Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Cuccinelli asks Kaine and Warner to delay acting on labor board nominees until Supreme Court decides constitutionality of Obama recess appointments

English: Attorney General of Virginia Ken Cucc...
English: Attorney General of Virginia Ken Cuccinelli (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Cuccinelli asks Kaine and Warner to delay acting on labor board nominees until Supreme Court decides constitutionality of Obama recess appointments 


RICHMOND (July 19, 2013) - Last night, Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli sent a letter to Virginia senators Mark Warner and Tim Kaine requesting that they delay acting on President Obama's recent nominations to the National Labor Relations Board until the U.S. Supreme Court decides the constitutionality of the president's previous appointments to the board. Obama made his previous appointments without the constitutionally required Senate confirmation by claiming that the U.S. Senate was in recess when it was not.

Recess appointments are emergency appointments the president makes to commissions and boards when the Senate is not in session and he determines that he cannot wait for the Senate to reconvene to hold hearings to confirm his nominees. However, only the Senate can declare itself in recess, not the president. The president made three appointments to the NLRB when the Senate was merely not meeting for three days but had never recessed.
Three federal appeals courts, including the Fourth Circuit, have declared the original appointments unconstitutional. The D.C. Circuit Court case has made it to the Supreme Court.

If the Senate moves forward with approving the president's new nominees, Cuccinelli says actions by the new board could render the issue moot and the Supreme Court would not be able to decide this important separation of powers issue, which would clarify the issue for future appointments.
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