MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
Over the past year, President Trump has championed coal mines. He signed an executive order to, quote, "reinvigorate America's beautiful, clean coal industry." The order aims to increase production, and it'll do that by cutting what it describes as unnecessary regulations. But is it also putting miners' health at risk? We've got Justin Hicks here from the Appalachia Mid-South Newsroom. Hey, Justin.
JUSTIN HICKS, BYLINE: Hey, Mary Louise.
KELLY: So President Trump signed this executive order early last year - early 2025. What changes have you seen in the coal industry since then?
HICKS: Yeah. So President Trump vowed to reduce all that federal red tape, and he says he's going to end what he calls discrimination against coal-powered electric plants. And he started a so-called Energy Dominance Council this year that favors things like coal and uranium mining. And he added a type of coal used to make steel to a list of critical minerals, and so that means the government will closely watch and support it.
And meanwhile, some power companies that were going to phase out coal-fired electric plants are actually being ordered to reverse course. And of course, this comes in the backdrop of everybody looking for more energy to supply a crop of data centers that are popping up everywhere.
KELLY: OK, now tell us about the questions this is raising about what this new approach might mean for miners' health and safety.
HICKS: Yeah. So it really comes to a head with black lung disease. So black lung disease is a common name given to a lung condition really prominent in mining. Several of my public radio colleagues and I have been following this disease for decades. And it comes from inhaling toxic rock dust. And people suffering from it say it feels like you have shards of glass stuck in your lungs. This is incurable, and health researchers know it's been on the rise in central Appalachia. And that's where coal is harder to reach because it's under bigger layers of rock that just need to be crushed up more to get to the coal.
KELLY: Although I'm recalling the Biden administration did issue safety rules trying to limit exposure to that toxic dust you're talking about. What happened to those rules?
HICKS: Yeah. So those Biden-era rules required annual health checkup for miners and cut the legal exposure levels in half of that toxic dust. And - you know, and it required better ventilation and other measures aimed to improve air quality in mines. And these rules affected every single mine, not just coal, and so it was almost immediately challenged in court. Companies that mine other stuff like sand and gravel - even the stuff that goes into kitty litter - they said the safety measures would just cost them too much money. And Biden's mine safety agency said it was going to defend those rules, but then Trump took office and the new mining and safety administrator indefinitely paused the enforcement.
So I spoke with Vonda Robinson with the National Black Lung Association, and she says she's really scared the Trump administration is signaling that they're going to roll back safety measures her group fought for decades to get.
VONDA ROBINSON: Trump wants to make America great again. Well, we need to make our coal miners healthy again. We need to worry about the safety and health of our coal miners.
HICKS: And Vonda's group held a rally in D.C. in October, trying to get the government's attention, but Robinson said nobody in the Trump administration would meet with her. And so instead, this is just turning into a yearslong legal drama.
KELLY: In just a sentence or two, Justin, where does that court challenge stand?
HICKS: Yeah. So it still has to be resolved. Mining companies are getting impatient. They are asking the judge of some idea. MSHA has said they're going to change rules. So mining companies want to know what those changes will be. We'll find out here in 2026.
KELLY: Justin Hicks with the Appalachia Mid-South Newsroom, thanks.
HICKS: Yeah, thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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