Could NJ fill void of gutted agencies?

Advocates worry about workers' rights, safety

By: Daniel Munoz
NorthJersey.com
USA Today Network - New Jersey

..... Labor advocates are wondering how effectively New Jersey could step up to protect workplace safety and worker rights, if the Trump administration tries to defang the federal agencies that have traditionally handled that role.
..... Those same labor advocation are nervous about how federal agencies designed to protect workers safety, wage laws and workplace discrimination will fare under President Donald Trump and an administration that has already moved Aggressively to cut staff at major agencies across the federal government.
..... Trump has already made several moves to fetter some agencies designing to protect workers.
..... Shortly after taking office in January, [2025] for instance, he removed several members form the National Labor Relations Board and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
..... Critics say the steps effectively hobbled those agencies in their ability to carry out their missions.
..... In the NLRB case, a U.S. district judge ruled March 6 [2025] that the fired board members was illegally removed and must be reinstated, Reuters reported. The Trump administration has appealed.
..... And earlier this year, [2025] Representative Andy Biggs, R-Arizona, introduced legislation to climate another workplace-related ency the Occupational Safety and Health Administratrix.
..... Meanwhile, Elon Musks' Department of government Efficiency, or DOGE, has taken aim at cutting the staff of the federal Labor Department, the parent agency of OSHA. Several state attorneys general, including New Jersey's Matt Platkin, have taken legal acetonic to block those cuts.
..... "The federal government is being dismantled,and it's really uncertain what kids of protections workers are going to have," said Terri Gerstein, a former deputy commissioner of the New York Labor Department.
..... Carman Martino, a labor expert at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, agreed, Martino said the actions the administration is taking with OSHA and the NLRB might give a worker pause before reporting unsafe working conditions or trying to form a union.
..... "I can't imagine workers feeling confident about filing complaints of any kid," Martino said.
..... Most concerning would be the lack of staff to enforce various federal laws that protect New Jerseyans, said Robert Asaro-Angelo, the state's labor commissioner.
..... "When you pass a bill or provide funding for something, that doesn't always equal bodies to implement that, and we need bodies, we need human beings, to implement so many of these programs," he said.
..... OSHA monitors workplace safety; the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission handles workplace discrimination laws; the Labor Department monitors wage and hour laws; and the NLRB monitors workplace union laws.

Adopting state-level protections

..... Half of the U.S. states have their own versions of OSHA. New Jersey has such an apparatus, but it coves only public employees.
..... That New Jersey hasn't expanded the office to include the private sector "doesn't necessarily speak ill of New Jersey's ability to protect workers," said Gerstein, the director of the NYUWagner Labor Initiative in Manhattan.
..... "I do wonder if now under the current circumstances, some of the states ... that have not a sate [OSHA] plan, they might consider it," Gerstein said.
..... Currently sate-level OSHAs get half of their funding form their state and the rest form the federal government.
..... Asaro-Angelo, New Jersey's labor commissioner, said that if the federal OSHA were ever abolished, the state could adopt its own private-sector- OSHA.
..... New Jersey might be able to take its now OSHA for public workers and "potentially scale all of that up," agreed Paul Sonn, a state policy program director at the National Employee Law Project.
..... But it would be a challenge. "It's like setting up an entirely new government agency. It's not a small undertaking," Gerstein said.
..... New Jersey labor officials implemented temporary state-level worker safety rules during the COVID-19 pandemic to cover mitigation efforts such as masking and social distancing. those rules expired in July 2021.
..... Thomas Wright, a spokesperson for the state Labor Department, said the state received 3,393 complaints related to COVID-19, and 2,832 of those cases required labor officials to contact the business to rectify the issue.
..... "We intervened on behalf of the worker, the employer fixed the issue, and no further penalties or action from our department were merited,' wright said.
..... But Martino, the Rutgers labor expert, questioned the ability of the state to mimic better-resourced federal agencies for all worker safety rules.
..... "If there's not money to spend, if there's not money to staff up, if there's not money to train people, I don't see how they could do it," he said

