Report: Labor Secretary Walsh to leave Biden Cabinet for NHL union
WASHINGTON — U.S. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh is expected to leave the Biden administration to run the National Hockey League Players’ Association, according to two people familiar with his plans.
The hockey players’ union has been searching for a new executive director to take over for Don Fehr, who had been in charge for more than a decade. An association spokesperson had no official update on the situation when reached Tuesday.
A serious fan of the Boston
Bruins, Walsh showed an encyclopedic knowledge of the sport in videos posted online during his tenure from 2014 to 2021 as mayor of Boston.
As labor secretary, Walsh helped broker a temporary work agreement between major freight railroads and their unions,preventing the risk of a strike that could have disrupted the U.S. economy ahead of the 2022 midterm elections. Congress later imposed a contract on the unions after workers failed to ratify the agreement.
An administration official said Tuesday that Walsh was expected to leave his post after President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address, as did a second person familiar with Walsh’s plans, who stressed that the plan was not yet final. Both people spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss departure plans.
Walsh’s departure would make him the first of Biden’s Cabinet secretaries to leave. White House chief of staff Ron Klain has his last day at the White House on Wednesday. And last week, Biden announced the upcoming departure of Brian Deese, the director of the
National Economic Council.
Incoming chief of staff Jeff Zients has spent the last several months working to prepare the administration for potential staff turnover as Biden hit the two-year mark in office. After two years of unusual stability in the staffing ranks, White House officials have telegraphed that additional changes are likely in the coming months as burnedout staff seek new opportunities and are replaced by those with fresh energy — and as Biden prepares for the expected launch of his reelection campaign in the
coming months.
Biden noted in a January speech to mayors that Walsh was making sure that government construction projects paid a prevailing wage and that apprenticeship programs were giving blue-collar workers needed skills.
Walsh, 55, moved into politics after rising through
the ranks of a construction union. At the age of 21, he joined Laborers’ Local 223 and eventually became its president. He was elected to the Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1997 and stayed in the legislature until being elected mayor. He was also formerly head of the Boston Building Trades union.