Chavez-DeRemer is expected to help Trump push the GOP in a more pro-union direction. First, she’ll have to confront Republican skepticism on the Hill.

Lori Chavez-DeRemer, President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Labor Department, is heading to West Palm Beach, Fla., on Monday to interview candidates for senior roles in the Labor Department, National Review has learned.

And later this week, the first-term congresswoman – who just lost reelection to her Portland-area Oregon House seat – plans to meet privately with several GOP senators on Capitol Hill as she and a host of the president-elect’s cabinet picks rush to gin up support before lawmakers head home for the holidays. Her meeting schedule has yet to be finalized.

The Labor Secretary designee’s trip this week to Trump’s Florida political compound comes roughly three weeks after her nomination to the job, which consists of overseeing Occupational Safety and Health Administration and workplace regulations under a GOP that has warmed to unions in recent years. Just last week, for example, Trump had high praise for the International Longshoremen’s Association after meeting with the group’s leaders.

“I’ve studied automation, and know just about everything there is to know about it,” the president-elect wrote in a December 12 social media post railing against port automation. “The amount of money saved is nowhere near the distress, hurt, and harm it causes for American Workers, in this case, our Longshoremen.”

The labor secretary nomination will fall under the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee’s jurisdiction under the leadership of soon-to-be Chairman Bill Cassidy (R., La.). She must win support of a simple majority of HELP Committee members to advance to a confirmation hearing.

Like many other Republicans, Cassidy has expressed concern over Chavez-DeRemer’s support for the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, which would override right-to-work laws on the state level and heavily regulate freelance work. The Oregon congresswoman, who is the daughter of a Teamster, is one of only three House Republicans to vote in favor of the bill.

“I will need to get a better understanding of her support for Democrat legislation in Congress that would strip Louisiana’s ability to be a right to work state, and if that will be her position going forward,” he wrote in a November 22 statement.

Chavez-DeRemer is also expected to come under scrutiny From Senate Republicans over her support for the Public Service Freedom to Negotiate Act, which would require state and local government employers to collectively bargain.

At this stage of the confirmation process, it remains unclear just how many Senate Republicans remain skeptical of her nomination. But as National Review reported earlier this month, there are a significant number of Senate Democrats who are open to her nomination given her support for pro-organized labor-related legislation and union leaders even while in Congress.

During one of her reelection rallies back in October, Speaker Mike Johnson told the crowd: “She’s got more labor union endorsements than any Republican I’ve ever seen in my life.”

“She seems to be an incredibly strong, pro-labor choice,” Senator John Fetterman (D., Pa.) told National Review of Chavez-DeRemer in a recent interview. Her nomination has also won high praise from progressive Senator Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.), as well as union leaders such as Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, and Teamsters president Sean O’Brien, who spoke at the Republican convention over the summer and reportedly lobbied the Trump transition team to tap Chavez-DeRemer for labor secretary.

Speaking with reporters earlier this month about her support for the PRO Act and “pro-union” record, Senator Tommy Tuberville (R., Ala.), who sits on the HELP Committee, said Chavez-DeRemer “checks all the boxes for the left, not many for the right.” Though her legislative record gives him pause, he looks forward to meeting with her about her plans to lead the Labor Department and insists he will “give President Trump the benefit of the doubt here because he nominated her and there’s got to be a reason.”