Acting Labor Chief Eyed as Successor in Search for Replacement

New acting Labor Secretary Keith Sonderling has early support from the business community to assume the agency’s top role as President Donald Trump’s search for a replacement becomes muddied by the upcoming midterm elections.

The White House has exhausted the goodwill it enjoyed when Trump named a former Republican lawmaker with ties to organized labor to the post last year. Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer resigned Monday after being plagued since January by allegations she committed travel fraud and had an inappropriate relationship with a staffer.

Her departure mars efforts by the White House to bring unions into the MAGA constituency. She was sold to lawmakers and the public as being a pro-labor Republican with ties to the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, but also with a history of running a small business and having conservative values.

She got 67 votes for confirmation and was praised by some union leaders at the time. The next nominee will face a tougher fight for support from Senate Republicans worried about losing their seats in the upcoming midterm elections and Democrats who’ve opposed Trump’s policies.

“It could get gnarly and I would not expect senators to be as accommodating as they were in the beginning of the administration,” said Nicholas Beadle, a former DOL official who spent more than a decade at the agency in various roles. “This next nominee is also going to have to answer a lot of tough questions.”

Sonderling can act as head of the DOL indefinitely. Trump has replaced some cabinet members quickly: he named former Sen. Markwayne Mullin to head the Department of Homeland Security the same day it was announced Kristi Noem would step down. Like Sonderling, Todd Blanche was elevated from deputy attorney general to acting AG after Pam Bondi left for a job in the private sector.

Prior to Chavez-DeRemer’s nomination, Sonderling was among several candidates considered for the labor secretary role.

Traditional vs. MAGA Candidates

DOL observers and stakeholders see Sonderling as the obvious choice to take the reins as secretary given his labor and employment law background and widespread support among employer-side attorneys and business groups.

While Chavez-DeRemer was on her year-long, 50-state America at Work tour, Sonderling largely ran the day-to-day operations of the department.

Sonderling has spent almost a decade in policymaking positions at the DOL and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. He pushed the usage of DOL opinion letters and has been traveling the country to support the administration’s goals around AI education and upskilling.

Josh Nadreau, an employer-side lawyer with Fisher Phillips LLP, said there was “growing excitement” about the prospect of Sonderling in the top job among his fellow attorneys, who want someone who can quickly effectuate policy changes including those around joint-employer and independent contractor classifications.

“He’s policy focused but he’s one of the few people that has the ability to sit in the top seat and not lose the mission while still getting involved in policy,” he said. “Unlike someone who might be coming in from the outside and has to get up to speed, he knows which levers to pull and when to pull them in terms of getting things done.”

But Sonderling’s reputation of getting into nitty-gritty policy details might not necessarily endear him with the president, Beadle said.

“That doesn’t necessarily ring Trump,” he said of Sonderling’s recent initiatives. “If you read the tea leaves in this administration, they may go with fire and brimstone and it could be someone who is a very disruptive and confrontational choice.”

Midterms Looming

Chavez-DeRemer’s bipartisan support made her difficult to remove, even as the inspector general probe into her alleged misconduct expanded in recent weeks. With the November midterms on the horizon, the Trump administration now faces a potentially sticky battle to get someone confirmed to the top labor spot.

Any nominee will have to be vetted by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, which has held up previous labor picks.

The nominations of National Labor Relations Board Member Scott Mayer and General Counsel Crystal Carey were both held up in committee after Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) expressed concerns about anti-worker policies. Hawley has emerged as one of several GOP members seeking the support of organized labor and may not look kindly on Sonderling’s pro-employer background.

HELP Committee Chairman Bill Cassidy (R-La.) is facing a tight primary battle with Rep. Julie Letlow, who received an endorsement from Trump. Cassidy lost Trump’s support after voting to support his 2021 impeachment.

Judy Conti, former government affairs director at the National Employment Law Project, said Trump won’t be able to count on any votes from the Democrats.

“It’s as much about making a statement against this administration as it is against the person who’s nominated,” she said. “So they’re going to need someone who can hold all of the Republicans together.”

If confirmation proceedings drag on, Sonderling can serve in an acting capacity until a successor is named.

However, the lengthy tenure of an acting DOL head can draw legal and political pushback—as most recently experienced by Biden’s acting Labor Secretary Julie Su, who never got a Senate confirmation vote in the face of heavy employer opposition.