Andrew Puzder

Andrew Franklin Puzder (; born July 11, 1950) is an American attorney, author, and businessman who has served as United States Ambassador to the European Union since 2025.

Puzder worked as a commercial trial lawyer in private practice from 1978 to 1995, handling many high-profile cases and being active in the anti-abortion movement. He was chief executive officer of CKE Restaurants, the parent company of Hardee's and Carl's Jr., from September 2000 to March 2017. While holding this position, he was nominated on December 8, 2016, by then-President-elect Donald Trump to serve as Secretary of Labor. After it came out that he had kept an illegal immigrant as his housekeeper, paying no taxes on her work, Puzder, who also faced criticism for his company’s treatment of its workers, withdrew on February 15, 2017, for want of votes needed for his confirmation.

On January 22, 2025, President Trump announced his nomination of Puzder to serve as United States Ambassador to the European Union in his second administration. He was confirmed by the United States Senate on August 2, 2025. He presented his credentials on September 11, 2025.

Puzder is a frequent commentator on economic and political issues. He co-authored a book entitled Job Creation: How It Really Works and Why Government Doesn't Understand It. After withdrawing as Secretary of Labor nominee, Puzder published his second book, The Capitalist Comeback: The Trump Boom and the Left's Plot to Stop It, in 2018.

Puzder was born on July 11, 1950, in Cleveland, Ohio, the son of Winifred M. (Franklin) and Andrew Frank Puzder, a car salesman. He grew up in a working class community in Russell Township.

Earning his way through college and law school, while supporting his family by working construction, landscaping, and painting houses, he attended Kent State University, but later dropped out in 1970 to play guitar and perform in bands.

Puzder would later move to Cleveland Heights where he managed a guitar studio while attending Cleveland State University, receiving a BA in history in 1975. He then attended Washington University School of Law where he was the senior editor of the Washington University Law Quarterly, receiving his JD in 1978. Puzder would become the first in his family to graduate from college.

During the 1980s and early 1990s, Puzder was considered Missouri's leading anti-abortion lawyer and was active in the anti-abortion advocacy group Lawyers for Life. In 1984, Puzder and another lawyer wrote an article for the Stetson Law Review proposing a Missouri law that would define life as beginning at conception in the broad context of contract or property law. Working with St. Louis area Congresswoman Ann Wagner's mother-in-law, Puzder reasoned that if fetuses were recognized as having rights in other contexts, it would establish a foundation for challenging Roe v. Wade later on.

It would also influence one section of Missouri House Bill 1596, an abortion law prohibiting the use of state money for abortions and declaring that life begins at conception. Following a challenge, the Supreme Court in 1989 upheld the law in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services. The watershed decision opened the door for new state-level restrictions on abortion.

Following the Webster decision in 1990, Puzder authored a commentary article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that "called on his colleagues and abortion-rights supporters to work together for new laws to help pregnant women and their children." BJ Isaacson Jones, the Director of Reproductive Health Services (the abortion clinic involved in the Webster case), contacted him and they began talking about areas where they could find common ground in an effort to help women and children.[13][14] Their common ground efforts grew into a national organization known as the Common Ground Network for Life and Choice with the objective of helping "activists get beyond their differences and, together, help pregnant women." The Network had an office in Washington DC and held two national conferences. In 1995, Puzder and Isaacson-Jones co-authored a pamphlet entitled Adoption as Common Ground and Isaacson Jones opened an adoption agency in the clinic.

In July 1989, Puzder was appointed chair of the Task Force for Mothers and Unborn Children by Missouri Governor John Ashcroft. After The Riverfront Times published an article detailing allegations that he had abused his wife, he offered up his resignation to the Governor, which the Governor later rejected.

