Sharon Block and Richard G. Griffin gained notoriety as two of the three recess appointments to the NLRB back in January, 2012. These appointments drew the ire of Republican legislators because they bypassed the normal Senate confirmation process and became the target of legal challenges as we have covered extensively.

This controversy culminated in the D.C. Circuit's January 25, 2013 decision in Noel Canning v. NLRB which held that the appointments were invalid under the U.S. Constitution. Undeterred, President Obama announced on Wednesday that he was renominating Block and Griffin to the Board.

Conversely, on the same day that the President pushed forward his NLRB picks, Speaker of the House John Boehner sent a letter to NLRB Chairman Mark Pearce asking him to suspend all Board activity until the constitutional issues concerning the recess appointments have been resolved. Obviously there will be more to come on this.