Even without a new Assistant Secretary for OSHA, the Trump Administration has recently deleted numerous Obama-era OSHA plans for workplace safety related rules. Rules that administration officials have said they plan to overhaul or scale back include: regulations strengthening limits to exposure to beryllium, addressing workplace safety violation in healthcare, and addressing combustible dust and noise in construction.
Several OSHA rulemakings have been changed to “long-term actions,” causing speculation that the administration considers these items to be of low or no priority. The topics of these rules include emergency response and preparedness, infectious diseases in health care, and cranes and derricks in construction.
Given the Trump administration’s executive order requiring two standards to be removed for every one added, we are speculating that it is not likely OSHA will be adding many new regulations in the near future.
The latest regulatory agenda for OSHA is available here, and a list of completed/discontinued rules is available here.