Dear Senator:

On behalf of the National Women’s Law Center Action Fund, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and National Partnership for Women & Families, we write in strong opposition to the confirmation of Jonathan Berry to be Solicitor for the United States Department of Labor (DOL). The undersigned groups are committed to civil rights, workers’ rights, and gender justice and are deeply concerned about Berry’s extremist views on labor policy, which are demonstrated in Project 2025’s labor chapter, of which he is the author.¹ Implementing his recommendations for the DOL would harm workers throughout the United States by undermining key civil rights and worker protections, resulting in less accountability for discrimination at work, greater economic uncertainty, increased workplace hazards, and limited job opportunities for women, workers of color, LGBTQI+ workers, workers with disabilities, and many other workers throughout the country.

As the lead attorney at the key agency charged with protecting our nation’s working people, the Solicitor of Labor must have a demonstrated commitment to promoting the well-being and rights of working people. The Department of Labor enforces a number of laws vital to workers’ economic security and safety at work, such as the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), including the PUMP for Nursing Mothers Act; the Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) Act; and the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA). Strong enforcement of these laws is essential to protecting workers and ensuring they are fully able to assert their rights. The FLSA, for example, provides minimum wage and overtime protections—protections that are particularly relevant for women because women, especially women of color, are overrepresented among workers paid at or below the federal minimum wage,² are more likely to benefit from the Biden overtime rule due to their disproportionate representation in lower-paying jobs,³ and represent more than two-thirds of tipped workers.⁴

It can be very challenging for workers to assert even these core protections given the very real fear of retaliation, particularly for workers living paycheck to paycheck. That’s why a Solicitor of Labor who will stand up for workers is so important. But Jonathan Berry will not be that Solicitor of Labor. Instead, Berry’s extremist views would undercut legal protections by rolling back decades of labor and civil rights and replacing them with policies rooted in racist and sexist beliefs that center corporate profit over worker well-being. Because women,⁵ and especially women of color,⁶ are overrepresented in the lowest-paid jobs, they are particularly likely to suffer if Berry seeks to fulfill the vision he set out in Project 2025.

Read the full letter and see the list of signatories in the official letter here.