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With no federal standard for heat, states are making their own to protect workers
Admire Stewart and Margie Rodriguez hold up water bottles that Rodriguez purchased for housekeepers at the University of Maryland. Hydration is a challenge when the housekeepers work long hours in unairconditioned dormitories across campus.
Emily Hofstaedter/WYPR
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Emily Hofstaedter/WYPR
Admire Stewart takes a deep breath and sits still while a breeze hits her face. Her gallon-sized water bottle is by her side.
“Right now I have a migraine because of the heat yesterday and I have heat hives,” she says as she points to the bumps on her arms. She’s trained herself not to scratch them, which only makes them worse.
Stewart works inside Ellicott Hall, one of the unairconditioned dormitories on University of Maryland’s College Park campus.
President Joe Biden introduced an occupational standard for workers laboring in extreme heat, but it could take years to take effect. Meanwhile, states like California, Colorado, Minnesota, Oregon and Washington have passed protections as workers toil in extreme temperatures.
Maryland is set to finalize its heat standard later this summer, making it the first state to do so on the East Coast.
When students leave for the summer, Stewart is one of dozens of housekeepers who clean every inch of the building – doing laundry, waxing floors, and pushing a vacuum through student bedrooms.
When she spoke to a reporter in early June, she said temperatures in the building had already swelled close to ninety degrees.
“I really didn’t finish my assignment yet because I’ve been really slowing myself down a little bit [more] than usual,” she said.
Stewart feels generally supported by her employer to take the measures she needs to keep herself from getting too sick– like slowing down, stopping for water, or just leaving work undone until the worst part of the heat passes.
But many are not so lucky.
Thirty-six U.S. workers died from heat sickness in 2021, the last complete year in which the Bureau of Labor Statistics provided data. That number has grown throughout the last decade and according to independentinvestigations, those are likely undercounts.
In the decade from 2011-2020 there were 34,000 work-related heat injuries and illnesses severe enough that workers had to take time away from the job. It’s likely those numbers are undercounts too, according to the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) because states have varying definitions for heat sickness and most data comes from self-reporting.
State Delegate Lorig Charkoudian, a Democrat, proposed the bill to create Maryland’s heat standard back in 2020.
“We are facing serious impacts from climate change, and it plays out in many ways, harming usually, the most vulnerable communities first,” Charkoudian said.
Occupational safety experts say Maryland is poised to enact one of the most comprehensive standards.
Under the rules, employers will have to post protections in workers’ native languages and provide acclimatization periods so workers can get adjusted to the heat. Workplaces will have to have a written heat safety plan for any work done when the heat index, including humidity, is at 80 degrees or above. That goes for indoor and outdoor work. Additional protocols, like paid mandatory cooled and shaded breaks every two hours, are triggered when temperatures reach ninety degrees.
The incoming standards have received pushback from some industry groups.
Steve Sohasky, who advises construction companies with Creative Risk Management Solutions, says the standard is too extreme and that workers and companies can regulate themselves.
“If people need breaks, they take breaks, you know, we have that flexibility in the job,” Sohasky said after a stakeholder meeting with the Maryland Department of Labor.
Construction workers make up about 6% of the workforce, but according to a National Institute of Health study account for over one-third of yearly heat deaths. Workers of color and immigrants tend to work jobs with the most risk of heat sickness.
Adele Abrams, a labor attorney based in Maryland, says the dangers of working in the heat shouldn’t be minimized.
“I represent employers but I’m not going to sugarcoat this: people die from heat illness. I have had fatality cases I have handled where I know weather conditions were a contributing factor in causing the death of the worker,” she said.
Industry advocates have expressed concerns about the feasibility of setting up cooling and shading stations, especially in jobs where crews are constantly moving. But Abrams says some solutions require planning and creativity. Low-cost options include letting crews sit in a truck with the AC on or setting up a cooling trailer.
Abrams expressed concerns about the patchwork of state protections going into effect as the federal government slowly moves to set its own standards.
“How many times can [employers] reinvent the wheel and re-do their programs?” Abrams said. “This was part of what was making employers crazy back when the COVID regulations were in place…it seemed like every other month we were having to retool it because new information was available or old information was found not to be accurate.”
Anastasia Christman, a policy analyst from the National Employment Law Project, says Congress is notoriously slow in updating laws for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA.
“The public comment period can be made very long, the cost-benefit analysis is very difficult in the case of OSHA, because how do you count the value of injuries that won’t happen? You’re having to sort of count something negative,” Christman said.
Meanwhile, states like Texas and Florida have made it illegal for municipalities to pass their own heat ordinances.
Christman points out that heat, which can cause tiredness or confusion, can be the underlying cause of other incidents like forklift collisions or car accidents on the commute home.