OSHA faced criticism

..... The number of workplace inspections carried out by OSHA during Trump's first term was significantly lower than during prior administration, according to an analysis by the Center for Public Integrity.
..... OSHA inspectors were particularly absent during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in spring 2020, the center reported.
..... On March 10, 2[205] the U.S. Senate confirmed Lori Chavez-DeRemer, a former Republican representative from Oregon with a pro-union record, to lead the Labor Department.
..... In congress, she was one of three Republican House co-sponsors of a sweeping pro-union bill called the Protecting the Right to Organize act, aimed at expanding labor protections to let people collectively organize and bargain in their workplace.
..... She was endorsed by more than a dozen unions including the Teamsters Joint Council 37 and others representing firefighters, flight attendants and grocery workers.
..... The new secretary 'comes from a worker-friendly background," said Asaro-Angelo, who expressed optimism about his new federal counterpart.
..... If the federal NLRB were incapacitated, Asaro-Angelo noted, two state bodies could fill in the gap.
..... The Public Employment Relations Commission handles union o5rganizing for public workers in New Jersey.
..... And the New Jersey State Board of Mediation handles workers not covered by the NLRB, such as agricultural employees.
..... "Let's just say t6heoreticlly Congress doesn't eliminate the NLRB, but they narrowed tis scope or jurisdiction," Asaro-Angelo said. "Whatever sector is not under jurisdiction, those kinds of elections could then take place at a state level."

What can states do?

..... in November, [2024] the National Employment Law Project published six recommendations for creating state-level labor rights:
* Bolster overtime rules for salaried, white-collar workers so that more salaried workers are eligible for overtime.
* Implement state-level workplace heat standards, which are already being proposed in New Jersey.
* Curb non-compete agreements.
* Boost labor union rights such as unemployment benefits for striking workers, which New Jersey already does, and put information Online about the right to organize.
* Broader state-level antitrust enforcement that codifies federal rules.
* Create a searchable, database of enforcement data and violations.
..... The law project's Sonn said New Jersey could ban or restrict non-compete agreements - something that would require legislation and has already been done in California, Minnesota, North Dakota and Oklahoma.
..... States could also ban non-competes outright, or for workers under a certain income, said NYU's Gerstein.
..... Non-compete agreements bar workers who leave an employer from working at a competitor. In New Jersey, non-competes are limited, but still allowed.
..... Additionally, state can ramp up their public education campaigns around works rights, Sonn said.
..... In addition, state and cities can call out employers that receive fines or violations or even take away a business' license or disqualify it from receiving state financial assistance, said Debbie Berkowitz, a former OSHA administrator during the Obama administration.
..... If Trump incapacitates OSHA, "then I think the states and cities need to move in," said Berkowitz, who's now an academic fellow at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.
..... As with non-competes, New Jessey has clamped down on no-poach agreements, in which competing companies agree not to hire each other's employees.
..... State officials have argued that those agreements violate federal antitrust laws and can prevent workers from moving up in there careers.
..... New Jersey already has it sown workplace anti-discrimination laws and wields the power to issue stop-work orders for business that violate wage and hour laws, Gerstein said.
..... "It is a tool to stop the exploitation of workers," Asaro-Angelo said.
..... State can pass more stringent overtime exemption laws for salaried employees and enact higher minimum wages than the federal $7.25 minimum hourly wage. New Jersey's minimum wage is $15.49.

Proposed heat standard

..... Under former President Joe Biden, OSHA proposed a nationwide heat standard, but under Trump, the rainmaking was paused.
..... New Jersey's own proposed heat standard is part of Assembly bill 5022, which was approved by the Assembly Labor Committee on February 20 [2025] in an 8-4 vote.
..... It would require the state Labor Department to cerate "heat stress levels for employees that, if exceeded, trigger actions by employers to protect employees from heat-related illness and injury."
..... Under the Biden administration, OSHA emphasize the use of "Water, Rest, Shade," which business were encouraged but not required to provide to their staff during heat waves.
..... Individual employers also would have to create their own heat illness and injury prevention plans, according to the state legislation.
..... A version in the state Senate was introduce on November 18, 2024, but it has not seen any movement.
..... The measure has been panned by business lobbying groups, such as the New Jersey Business and Industry Association, which said the rules could cerate obstacles for businesses simply to stay open during warm weather.

..... This article contains material from USA Today.

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