PRESS RELEASE
September 25, 2026
Contact:
Trey Pollard – [email protected] – 202-904-9187
APPALACHIA — A new report from Reimagine Appalachia and the Appalachian Citizens’ Law Center reaches the stark conclusion that as rates of black lung disease reach a fifty year high among Central Appalachian coal miners, the Trump Administration has taken a shocking lack of action. Who Pays the Price? Cuts to Mine Health and Safety Under the Trump Administration finds that the Trump Administration has failed to enforce long-awaited life-saving protections from toxic silica dust, taken staff who screen for black lung off the job, slashed the numbers of mine inspectors, and failed to ensure that mining families struck by black lung have the means to make ends meet.
“Central Appalachian coal reserves are heavily depleted, meaning that we have to mine a lot more rock to reach each ton of dwindling coal. And yet, we are continuing to produce large amounts of coal, meaning we are cutting rapidly escalating amounts of the contiguous, highly-toxic, silica-bearing sandstone reserves – at the same time we are willfully refusing to afford the appropriate measure of protection from silica dust,” said Sam Petsonk, Labor, Employment & Black Lung Lawyer at Petsonk PLLC. “We are inviting this certain, escalating risk of extreme health harms. That is a crisis of our own willful making. A rapidly mounting crisis. But a curable one – if only we have the willpower to do what’s right.”
This report tracks major milestones regarding mine safety and health from January 2025 to August 2026. The findings are jarring, indicating that over the last 500 days, the Administration’s approach to coal miner safety and health has been characterized by disinvestment and regulatory rollbacks on initiatives aimed at curbing the black lung epidemic. These actions stand in stark contrast to the Administration’s sizable investments and loud advocacy for bolstering the coal industry more broadly. Now, miners are paying the price with their lives.
Findings include:
- A lack of enforcement and rollback of a 2024 rule regulating miners’ exposure to respirable crystalline silica
- The rollback and lack of enforcement of a 2024 rule regulating the authorization of coal operators that self-insure their black lung liability
- Mass layoffs at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
- Staff reductions at the Federal Mine Safety and Health Review Commission
- Understaffing and funding cuts at the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA)
- Bills like the Black Lung Benefits Improvement Act, Relief for Survivors of Miners Act, and Support Our Miners Act have initiated attempts at reform, but lack bipartisan support
“The last time black lung cases in long-tenure Central Appalachian miners reached 34%, it was the 1970s. The federal government responded by introducing mine safety regulations and health research initiatives—a tremendously successful policy that dropped cases to only 7% by 1999,” said Meredith Perkins, a black lung historian and Master of Public Affairs–Master of International Affairs student at Indiana University – Bloomington. “Instead of strengthening and reforming black lung programs like we did in the 1970s, the federal government today is divesting funds, cutting staff, and unraveling regulations. These measures don’t cut costs; they undercut prevention efforts and shift costs downstream, causing miners and taxpayers to bear higher burdens.”
The report finds that the Trump Administration has advanced over $1 billion in investments to support the domestic coal industry even as they gut miner safety and health initiatives. At the same time, the costs of implementing protections and improvements are comparatively small. For example, the Black Lung Benefits Improvement Act would cost just $7.4 million annually, and the coal industry’s implementation costs for the 2024 silica rule were projected as just $8.2 million annually.
“We know what is causing this epidemic, and we know how to stop it—and yet we not only see a complete lack of action, we see a regression from the little progress we have made for coal miners,” said Dana Kuhnline, Program Director at ReImagine Appalachia. “There is absolutely no excuse. Everyone with the power to do something about black lung has known exactly what to do for decades, and they simply don’t. The coal industry can not exist without coal miners; any investment in the industry should incorporate strong worker protections at its core.”
This rapidly mounting crisis is curable–but swift action must be taken. Instead, the Administration shelved the 2024 silica dust safeguard. The timing of the Trump Administration’s rollbacks and cuts to black lung programs could not come at a worse time. In August 2026, NIOSH released findings that showed that 32 percent of veteran underground coal miners in Central Appalachia have coal workers’ pneumoconiosis—black lung disease. These rates are up 12 percent from when NIOSH last reported on rates of the disease in 2018. Rates of black lung are, in fact, the highest they have been since 1978.
“Every available health metric that we have today is pointing towards this crisis expanding across the region. Instead of helping out coal miners, the Administration and this Congress are prioritizing the coal industry’s ‘wish list’ over the health and safety of Appalachia’s mining workforce,” said Brendan Muckian-Bates, Policy and Advocacy Associate for Appalachian Citizens’ Law Center. “It’s unconscionable, given everything that we know about this disease and the debilitating impacts it has on families and communities, that our elected officials are not screaming from the rooftops to say that ‘enough is enough.’”