Yesterday, Hot Air was invited to sit in on a media conference call, arranged by the Workforce Fairness Institute, with Senator Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) on the subject of the current battle between the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and Boeing. While we’ve covered the ongoing battle here previously, DeMint brought up some new wrinkles in the story during his prepared remarks and the Q&A session which followed. Chief among them was the fact that the President’s new chief of staff has some ties to the case which might make him a tad bit less than unbiased.

White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley should take a leave of absence from the White House if the National Labor Relations Board’s allegations against Boeing are true, Sen. Jim DeMint said Thursday.

The NLRB is suing Boeing for allegedly retaliating against strikes at a unionized plant in Washington state by opening a new facility to build 787 airplanes in South Carolina.

DeMint (R-S.C.) called the lawsuit “anti-American and anti-democratic,” pointing out that Daley was on Boeing’s board of directors when the decision was made to place the new plant in South Carolina.

“If the president really believes Boeing broke the law as is contended by the National Labor Relations Board, he should ask his chief of staff [Bill] Daley to take a leave of absence,” DeMint said Thursday on a conference call with reporters, organized by the right-leaning Workforce Fairness Institute.

This adds yet another layer to the rotten onion that this case is turning out to be. On the one hand, we’ve got the NLRB which is clearly not working in either the interests of the workers or of Boeing, but for the unions, and attempting to send a message to businesses about the cost of moving to right to work states. But now, on the other side, DeMint notes that “Obama’s fingerprints” are all over this case and his chief of staff was on Boeing’s board when all of this was set in motion?

During the call, Senator DeMint also noted that there is increasing frustration arising on many fronts regarding this case. The fact is, the NLRB doesn’t even need to win the suit. They can chalk this up as a success if they can just drag the case out long enough in court that it costs Boeing millions of dollars in legal fees and delays in getting their new production line up and running. The result of this, he noted, could easily be more businesses either choosing not to expand their operations and hire more workers or, even worse, choosing to relocate overseas where they won’t face so much meddling from their own government.