One Special Interest at a Time: GOP Chairman Michael Steele Notes on Meet the Press that President Obama may not have Time to Address “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” but he Found Time to Encourage PLAs on Federal Construction
On the May 17 edition of Meet the Press, David Gregory asked DNC Chairman and Virginia Governor Tim Kaine about President Obama’s lack of action on the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy. Governor Kaine said the President simply hadn’t gotten to it yet. Chairman Steele’s response hit the nail on the head.
GOV. KAINE: This [Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell] is a very important priority, but it is something that’s going to need Congressional support so he’s working with the military leaders on this. And there’s a whole host of other issues that the president has said, “I’m getting to. I can’t get to them yet, but I’m going to get to them.” And that’s what happens with every president.
MR. STEELE: But it’s not a, but it’s not as important as overturning the project labor agreements [ban] that would allow small businesses to actually effectively compete on, on contracts, on federal contracts which they can no longer do because they’re not unionized.
Of course, Chairman Steele is referring to President Obama’s Executive Order 13502, which encourages federal agencies to utilize PLAs on all federal construction costing more than $25 million and repeals a previous executive order prohibiting PLAs on federally funded work.
While it’s difficult to know for sure how wasteful and discriminatory union-only project labor agreements moved up the administration’s to do list, I’ll bet this helped.