The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions announced Thursday it would push back the confirmation hearing of labor secretary nominee Andrew Puzder.
An aide to Sen. Lamar Alexander (R., Tenn.), the committee chairman, told the Washington Free Beacon that the committee scrapped its scheduled hearing in order to accommodate the nominee's background checks and disclosures.
"The committee will not officially notice a confirmation hearing with Mr. Puzder until the committee has received his paperwork from the Office of Government Ethics [OGE]," the aide said.
The committee is charged with reviewing Puzder's nomination before recommending him for a vote on the Senate floor. Committee members will be the first to see FBI and OGE background checks furnished by Puzder, as well as other disclosures. The nominee would have had to turn over all of those documents by Thursday in order to abide by the scheduled Feb. 7 confirmation hearing.
Alexander decided to postpone the hearing—the fourth such delay—in order to give Puzder more time to straighten out his paperwork and avoid process-oriented complaints that have dogged other nominees, most recently education secretary nominee Betsy DeVos.
Puzder is the CEO of CKE Restaurants, the parent company of fast food chains Hardees and Carl's Jr. Trump tapped him to head the Labor Department in December, spurring opposition from organized labor. The announcement prompted a flood of unfair labor practice complaints against CKE.
Puzder spokesman George Thompson told the Washington Free Beacon that the nominee is eager to appear before the committee, and is working to comply with OGE on his disclosures. The spokesman added that attacks against Puzder and his company have not helped the process.
"It's very unfortunate that these are deliberate attacks from the Democrats and their special interests. They're going to continue to persist obstructing nominees," Thompson said. "He's very much exactly what American workers and small business owners need."
Puzder was scheduled to appear before the committee on Jan. 12, Jan. 17, Feb. 2, and Feb. 7. If confirmed, Puzder would be the first career businessman to lead the Department of Labor since Ronald Reagan appointed construction executive Raymond Donovan in 1981.