WASHINGTON (CNN) - President Bush plans to nominate a Nebraska businessman who is an outspoken advocate of international trade as the administration's "manufacturing czar," administration sources told CNN Wednesday.

In an odd twist, Democrat John Kerry's campaign issued a statement dismissing the importance of the position a full day before the White House planned to make the announcement.

The announcement to the Commerce Department post was planned for Thursday, but administration officials said a statement is likely to be issued Wednesday evening, in part because of questions prompted by the Kerry campaign release.

The choice is Tony Raimondo, chairman and CEO of the Behlen Manufacturing Group. He will be tapped as assistant secretary of commerce for manufacturing and charged with making sure administration policy helps the nation's struggling manufacturing base.

Behlen makes steel buildings and livestock pens used mostly in the agricultural sector. Raimondo is active in the National Association of Manufacturers, an industry group generally in line with Republicans on economic issues.

Bush announced he was creating the new position five months ago, and many Democrats have been harshly critical in recent days and weeks at the delay in filling the position. They said the long wait suggested to them that Bush made the announcement as a publicity stunt and that the post must not have any meaningful authority.

But Wednesday, Senator Kerry took a different tack.

"Putting another bureaucrat in the Department of Commerce isn't going to get people back to work," the presumptive Democratic nominee said in a written statement. "This is like the quarterback late in the fourth quarter promising he can turn the game around by hiring a new water boy."

Earlier in the day in a speech in Cleveland, Bush lamented job losses in the country's manufacturing heartland but defended his trade policy as critical to creating new jobs. (For more on Bush's remarks, click here).

In its statement, the Kerry campaign did not say how it received advance word of the president's decision to offer the post to Raimondo.

YOUR E-MAIL ALERTS Follow the news that matters to you. Create your own alert to be notified on topics you're interested in. Or, visit Popular Alerts for suggestions. Manage alerts | What is this?

But Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson was a Behlen director after his term as Nebraska governor expired in 1999, and news accounts in the state note that Raimondo traveled on trade missions with Nelson during his term as governor.

White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan had a sharply worded retort when asked about the Kerry statement.

"Senator Kerry's dishonest political rhetoric cannot hide his pessimistic, jobs-killing policies of tax increases and economic isolation," McClellan told CNN in a telephone interview.