Thursday, December 18, 2008 4:16 PM

Obama's Labor Pick Reported To Be Hilda Solis

By KASIE HUNT, CongressDaily

Rep. Hilda Solis, D-Calif., is widely reported to be President-elect Barack Obama's nominee for Labor secretary, a labor official said today. Solis, 51, was elected to Congress in 2000 from a heavily Democratic district that includes part of Los Angeles.

Before that, she served as President Carter's director of Office of Hispanic Affairs and spent six years in the California state House and Senate. She has a strong background on union issues, having worked to unionize farm workers in California and co-sponsoring "card check" legislation that would allow workers to form unions by signing authorization cards.

No confirmation has yet emerged from the transition team, but that didn't stop labor advoactes and members of Congress from weighing in on the reports.

"Hilda Solis is a very strong champion of working families and will be an outstanding secretary of Labor," said House Education and Labor Chairman George Miller, D-Calif. Labor leaders were also pleased by the pick. "The new secretary of Labor is terrific. We are incredibly enthusiastic about her," said Anna Burger, secretary-treasurer of the Service Employees International Union and chairwoman of the union political federation Change to Win. "We have a department of Labor that is built for the 19th century, not the 21st century, and I think Hilda Solis will be terrific at changing this."

Solis' profile in the Almanac of American Politics describes a Pelosi loyalist who has worked closely with organized labor in the past.

Solis has been among the most liberal members of the House and rarely casts a conservative vote. In the minority, she was a tenacious defender of her community. She fought proposals to weaken worker safety regulations and complained that the Nielsen television ratings undercounted Latinos.

She showed her good standing with Nancy Pelosi by gaining a highly-sought seat on the Energy and Commerce Committee, and has been active on its Environment and Hazardous Materials Subcommittee -- a good fit with her career work. Solis has scored some legislative successes. She was among the early sponsors of the bill to give citizenship eligibility to immigrants who have served a year in the military, which George W. Bush signed in November 2003; previous law required three years of service.

She enacted a bill for the Interior Department to restore the water flow of the San Gabriel River and study ways to create more green space and urban recreation areas. She enacted another bill to name a post office in Duarte for Francisco Martinez Flores, a Marine who was among the first casualties in the Iraq war. As a Pelosi loyalist, she has been active in leadership circles and was named to the select committee on global warming; she has cosponsored legislation that sets greenhouse gas emission targets.