Puzder, chief executive of CKE Restaurants Inc, which operates the Carl’s Jr and Hardee’s, often argues that a higher minimum wage would hurt workers

This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

Donald Trump has named fast food executive Andy Puzder to head the US Department of Labor, in an appointment likely to antagonize organized labor.

Puzder, chief executive of CKE Restaurants Inc, which operates the Carl’s Jr and Hardee’s fast-food chains, has been a vociferous critic of government regulation of the workplace.

Puzder frequently publishes commentary and gives television interviews in which he argues that a higher minimum wage would hurt workers by forcing restaurants to close and praises the benefits of automation in the fast-food industry.

Contrastingly, in a statement announcing the nomination, the president-elect said Puzder’s “record [of] fighting for workers makes him the idea candidate to lead” the department.

“Andy will fight to make American workers safer and more prosperous by enforcing fair occupational safety standards and ensuring workers receive the benefits they deserve, and he will save small businesses from the crushing burdens of unnecessary regulations that are stunting job growth and suppressing wages,” Trump said.

“I am honored to be nominated by President-elect Trump for Secretary of Labor. I look forward to the opportunity to help President-elect Trump restore America’s global economic leadership,” Puzder said.

Fast-food workers, who are largely not unionized, are engaged in a multi-year campaign known as the “Fight for $15” which is supported by labor unions, to raise minimum wages around the country to $15 an hour. They have garnered statewide successes in New York and California and in cities and municipalities such as Seattle.

The selection of Puzder was first reported by the Wall Street Journal.

Trump’s decision to tap Puzder as chief of the country’s largest labor agency, which regulates wages, safety and discrimination in the workplace, comes as the president-elect is engaged in a Twitter brawl with the head of a local United Steelworkers union in Indiana.

United Steelworkers Local 1999’s president, Chuck Jones, who represents workers at United Technologies Corp’s Carrier plant in Indianapolis, criticized Trump for inflating the number of jobs that would be saved by his intervention in the company’s decision to move some production to Mexico.

Carrier deal saves Indiana jobs, but Trump critics fear dangerous precedent Read more

Trump posted on Twitter that Jones has done a “terrible job representing workers”. Some of the president-elect’s supporters sent Jones death threats.

Jones said after speaking to the company that 800 jobs will remain in Indianapolis and 730 of those will be union jobs, with another 70 management positions. But Trump said last week during an appearance at the Carrier plant that a deal made by Indiana to give the company $7m in tax breaks would keep 1,100 jobs in the region.

“Our people, at that point in time, got their hopes back up that they might have a job,” Jones told CNBC on Thursday. “I’ve said at every interview that I’m grateful for President-elect Trump getting involved without his involvement these 800 jobs would not remain in Indianapolis.

“All he had to do is come back and say I was misled by [United Technologies] ... instead of doing that he goes on the attack on me?” Jones added.