Trump intensifies anti-union actions: bargaining limits and cut to OSHA inspections

In the year after his return to the White House, President Donald Trump advanced several measures that labor leaders and workplace experts say have weakened worker and union protections. Notable steps include a 20% reduction in Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) inspections compared with President Joe Biden’s final year in office, and repeated delays in implementing a silica dust rule affecting coal miners; the United Mine Workers pressed for immediate enforcement of the stalled rule.

The administration pursued wage-related changes: Trump signed an order cutting the minimum rate for federal contractors to $13.30 an hour from $17.75, a move that, according to experts quoted in reporting, cost some workers more than $9,000 a year. Last year the administration rescinded a Biden-era regulation that had broadened overtime eligibility; as a result, 4.3 million workers will no longer qualify for time-and-a-half overtime pay.

Trump has also pressed an unprecedented campaign to curtail collective bargaining: despite several court rulings that slowed parts of the effort, the administration is pushing to strip about 1 million federal employees of collective bargaining rights, affecting hundreds of thousands at the Transportation Security Administration, the Department of Veterans Affairs, the Department of Agriculture and the Environmental Protection Agency. AFL-CIO president Liz Shuler described this as "the largest single act of union-busting in our history."

The president fired Gwynne Wilcox, the pro-union chair of the National Labor Relations Board — the first such firing of an NLRB member — and has appointed several pro-business officials to the board. In February, after intense corporate lobbying, the administration moved to rescind a Biden-era rule and make it easier for employers to classify workers as independent contractors, a change that reduces employer obligations for minimum wage, overtime and contributions to Social Security, Medicare and unemployment insurance.

Critics including Association of Flight Attendants president Sara Nelson and Heidi Shierholz of the Economic Policy Institute say the administration is systematically weakening worker protections across safety, wage-and-hour and accountability rules. White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers countered that President Trump prioritizes American workers, citing the "largest middle-class tax cuts in history," investments and trade deals to reshore manufacturing.

Economic indicators during the period show wages rising more slowly than prices, with reporting attributing price increases in part to tariffs and the Iran war. Since Trump’s return to office the U.S. has lost 35,000 manufacturing jobs, though there have been modest recent gains in factory employment.