Photo by US Department of Labor on Flickr is licensed under CC BY 2.0: https://bit.ly/3UzOMDN

Biden’s Acting Secretary of Labor Julie Su is facing yet another subpoena from the House Education & Workforce Committee after failing to provide timely answers on the Department of Labor’s (DOL) return-to-office plans.

House Education & Workforce Committee Chairwoman Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) served a subpoena to the Acting Secretary on Monday, compelling Su to provide “documents on DOL’s return-to-office action plan to ensure accountability for taxpayers who are paying for an absentee federal government that ceased regular operations nearly four years ago.” DOL has faced criticism for its low rates of in-office attendance after the country exited the COVID-19 pandemic, with nearly a third of DOL workers continuing to telework every day as of 2022.

The DOL was originally supposed to produce its return-to-office plans to the White House’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) by January 26th. On March 6th, Chairwoman Foxx sent a letter to Acting Secretary Su requesting information on that plan, which still had not been produced. At a committee hearing featuring Su on May 1st, Foxx again requested information on the return-to-office plan and threatened to issue a subpoena if Su did not comply.

“Acting Secretary Su must be held accountable for her own inaction. She has earned this subpoena,” wrote Chairwoman Foxx in a statement upon issuing the subpoena on Monday.

This is not Su’s first time facing a congressional subpoena for her evasive behavior.

In November 2023, Chairwoman Foxx issued a separate subpoena to the Acting Secretary for her failure to provide documents related to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s (OSHA) “Workers’ Voice Summit,” a taxpayer-funded event that was criticized as political in nature. Su ultimately failed to comply with this subpoena, according to Rep. Foxx.

Earlier in 2023, Julie Su also tried to evade a statutorily mandated oversight hearing before the House Education & Workforce Committee. She only agreed to appear before the committee in June after Chairwoman Foxx threatened to issue yet another subpoena to compel her attendance.

Julie Su has shown a flagrant disregard for congressional oversight. She already made clear that she does not believe Congress’s advice and consent is necessary for her to serve indefinitely as Acting Secretary, having sat in the position for over a year despite being rejected by the Senate. Now Su has shown repeatedly that she does not care about Congress’s power to request department records and hold the executive branch accountable for its actions.

The American people deserve a Secretary of Labor who is able to be confirmed and who takes seriously the coequal authority of the legislative branch. Julie Su’s failure to comply with basic congressional oversight provides even more reason for her to resign.