator of the Wage and Hour Division at the Department of Labor. DeCamp is a famous enemy of working men and women, who made his career as a corporate employment defense lawyer representing Wal-Mart and other large employers. He was the attorney representing Wal-Mart in Dukes v. Wal-Mart, a 1.6 million member class action for equal pay violations and gender discrimination currently pending in the 9th U. S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

DeCamp will soon be in charge of enforcing the Family and Medical Leave Act, the Migrant and Agricultural Worker Protection Act and the Fair Labor Standards Act. Democrats opposed to the appointment say DeCamp has never represented a single employee in his lengthy career, which DeCamp apparently does not dispute. Ted Kennedy calls the appointment “an insult to America’s workers,” and said that “appointing DeCamp to enforce laws he doesn’t believe in and protections he doesn’t support is another example of the low priority that the administration gives to the rights and well-being of America’s workers."

We agree. It is the political equivalent of appointing a drug kingpin defense lawyer to head the FBI's Organized Crime Program and oversee Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization (RICO) Statute. Of course, we expected nothing different from an administration that appointed a timber industry lobbyist to run the forest service, and a mining industry lobbyist to oversee public lands for the Bureau of Land Management; put a lobbyist for the American Petroleum Institute on the Council on Environmental Quality and a utility company lobbyist at the top of the Environmental Protection Agency's clean air division.