SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
"The federal government should be stepping in to supplement food distribution networks to get our abundant frozen meat supplies to stores and food banks that need them." (Photo: AP/Nati Harnik)
'Catastrophic Harm' Feared as Trump Uses Emergency Powers to Keep Meat-Packing Plants Open
"We only wish that this administration cared as much about the lives of working people as it does about meat, pork, and poultry products."
Apr 28, 2020
President Donald Trump is expected to take executive action as soon as Tuesday to declare meat packing plants in the U.S. essential businesses, keeping the processing facilities open despite concerns over worker and food safety in the midst of the coronavirus outbreak.
The movegenerated criticism from labor unions, animal rights groups, and consumer advocates who charged the president was acting with gross negligence and disregard.
"We only wish that this administration cared as much about the lives of working people as it does about meat, pork, and poultry products," Retail, Wholesale, and Department Store Union president Stuart Applebaum said in a statement.
"Employers and government must do better," he added. "If they want to keep the meat and poultry supply chain healthy, they need to make sure that workers are safe and healthy."
Meat processing plants have been at the center of outbreaks in numerous states, leading food safety advocates on social media to call for a shutdown of the industry:
As Bloomberg reported, Trump decided to take executive action "amid estimates that as much as 80% of U.S. meat production capacity could shut down."
But the move is almost guaranteed to set up a confrontation at the plants:
The order sets the stage for a showdown between America's meat giants, which have been pressing to reopen plants, and some local officials and labor unions who've called for closures in a bid to prevent the virus from spreading. The president himself has long agitated for Americans to return to work and restore an economy crippled by social distancing measures.
"Trump's plan to instruct slaughter plants to stay open despite causing major outbreaks of Covid-19 is even worse than his suggestion to use disinfectant to treat sick people" Food & Water Watch's Tony Corbo said in a statement. "It's deadly and foolish and will cause catastrophic harm."
Corbo added that it was clear that "if unsafe food plants remain open, more food workers will die."
"The federal government should be stepping in to supplement food distribution networks to get our abundant frozen meat supplies to stores and food banks that need them," said Corbo. "Instead, they're currying favor with giant corporations that have continuously put their bottom line above worker workers' health, food safety, and the vitality of our food supply chain."
The Environmental Working Group's senior vice president for government affairs Scott Faber echoed the calls for the president to put worker safety ahead of corporate profits and ensure plant employees are at least provided with personal protective equipment (PPE) and other needed safety.
"Sending workers back to meat-processing plants without proper protection is tantamount to a death sentence," said Faber. "Rather than escalating this danger with reckless fiats, President Trump should be ensuring food and farm workers have adequate PPE, plenty of space to work safely and free testing--not to mention paid sick leave and medical care if they do get sick."
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
President Donald Trump is expected to take executive action as soon as Tuesday to declare meat packing plants in the U.S. essential businesses, keeping the processing facilities open despite concerns over worker and food safety in the midst of the coronavirus outbreak.
The movegenerated criticism from labor unions, animal rights groups, and consumer advocates who charged the president was acting with gross negligence and disregard.
"We only wish that this administration cared as much about the lives of working people as it does about meat, pork, and poultry products," Retail, Wholesale, and Department Store Union president Stuart Applebaum said in a statement.
"Employers and government must do better," he added. "If they want to keep the meat and poultry supply chain healthy, they need to make sure that workers are safe and healthy."
Meat processing plants have been at the center of outbreaks in numerous states, leading food safety advocates on social media to call for a shutdown of the industry:
As Bloomberg reported, Trump decided to take executive action "amid estimates that as much as 80% of U.S. meat production capacity could shut down."
But the move is almost guaranteed to set up a confrontation at the plants:
The order sets the stage for a showdown between America's meat giants, which have been pressing to reopen plants, and some local officials and labor unions who've called for closures in a bid to prevent the virus from spreading. The president himself has long agitated for Americans to return to work and restore an economy crippled by social distancing measures.
"Trump's plan to instruct slaughter plants to stay open despite causing major outbreaks of Covid-19 is even worse than his suggestion to use disinfectant to treat sick people" Food & Water Watch's Tony Corbo said in a statement. "It's deadly and foolish and will cause catastrophic harm."
Corbo added that it was clear that "if unsafe food plants remain open, more food workers will die."
"The federal government should be stepping in to supplement food distribution networks to get our abundant frozen meat supplies to stores and food banks that need them," said Corbo. "Instead, they're currying favor with giant corporations that have continuously put their bottom line above worker workers' health, food safety, and the vitality of our food supply chain."
The Environmental Working Group's senior vice president for government affairs Scott Faber echoed the calls for the president to put worker safety ahead of corporate profits and ensure plant employees are at least provided with personal protective equipment (PPE) and other needed safety.
"Sending workers back to meat-processing plants without proper protection is tantamount to a death sentence," said Faber. "Rather than escalating this danger with reckless fiats, President Trump should be ensuring food and farm workers have adequate PPE, plenty of space to work safely and free testing--not to mention paid sick leave and medical care if they do get sick."
President Donald Trump is expected to take executive action as soon as Tuesday to declare meat packing plants in the U.S. essential businesses, keeping the processing facilities open despite concerns over worker and food safety in the midst of the coronavirus outbreak.
The movegenerated criticism from labor unions, animal rights groups, and consumer advocates who charged the president was acting with gross negligence and disregard.
"We only wish that this administration cared as much about the lives of working people as it does about meat, pork, and poultry products," Retail, Wholesale, and Department Store Union president Stuart Applebaum said in a statement.
"Employers and government must do better," he added. "If they want to keep the meat and poultry supply chain healthy, they need to make sure that workers are safe and healthy."
Meat processing plants have been at the center of outbreaks in numerous states, leading food safety advocates on social media to call for a shutdown of the industry:
As Bloomberg reported, Trump decided to take executive action "amid estimates that as much as 80% of U.S. meat production capacity could shut down."
But the move is almost guaranteed to set up a confrontation at the plants:
The order sets the stage for a showdown between America's meat giants, which have been pressing to reopen plants, and some local officials and labor unions who've called for closures in a bid to prevent the virus from spreading. The president himself has long agitated for Americans to return to work and restore an economy crippled by social distancing measures.
"Trump's plan to instruct slaughter plants to stay open despite causing major outbreaks of Covid-19 is even worse than his suggestion to use disinfectant to treat sick people" Food & Water Watch's Tony Corbo said in a statement. "It's deadly and foolish and will cause catastrophic harm."
Corbo added that it was clear that "if unsafe food plants remain open, more food workers will die."
"The federal government should be stepping in to supplement food distribution networks to get our abundant frozen meat supplies to stores and food banks that need them," said Corbo. "Instead, they're currying favor with giant corporations that have continuously put their bottom line above worker workers' health, food safety, and the vitality of our food supply chain."
The Environmental Working Group's senior vice president for government affairs Scott Faber echoed the calls for the president to put worker safety ahead of corporate profits and ensure plant employees are at least provided with personal protective equipment (PPE) and other needed safety.
"Sending workers back to meat-processing plants without proper protection is tantamount to a death sentence," said Faber. "Rather than escalating this danger with reckless fiats, President Trump should be ensuring food and farm workers have adequate PPE, plenty of space to work safely and free testing--not to mention paid sick leave and medical care if they do get sick."
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.