Senate stops Becker's nomination

Tuesday the United States' Senate rejected President Obama's nomination to fill a vacant seat on the National Labor Relations Board.

Tuesday saw the United States' Senate block President Obama's nomination of Craig Becker as a nominee to fill a vacancy on the National Labor Relations Board. Becker needed 60 votes to get the nomination, but ended up losing it by a vote of 52-33. Republicans had concerns that Becker would favor unions, and thus held-up the vote. Today they were joined by Blanche Lincolm and Ben Nelson who crossed party lines to block the nomination. Newly elected senator Scott Brown said, "My first priority in coming to Washington is to create jobs and put people back to work. Craig Becker's theories about how the workplace should function, if ever put into practice, would impose new burdens on employers, hurt job creation and slow down the recovery." The National Labor Relations Board is a five person board that is responsible for deciding cases that fall under the National Labor Relations Act. Republicans felt that Becker had a number of personal agenda items and a position like this on the NLRB would ultimately hurt the legitimacy of the board and its' service.