His former wife subsequently "fully" withdrew those allegations in 1990 and has been adamant that Puzder was "not abusive" and that she would "most definitely confirm to anyone who may ask that in no way was there abuse." In a letter dated Jan. 18, 2017 that she sent to Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., and Sen. Patty Murray, she stated: "Let me be clear. Andy is not and was not abusive or violent. He is a good, loving, kind man and a deeply committed and loving father." She acknowledged that she was "misled by faulty advice of someone I trusted" and noted that "[t]he fact that my attorney used 'adult abuse' as a vehicle to gain leverage in our divorce proceedings has haunted me as well as our children to this day."

Puzder is a frequent author on economic and legal issues in periodicals such as The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Real Clear Politics, CNBC online, National Review, The Hill, Politico, and the Orange County Register. He has been a guest on business news programs including Your World with Neil Cavuto, Varney & Co., Mornings with Maria, The O'Reilly Factor with Bill O'Reilly, Mad Money with Jim Cramer, Fast Money, Power Lunch, Lou Dobbs Tonight, and Squawk on the Street. He was the interviewee on Tucker Carlson Today's 2023 episode Burgers to Billions. He has co-hosted both Varney & Co. and Squawk on the Street. He is also a frequent speaker at colleges, universities, and other venues on economic issues and the impact of government regulations on corporations.

In 2010, Puzder and David Newton co-wrote the book Job Creation: How It Really Works and Why Government Doesn't Understand It. In the book, Puzder and Newton sharply criticize trade unions and argue in favor of deregulation, tax cuts, government spending cuts, and an increase in domestic oil production.

In 2018, Puzder wrote the book The Capitalist Comeback: The Trump Boom and the Left's Plot to Stop It. In the book, Puzder discusses how Donald Trump's presidency has impacted the U.S. economy.

In 2011, Puzder contributed to Believe in America, Mitt Romney's Plan for Jobs and Economic Growth. He was an Economic Adviser and a spokesman for the Romney campaign for President. Puzder also served as a Delegate to the 2012 Republican National Convention and as the Chairman of the Platform Committee's Sub-Committee on the Economy, Job Creation, and the Debt.

In 2016, Puzder raised money for the Trump campaign for President, and with his wife contributed $332,000 to Trump's campaign, joint fundraising committees, and the Republican National Committee, according to the Federal Election Commission. He was a Trump Presidential Trustee, Victory Finance Chair for California, spokesperson, and Senior Economic Advisor to the campaign. Puzder also served as a Delegate to the 2016 Republican National Convention and as the Chairman of the Platform Committee's "Restoring the American Dream" Sub-Committee on the economy, job creation, and the debt.

On December 8, 2016, President-elect Donald Trump nominated Puzder to be United States Secretary of Labor.

Puzder's confirmation hearing before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee was delayed several times due to the Office of Government Ethics not having finalized its review specifying how Puzder would avoid ethical conflicts. A source close to Puzder, speaking on condition of anonymity, accused Democrats of stalling the process: "With regards to Andy's paperwork, the Democrats and the Committee have been moving the goal post," the source said via email. Sources close to Puzder insist that he had maintained transparency and provided an enormous amount of detail in order to streamline the confirmation process.

Puzder had "come under intense fire from Democrats and liberal groups who accused him of mistreating his workers, opposing the minimum wage and supporting automation in the workplace." Labor Department investigators had discovered that franchisees of the Hardee’s chain, whose parent company he ran, had violated federal wage-and-hour regulations in many instances of wage theft, entitling workers to thousands of dollars in back pay. Puzder was also found to have employed an undocumented immigrant as a housekeeper, paying no taxes on her services till after he was chosen by Donald Trump to lead the Labor Department.

Puzder was married to Lisa Fierstein Henning from 1973 until their divorce in 1987, and they had two children together. During the divorce trial, his ex-wife alleged that Puzder had abused her. She later retracted the allegations. Puzder married Deanna L. Descher in 1987. He has six children and six grandchildren. He lives in Franklin, Tennessee with his wife. Puzder is Roman Catholic.

The National Advisory Board of Washington University School of Law