Administration reinstates hundreds of health and safety officials who were laid off
Source: ABC News
January 14, 2026, 4:19 PM
The Trump administration took steps this week to reinstate hundreds of health and safety officials who had previously been dismissed in widespread layoffs, granting a major win for advocates of workplace safety.
The newly reinstated employees belong to the National Institute of Safety and Health, or NIOSH, the federal institute within the Department of Health and Human Services that's focused on conducting research and making recommendations for the prevention of work-related injury and illness.
The hundreds of workers brought back this week join those previously reinstated in the coal workers' program focused on protecting miners from the black lung respiratory disease. Critics of the Trump administration have accused the government of stripping away key protections for miners in its bid to reinvigorate the coal industry, ABC News has previously reported.
"This moment belongs to every single person who refused to stay silent," Dr. Micah Niemeier-Walsh, an industrial hygienist at NIOSH and the vice president of the American Federation of Government Employees outpost in Washington, D.C., said Wednesday following news of the reinstatements.
Read more: https://abcnews.go.com/US/administration-reinstates-hundreds-health-safety-officials-laid-off/story?id=129216896
They have bringing some back earlier in dribs and drabs. Speculating that there might have been some behind the scenes red state threats to tank stuff unless this happened.
REFERENCES
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