Latino lawmakers are urging the Trump administration to investigate working conditions for meat processing workers and issue a temporary emergency safety standard, a day after the president mandated that plants reopen.
President Donald Trump issued an executive order Tuesday requiring plants to stay open or reopen amid concerns about food shortages during the coronavirus crisis. But multiple meat processing facilities across the country have seen the coronavirus ravage their workforces, and Latino members of Congress led by Rep. Joaquín Castro (D-Texas), the Congressional Hispanic Caucus chair, are concerned that some companies are heaping even more risk on workers already prone to high rates of illness.
"Numerous companies across the meatpacking industry have not taken the necessary precautions they need to protect workers," the lawmakers wrote in a letter to the administration. "While some companies were early actors in providing personal protective equipment, the callous inaction of others has reportedly led to multiple deaths and thousands of sick workers, as well as the death of two inspectors from the Department of Agriculture."
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