Senate confirms Boston mayor Marty Walsh as Biden's labor secretary
Marty Walsh has been confirmed as the next US labor secretary, bringing Joe Biden’s cabinet a step nearer to completion.
The Senate voted 68-29 to confirm the Democrat, currently the mayor of Boston.
Aside from Walsh, there are a few finishing touches left for Biden’s cabinetlevel appointees. The Senate has yet to confirm Eric Lander as Biden’s top science adviser, and the White House still hasn’t named anyone to head his budget office, after Neera Tanden withdrew her nomination amid controversy. The White House is facing pressure from lawmakers on Capitol Hill to name Shalanda Young, the current nominee for deputy budget director, to the top role. Biden’s cabinet may be nearly complete but the work of building his administration is just beginning, as the president still has hundreds of key presidential appointments to make to fill out the federal government.
Biden has about 1,250 federal positions that require Senate confirmation, ranging from the head of the obscure Railroad Retirement Board to more urgent department positions such as assistant and deputy secretaries. Of the 790 being tracked by the Partnership for Public Service, a non-partisan goodgovernment group, 23 appointees have been confirmed by the Senate, 39 are being considered by the Senate, and 466 positions have no named nominee.
Recent crimes against Asian Americans have sparked fresh debate over the nation’s gun laws, but Biden has yet to nominate anyone to head the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. And the wave of migrants at the border is underscoring major challenges in enforcing immigration and asylum laws. Biden hasn’t nominated anyone to head the three key agencies in charge of much of their implementation: Customs and Border Protection;
US Citizenship and Immigration Services; and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Asked last week about those vacancies, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said they were “all important agencies” but offered no timeline for naming nominees.
There are also key vacancies at the Department of Health and Human Services that will play a significant role in addressing the coronavirus pandemic. Biden has named Chiquita Brooks LaSure to be the administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, but it is unclear whom he will choose to head the Food and Drug Administration, which plays an important role in approving vaccines and treatments for the pandemic.
The pace of filling the positions has been hamstrung from the start because of what Biden’s team say was a lack of cooperation from Trump administration officials throughout the transition. Democrats privately acknowledge that Trump’s second impeachment trial also slowed down the process.
Biden’s cabinet picks have included several historic firsts, including Deb Haaland, who was confirmed last week as the first Native American interior secretary, Lloyd Austin, the first African American to lead the Pentagon, and Pete Buttigieg, who became the first openly LGBTQ+ cabinet secretary when he was confirmed as transportation secretary.