Trump Taking Flak from Mining Industry for Potential Closure of Field Safety Offices 

Safety at Work

The health and safety of coal miners could be in danger if the Trump administration eliminates mine safety employees, including those working at the Mine Safety and Health Administration offices nationwide that oversee safety field offices, according to the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA).  

“There is a perfect storm brewing in America’s coalfields that will have the effect of destroying thousands of  coal miners’ jobs and significantly increase the risks those miners who are left will face to their health and safety on the job,’’ said Cecil E. Roberts, president of the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) International. 

The Trump Administration’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has trumpeted cost savings by laying off thousands of federal workers and terminating office leases.   

DOGE said its move to end the leases at four Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) offices  in Pennsylvania will save the government $2.99 million out of a federal budget that projects $7 trillion in expenditures in this fiscal year ending.  

 “The looming closure of MSHA offices across the country would roll back decades of progress in mine safety and health. Without MSHA’s presence in the field, violations will go unchecked, hazards will grow and the risk of another disaster like  Upper Big Branch will increase,” said Erin Bates, communications director of the United Mine Workers of America.  Fifteen years ago, 29 miners lost their lives at the Upper Big Branch in West Virginia.  

UMW officials further noted that they are thankful that ranking Congressional member Bobby Scott and Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia are working this month to reintroduce the Robert C. Byrd Mine Safety Protection Act for the 119^th Congress. The bill would strengthen enforcement, increase penalties for safety violations and hold bad actors accountable addressing the failures that led to the Upper Big Branch disaster on April 5, 2010.  

However, some mining experts concede that field offices have been consolidated before,  but they also pointed out that it is “highly unusual’’ to close so many offices without due process.  

In early March 2025, the House Committee on Education and Workforce submitted a letter to Vince Micone, the acting secretary of  labor requesting  documents and information  on proposed closures and expressing concern that as many as 90 mine inspection jobs may have been rescinded. Their letter specifically referred to the agency’s history of understaffing that led to catastrophies like the Upper Big Branch mine explosion that killed 29, the nation’s worst mining accident in four decades.  

“We are not getting any communication from the Trump administration and it is very disturbing,’’ said Bates.  

The U.S. mining industry supports some 40,000 miners nationwide. The number of fatal injuries in mining, quarrying and the oil and gas extraction industry rose from 78 in 2020 to 95 in 2021, a 21.8 percent increases, the latest figures available.  Fatal injuries in the industry were above 100 in the three years prior to 2020: 112 fatalities in 2017, 130 fatalities in 2018 and 127 fatalities in 2019. And MSHA just reported that 5 miners died in the first months of 2025.  

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