“I think it will be very interesting to see whether or not we see not only a decrease in straight up heat illness, but also a decrease in all these other kinds of injuries. And if in fact, the workplace just starts to become exponentially safer,” she said.
If a federal standard goes into effect, experts say enforcement will still be a challenge. OSHA has fewer than 2,000 inspectors responsible for nearly eight million worksites.
One observer of the current Senate race in Louisiana noted that Sen. Bill Cassidy could lose his reelection bid.
Annie Flanagan for NPR
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Annie Flanagan for NPR
Sen. Bill Cassidy lost Saturday’s Louisiana Republican primary according to a race call by the Associated Press.
Cassidy, who served two terms in the Senate, was one of seven Republican senators who voted to convict President Trump after the January 6th insurrection at the Capitol. That vote put him at odds with Trump and his MAGA coalition, ultimately leading Trump to push Rep. Julia Letlow to run against Cassidy.
Cassidy’s bid for a third term was viewed as a test of Trump’s grip on the party–and of what voters want from their representatives in Washington. The primary pitted Cassidy, a veteran lawmaker, former physician and chair of the powerful Senate health committee, against Letlow, a political newcomer and a millennial MAGA loyalist.
A detailed view of a hat that reads, Run Julia Run, is seen at a campaign event for Rep. Julia Letlow (R-LA) on May 6, 2026 in Franklinton, Louisiana.
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A former college administrator, Letlow won a special election in 2021 for the House seat her late husband, Luke, was set to assume before he died from COVID in 2020.
In Congress, Letlow sponsored a bill to collect oral histories from the pandemic and has focused on education and children. She introduced the “Parents Bill of Rights Act,” which would allow parents to review classroom materials like library books and require schools to notify parents if their child requests different pronouns, locker rooms or sports teams.
She also serves on the powerful appropriations committee and has embraced Trump’s agenda.
Letlow, who came first in Saturday’s primary, will face Louisiana state Treasurer John Fleming in the runoff on June 27. Cassidy came in third.
The election result is a victory for President Trump who has put Republican loyalty to the test on the ballot so far this year in Indiana state senate primaries and in Cassidy’s race.
Another major test of Trump’s influence comes in Kentucky’s primary on Tuesday when Republican Rep. Thomas Massie, who has found himself at odds with the president, faces a challenger endorsed by Trump.
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Brass bands in Beijing make way for sticker shock at home as Trump returns to escalating inflation
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump returned from the spectacle of a Chinese state visit to a less than welcoming U.S. economy — with the military band and garden tour in Beijing giving way to pressure over how to fix America’s escalating inflation rate.
Consumer inflation in the United States increased to 3.8% annually in April, higher than what he inherited as the Iran war and the Republican president’s own tariffs have pushed up prices. Inflation is now outpacing wage gains and effectively making workers poorer. The Cleveland Federal Reserve estimates that annual inflation could reach 4.2% in May as the war has kept oil and gasoline prices high.
Trump’s time with Chinese leader Xi Jinping appears unlikely to help the U.S. economy much, despite Trump’s claims of coming trade deals. The trip occurred as many people are voting in primaries leading into the November general election while having to absorb the rising costs of gasoline, groceries, utility bills, jewelry, women’s clothing, airplane tickets and delivery services. Democrats see the moment as a political opportunity.
“He’s returning to a dumpster fire,” said Lindsay Owens, executive director of Groundwork Collaborative, a liberal think tank focused on economic issues. “The president will not have the faith and confidence of the American people — the economy is their top issue and the president is saying, ‘You’re on your own.’”
The president’s trip to Beijing and his recent comments that indicated a tone-deafness to voters’ concerns about rising prices have suggested his focus is not on the American public and have undermined Republicans who had intended to campaign on last year’s tax cuts as helping families.
Trump described the trip as a victory, saying on social media that Xi “congratulated me on so many tremendous successes,” as the U.S. president has praised their relationship.
Trump told reporters that Boeing would be selling 200 aircraft — and maybe even 750 “if they do a good job” — to the Chinese. He said American farmers would be “very happy” because China would be “buying billions of dollars of soybeans.”
“We had an amazing time,” Trump said as he flew home on Air Force One, and told Fox News’ Bret Baier in an interview that gasoline prices were just some “short-term pain” and would “drop like a rock” once the war ends.
Inflationary pain is not a factor in how Trump handles Iran
Trump departed from the White House for China by saying the negotiations over the Iran war depended on stopping Tehran from developing nuclear weapons. “I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation. I don’t think about anybody. I think about one thing: We cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon,” Trump said.
That remark prompted blowback because it suggested to some that Trump cared more about challenging Iran than fighting inflation at home. Trump defended his words, telling Fox News: “That’s a perfect statement. I’d make it again.”
The White House has since stressed that Trump is focused on inflation.
