Seth Harris has been named by President Obama to be deputy secretary of labor, the number two spot at DOL. Harris worked for the Obama campaign and served in the Clinton administration.

According to a White House statement, Harris was most recently the Obama Transition Project’s Agency Working Group Leader for the labor, education, and transportation agencies. He is a professor and the director of Labor & Employment Law Programs at New York Law School. He is also a Senior Fellow of the Life Without Limits Project of the United Cerebral Palsy Association and a member of the National Advisory Commission on Workplace Flexibility.

Harris served as the chair of Obama for America’s Labor, Employment, and Workplace Policy Committee and a co-chair of its Disability Policy Committee.

During the Clinton administration, he served as counselor to the secretary of labor and acting assistant secretary of labor for policy, among other policy-advising positions.

Before joining the administration, he was a law clerk to Judge William Canby of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit and Judge Gene Carter of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maine.

He graduated cum laude from New York University School of Law where he was editor-in-chief of the Review of Law & Social Change. He received his Bachelor’s degree from Cornell University’s School of Industrial & Labor Relations.