The AFL-CIO and unions representing workers across a variety of fields filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the Trump administration to reverse the unlawful gutting of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH). This agency is responsible for providing medical screenings for coal miners, administering the National Firefighter Registry for Cancer so we can better prevent occupational diseases in first responders, conducting investigations into workplace toxin exposure and so much more that makes us all safer.
Since then, as a result of immense pressure from the labor movement and other advocacy groups, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has started to reverse course by reinstating some NIOSH staff.
But by no means is this an end to our fight.
The chaos of firings, piecemeal recalls and funding attacks is undercutting the essential and lifesaving work that NIOSH does. By meddling in this agency and wrecking havoc on its programs, President Trump and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. are putting the health and safety of workers across the country in jeopardy.
Working people in this country deserve so much better. We deserve safety on the job. We deserve to be able to clock out and make it home to our families every night. And we deserve a government that works for us, not for rule-breaking corporations who want to skirt regulations.
