The Labor Department is proposing a $46.9 million cut to OSHA’s overall budget in fiscal year 2027 while emphasizing increased investment in compliance assistance programs and in artificial intelligence (AI) and data analytics that the agency says will allow it to use its limited resources more effectively.
September 16, 2026
A group of 16 Republican senators, led by Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Chairman Bill Cassidy (R-LA), is urging OSHA to consider a range of constituent-raised concerns about the Biden-era proposed heat standard as the agency discusses “pragmatic solutions for preventing heat-related hazards in the workplaces.”
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The co-chairs of the House Labor Caucus are urging leaders of a newly formed Democratic AI commission to ensure that an upcoming policy framework for AI regulation includes protection of workers as a central tenet, pointing to the need to promote guardrails to ensure the promise of the technology is met.
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A group of House Democrats, led by Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), is renewing a push to prohibit the use of hydrogen fluoride under federal toxics law, pointing in recently reintroduced legislation to past incidents of immediate injuries and deaths to refinery workers who are exposed to the chemical.
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Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and several of her Democratic colleagues are pressing Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer and OSHA head David Keeling to explain why the agency is proposing to roll back several worker protection standards and has reduced enforcement efforts.
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The AFL-CIO is urging key members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee to reject a Republican draft discussion bill aimed at making numerous industry-requested changes to TSCA, arguing the legislation as written “would put American workers, their children, spouses and neighbors in danger.”
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The House has approved a fiscal year 2026 spending bill that includes funds for OSHA and other worker-safety agencies at levels roughly the same as FY25, after House and Senate appropriators reached a deal on funding for several federal departments that rejects President Trump’s efforts to cut or nearly eliminate worker-protection funding.
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House Judiciary Committee Republicans are championing legislation that would prohibit lawsuits against manufacturers and sellers of artificial stone slabs for injuries caused by exposure to respirable silica during third-party fabrication, arguing hundreds of lawsuits in California courts are threatening to put American companies out of business.
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Congressional appropriators in newly released report language are directing EPA’s TSCA program to revise its standing memorandum of understanding (MOU) with OSHA to better clarify how the agencies coordinate on EPA’s workplace analyses and rules and for EPA to be more transparent in its TSCA new chemical reviews.
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Multiple labor unions, along with environmental and public health groups, are urging key members of Congress not to reopen TSCA for further reforms that might weaken the law beyond reauthorizing EPA’s user fee authority, as they charge the chemical industry is lobbying legislators to weaken worker protections.
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