Susan Crabtree May 31, 2011, 5:25 PM

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) plans to question President Obama’s choice for Commerce secretary on an issue related to union bargaining rights and Boeing.

John Bryson, who Obama tapped Tuesday to replace outgoing Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, serves on Boeing’s board of directors though he will be forced to step down and recuse himself from any matters dealing with the defense giant, if confirmed by the Senate.

Graham is outraged that the National Labor Relations Board is suing Boeing for allegedly retaliating against labor strikes by building a new plant in South Carolina, a state with weaker collective bargaining rights than other areas around the country.

Graham’s spokesman said Republicans senators would press the issue with Bryson during the debate over his nomination.

“In light of the NRLB’s unprecedented complaint against Boeing, one would expect that Mr. Bryson’s service on the company’s board of directors when they created the second 787 assembly line in South Carolina will be discussed at length during confirmation,” Graham spokesman Kevin Bishop said in a statement.

Bishop also pointed to White House Chief of Staff William Daley’s service on Boeing’s board of directors and noted that the company’s president, Jim McNerney, is chairman of Obama’s Export Council.

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) recently called on Daley to take a leave of absence form the White House if the lawsuit against Boeing moved forward.

So far, labor officials have not weighed in on the Boeing NRLB issue. One labor official told TPM that most nominees for Commerce secretary come from the business community so Bryson’s nomination isn’t “particularly shocking” and unions are encouraged by his longtime commitment to renewable fuels and green jobs.

For that reason, the nomination didn’t raise the same types of concerns that labor leaders had when Obama named Bill Daley chief of staff earlier this year.
While the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other business groups praised Daley’s appointment, labor unions were far less enthusiastic.

“The president is of course entitled to choose a chief of staff in whom he has complete confidence,” AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said in a statement. “Yet President Obama and his administration will ultimately be judged by results — whether the economy recovers robustly and begins to generate good jobs on the scale needed to improve the lives of working people.”

Trumka warned that Obama “needs a chief of staff who will reach out to diverse constituencies and make sure that the voices of ordinary Americans are heard in the White House.”

Barack Obama, Business, Commerce Department, Environment, Lindsey Graham, john bryson