The Controversial Past Of Obama’s New Labor Secretary

New Labor Secretary Thomas Perez – after a controversial tenure at the Department of Justice marked by his involvement in targeting voter identification laws, dropping charges against the New Black Panther Party, and fighting Arizona’s immigration enforcement – was ceremonially sworn by Vice President Joe Biden Wednesday.

Perhaps most germane to Perez’s current office was his action on “disparate impact” cases in employment and bank loans while serving as assistant attorney general for the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division. “Disparate impact” is a statistical tool to show that lenders or employers are discriminating against minorities, which doesn’t require showing intent to discriminate nor examine the individual decisions, rather relies only on the numbers.

More