Obama-Appointed Judge Who Stopped Overtime Rule Has GOP Roots

The judge who blocked one of President Barack Obama’s key labor initiatives has a history of supporting the Republican Party and landed on the bench with help from a pair of GOP senators.

Judge Amos Mazzant put the Labor Department’s overtime rule on hold Nov. 22, just days before some 4 million workers were set to become newly eligible for time-and-a-half pay. The ruling was a surprise to some critics of the rule, who thought they’d drawn a difficult hand when the lawsuit was assigned to an Obama appointee.

It turns out that Mazzant previously ran as a Republican for ...