The federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) allows the governments of 26 states, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands to adopt and enforce their own workplace safety and health rules for private businesses or state and local government workers. When federal OSHA enacts a new rule, state workplace safety agencies are required by federal law to adopt the U.S. rule or enact a measure of their own that is at least as effective as the federal mandate. Included on the “State Plans ” list of 26 are over half a dozen states that have vowed to sue over the impending OSHA test-or-vax ETS. In the latest chapter of the ongoing federal government v. states showdown over Covid-19, officials at the Department of Labor announced Tuesday that the agency is starting the process of revoking state-level oversight of OSHA programs in Utah, Arizona and South Carolina after the three states failed to adopt, at minimum, the federal Covid-19 safety plans for healthcare workers, released in June. South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster responded in a Tweet Wednesday that the state is making “immediate preparations for a vigorous and lengthy legal fight.” Read more from Bloomberg law.
