President Trump's pick for labor secretary, Andrew Puzder, admitted in a statement on Monday that he once hired an undocumented immigrant to work for his family.
"My wife and I employed a housekeeper for a few years, during which I was unaware that she was not legally permitted to work in the U.S.," acknowledged Puzder, the chief executive of CKE Restaurants, confirming a report in The Huffington Post. "When I learned of her status, we immediately ended her employment and offered her assistance in getting legal status. We have fully paid back taxes to the IRS and the state of California and submitted all required paperwork."
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), the chairman of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, said that "based upon what I've learned," because Puzder "voluntarily corrected" his error, he should not be disqualified from being a Cabinet secretary. Similar revelations from Zoe Baird and Kimba Wood, former President Bill Clinton's picks for attorney general in 1993, sank their nominations, and former President George W. Bush's labor secretary nominee, Linda Chavez, withdrew her name for a lesser related offense.