WASHINGTON - May 4 - Today’s bipartisan Senate vote for the Harkin amendment to stop the Bush Administration from cutting workers’ overtime pay while allowing updates to the overtime rule is a common sense decision that will mean real help for many working Americans. There is simply no reason for the Bush Administration to slash a single worker’s overtime pay, especially in this economy, when middle-income families are already so hard pressed.

The Bush Administration’s fierce determination to restrict the ability of workers who make between $23,660 and $100,000 a year to receive overtime pay—such as registered nurses, financial service workers, team leaders and others—is misguided. And rather than simplifying the law, the ambiguous language in the Department of Labor’s overtime pay regulation will create a flood of lawsuits and deprive millions of workers of hard-earned overtime pay.

To add insult to injury, many of these overtime changes appear to have no justification other than to satisfy the desires of business groups. The Administration’s final regulation is rife with special interest fixes for industries that have been unable to secure them from Congress.

It is puzzling that the Administration is pressing forward in defiance of a strong bipartisan majority of Congress. Last year, Congress twice directed the Administration not to take away workers’ overtime rights.

The Harkin amendment is necessary to strike troubling provisions of the final regulation that are intentionally cloaked in complex details to confuse workers. We urge the House to support the Harkin amendment and reassure all working Americans that their rights to overtime pay will be protected.

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