Bill Berkowitz
January 9, 2006

Cronies, chums and Bush surrogates get government posts

Peter Kirsanow, a Black conservative lawyer who represents management in disputes with labor, was handed a recess appointment to the National Labor Relations Board

On Wednesday, January 4, while the Jack Abramoff corruption scandal continued to unwind, sending shockwaves through the nation's capital, the Bush Administration announced a handful of recess appointments. Included on the list of appointees -- who do not have to face confirmation by the Senate -- was a host of Bush cronies who don't appear ready for primetime.

Julie L. Myers, a niece of former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Richard B. Myers and the wife of the chief of staff to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, was appointed to head the Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau at the Department of Homeland Security. Critics from both parties maintained that Meyers "lacked experience in immigration matters," the Washington Post's Thomas B. Edsall reported.

Tracy A. Henke was appointed executive director of the Office of State and Local Government Coordination and Preparedness. The Washington Post noted that Henke "had been accused in her politically appointed post at the Justice Department of demanding that information about racial disparities in police treatment of blacks in traffic cases be deleted from a news release."

Former Maryland Republican gubernatorial candidate (twice defeated) Ellen R. Sauerbrey -- an outspoken opponent of abortion rights and family planning -- whose nomination had been bottled up in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was named assistant secretary of state for population, refugees and migration. On Thursday, January 5, the New York Times pointed out that Sauerbrey "has zero experience in emergency management and refugee resettlement."

Another name on Bush's list was that of Peter N. Kirsanow. The conservative African American lawyer from Cleveland, who since 2001 has been serving on the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, was appointed to fill one of two vacant seats on the five-member National Labor Relations Board. He will maintain the NLRB position for the remainder of a five-year term that expires on August 27, 2008.

Kirsanow is a partner with Benesch, Friedlander, Coplan & Aronoff LLP. The firm's website points out that Kirsanow's practice has focused on "representing management in employment-related litigation, as well as in contract negotiations, NLRB proceedings, EEO matters, and arbitration."

In a section of his company bio entitled "Labor & Employment," the following accomplishments are listed:

Administrative Agency ProceedingsArbitrations

Successfully represented an employee leasing firm in the trucking industry in obtaining a court order vacating an arbitration award which reinstated a discharged truck driver who had tested positive for drugs.

Collective Bargaining

Represented a hospital in bankruptcy which included the rejection of the collective bargaining agreement in the Bankruptcy Court, counseling the client through a bitter strike, and obtaining Court ordered injunctive relief during the strike thereby significantly limiting the number of pickets around the hospital's premises.

Employment Law CounselingEmployment LitigationWorkers' Compensation Matters

Represented a foundry before OSHA and the Industrial Commission after one of the company's employees died, allegedly from a workplace injury.

Represented a steel processing manufacturer in OSHA, workers' compensation, and personal injury litigation proceedings following a machine failure resulting in the death of the machine operator.

But Kirsanow is more than just a lawyer who has represented the interests of management: He has a long history of involvement with conservative organizations and causes, and has often made controversial pronouncements on racial matters and labor issues.

In 1996, as a member of Project 21, ostensibly a group of Black conservative leaders, Kirsanow supported anti-union legislation in California that was intended to diminish labor's political power.

"Over the years, millions of employees subsidized, to the tune of tens of millions of dollars, union activities wholly unrelated to employees' wages or terms and conditions of employment," Kirsanow said. "The Worker Right to Know Act corrects the repugnant union practice of forcing employees to financially support political positions and arguments to which the employees are personally opposed."

In a 2002 speech at the Heritage Foundation, Kirsanow said that affirmative action had "metastasized into a racial spoils system consisting of preferences, quotas and set-asides."

According to a story posted at the website of the Communication Workers of America (CWA), the U.S. Civil Rights Commission "has adopted Kirsanow's proposals that only majority-approved reports appear on the website and that a draft report criticizing the civil rights record of the Bush administration be removed from the site."

In two recent columns for National Review Online (grants here and here) -- a publication to which he regularly contributes -- Kirsanow has trumpeted the nomination of Judge Sam Alito to the Supreme Court.

Just prior to his recess appointment, a report surfaced in the press that Kirsanow, who was on the advisory board of the NCPPR, might be tied to the Abramoff scandal.

According to the Washington Post (December 25, 2005), Kirsanow "served on an advisory board and [did] some writing for a group called Project 21 ... [which] sought to get publicity for the views of conservative blacks, including Kirsanow." Project 21 is a program of the National Center for Public Policy Research (grants), a right wing public policy research group that has been around for more than two decades and is closely connected to Tom Delay.

According to SourceWatch, a project of the Center for Media and Democracy, the NCPPR was originally founded "to present the conservative perspective on issues of significant public concern. As its first project, it exposed human rights abuses by the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. It then fought against a proposed 'nuclear freeze' and began supporting the Reagan Administration's policies regarding Central America. It now calls itself a 'communications and research foundation dedicated to providing free market solutions to today's public policy problems.'"

The Washington Post report pointed out that the AFL-CIO was questioning whether Kirsanow, "a prominent member" of Project 21, may be connected to Abramoff through their mutual involvement with NCPPR. Abramoff, who was a member of NCPPR's Board of Directors, used the group as a front for a "Scotland golfing junket," and other trips taken by Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), the former House majority leader.

"The center is also reported to have received a $1.07 million donation from Abramoff's client, the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians," the Post reported.

"This is really a stretch," Kirsanow responded in an interview with the Washington Post. "I don't know Abramoff, I don't know anything about Abramoff except from what I read in snippets in the paper. You might as well say I have a connection to Saddam Hussein."

While Kirsanow described Project 21 as "an initiative by the NCPPR to get alternative voices in the black community, those who did not sing from the traditional liberal hymnal," into the public policy debate, SourceWatch depicts it as "a conservative African American organization that opposes affirmative action and the minimum wage and has issued news releases in support of genetically modified foods."

In addition, SourceWatch pointed out, "Project 21 has been funded by R.J. Reynolds, and it has lobbied in support of tobacco industry interests, opposing FDA regulation of the industry, excise taxes and other government policies to reduce tobacco use."

On Thursday, January 5, 2006 AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, issued a statement condemning the Kirsanow appointment.: "In his writings and during his prior public service, Mr. Kirsanow has taken stands against the minimum wage, affirmative action, prevailing wages, voting rights legislation and other basic protections for workers and citizens, and he has expressed a marked hostility to unions. Appointment of a person with such views to a key worker rights adjudication and enforcement position raises legitimate questions among workers about what to expect now from the NLRB."

Reader Comments

You need to check out my father's case i.e. Cecil King v. Diamond Alkali/Shamrock or Ricerca, LLC. Lake County, Ohio. Not certain of case number, but there's some funky stuff going on there, and his NAACP referral attorney took his money with no contract, did no real work, then ignored any and all emails I gave him with substantive case law to prosecute this case.

Now my father informs me that Kirsanow does not want to appear at the oral argument on appeal.

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For background into this and a whole bunch of other NAACP follies visit my website and blawg: Some factions of the NAACP will climb into bed with, or allow themselves to act beholden to, the very same jerks that the "Nation's Oldest Civil Rights Organization" used to fight.

They did it with me and American Tower Corporation, and then later with the Jaffrey NH Police Department, even while Boston City Councillors and their staff helped me and wrote a press release that generated above-the fold coverage.

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The times.... they are a changin'.

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--- Christopher King | 1-12-2006 | 3:22 pm