Asked later about the president’s words, Vice President JD Vance said there had been a “misrepresentation” of the remarks. White House spokesman Kush Desai said the “administration remains laser-focused on delivering growth and affordability on the homefront” while indicating actions would be taken on grocery prices.
But as Trump appeared alongside Xi, new reports back home showed inflation rising for businesses and interest rates climbing on U.S. government debt.
His comments that Boeing would sell 200 jets to China caused the company’s stock price to fall because investors had expected a larger number. There was little concrete information offered about any trade agreements reached during the summit, including Chinese purchases of U.S. exports such as liquefied natural gas and beef.
“Foreign policy wins can matter politically, but only if voters feel stability and affordability in their daily lives,” said Brittany Martinez, a former Republican congressional aide who is the executive director of Principles First, a center-right advocacy group focused on democracy issues.
“Midterms are almost always a referendum on cost of living and public frustration, and Republicans are not immune from the same inflation and affordability pressures that hurt Democrats in recent cycles,” she added.
Democrats see Trump as vulnerable
Democratic lawmakers are seizing on Trump’s comments before his trip as proof of his indifference to lowering costs. There is potential staying power of his remarks as Americans head into Memorial Day weekend facing rising prices for the hamburgers and hot dogs to be grilled.
“What Americans do not see is any sympathy, any support, or any plan from Trump and congressional Republicans to lower costs – in fact, they see the opposite,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York said Thursday.
Vance faulted the Biden administration for the inflation problem even though the inflation rate is now higher than it was when Trump returned to the White House in January 2025 with a specific mandate to fix it.
“The inflation number last month was not great,” Vance said Wednesday, but he then stressed, “We’re not seeing anything like what we saw under the Biden administration.”
Inflation peaked at 9.1% in June 2022 under Biden, a Democrat. By the time Trump took the oath of office, it was a far more modest 3%.
Trump’s inflation challenge could get harder
The data tells a different story as higher inflation is spreading into the cost of servicing the national debt.
Over the past week, the interest rate charged on 10-year U.S. government debt jumped from 4.36% to 4.6%, an increase that implies higher costs for auto loans and mortgages.
“My fear is that the layers of supply shocks that are affecting the U.S. economy will only further feed into inflationary pressures,” said Gregory Daco, chief economist at EY-Parthenon.
Daco noted that last year’s tariff increases were now translating into higher clothing prices. With the Supreme Court ruling against Trump’s ability to impose tariffs by declaring an economic emergency, his administration is preparing a new set of import taxes for this summer.
Daco stressed that there have been a series of supply shocks. First, tariffs cut into the supply of imports. In addition, Trump’s immigration crackdown cut into the supply of foreign-born workers. Now, the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz has cut off the vital waterway used to ship 20% of global oil supplies.
“We’re seeing an erosion of growth,” Daco said.
Dr. Tracy Beth Hoeg, the Food and Drug Administration’s top drug regulator, said she was fired from the agency Friday after she declined to resign.
She said she did not know who had ordered her firing or why, nor whether Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. knew of her fate. The Department of Health and Human Services did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The departure reflected the upheaval at the F.D.A., days after the resignation of Dr. Marty Makary, the agency commissioner. Dr. Makary had become a lightning rod for critics of the agency’s decisions to reject applications for rare disease drugs and to delay a report meant to supply damaging evidence about the abortion drug mifepristone. He also spent months before his departure pushing back on the White House’s requests for him to approve more flavored vapes, the reason he ultimately cited for leaving.
Dr. Hoeg’s hiring had startled public health leaders who were familiar with her track record as a vaccine skeptic, and she played a leading role in some of the agency’s most divisive efforts during her tenure. She worked on a report that purportedly linked the deaths of children and young adults to Covid vaccines, a dossier the agency has not released publicly. She was also the co-author of a document describing Mr. Kennedy’s decision to pare the recommendations for 17 childhood vaccines down to 11.
But in an interview on Friday, Dr. Hoeg said she “stuck with the science.”
“I am incredibly proud of the work we were doing,” Dr. Hoeg said, adding, “I’m glad that we didn’t give in to any pressures to approve drugs when it wasn’t appropriate.”
As the director of the agency’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, she was a political appointee in a role that had been previously occupied by career officials. An epidemiologist who was trained in the United States and Denmark, she worked on efforts to analyze drug safety and on a panel to discuss the use of serotonin reuptake inhibitors, the most widely prescribed class of antidepressants, during pregnancy. She also worked on efforts to reduce animal testing and was the agency’s liaison to an influential vaccine committee.
She made sure that her teams approved drugs only when the risk-benefit balance was favorable, she said.
The firing worsens the leadership vacuum at the F.D.A. and other agencies, with temporary leaders filling the role of commissioner, food chief and the head of the biologics center, which oversees vaccines and gene therapies. The roles of surgeon general and director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are also unfilled.
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