latest collection of c-span products, apparel, books, home decor, and accessories. there's something for every c-span fan. and every purchase supports our nonprofit operation. shop now or anytime at c-spanshop.org. >> "washington j" continues. host: david michaels is with us. he served as the director of the occupational safety and health administration and assistant secretary of labor, the lord -- the longest serving osha head. professor michaels, welcome to the program. guest: thanks so much for having me on again. host: we are talking about men deep -- about vaccine mandates, but i wanted to ask you about osha. you are the longest serving osha head, from 2009 to 2017.

in terms of what osha does, how do they enforce workplace rules and regulations across the country? guest: i'm glad to answer that question because so many people don't understand what osha is or how it works. osha is more than 50 years old and essentially says employers have a responsibility, a requirement to provide a workplace free of recognized hazards. osha's job is to make sure employers follow the law. the most powerful tool osha has is a standard, a rule that says employers must do certain things to protect workers, and that is powerful because most employers are law-abiding and when a government agency issues a regulation, they say how are we going to comply? osha issued an emergency

standard around vaccine or testing would have a big effect without any sort of enforcement done by osha beyond putting out the rules. osha does have hundreds of inspectors. the labor department has hundreds more. they go out and they walk in to workplaces and they note hazards and issue citations. the standard will be enforced by inspectors but for the most part, they will be self enforced. employers try to do the right thing because they know that is the law. host: osha is now a 51 year agency. it was created by the occupational safety and health act of 1970. it has 1850 inspectors. that's a lot of workers to cover. about one for every 70,000 workers in this country.

in a job that requires their plates to be fairly full already, how will the administration be able to enforce this new mandate? guest: as you said, far too few inspectors. it would take over 160 years for osha to visit every workplace once. large employers will do the right thing but the other thing is workers who see a problem will call osha. they will let osha that their employer is not doing the right thing and osha can follow up by sending an inspector or a phone call and offer to spend -- to send an inspector. this isn't just enforced by inspectors randomly going to workplaces. i think this will have a huge effect. some employers may not follow this but as i said, most

employers will do the right thing, and are already trying to start implement thing this new requirement. host: hoping to listen from our viewers and listeners. we will hear from the president momentarily. lines for the eastern and central time zones are (202)-748-8000. (202)-748-8001 is the line for the mountain and pacific time region. if you want to send a text, (202)-748-8002. our guest is david michaels, head of osha from 2009 to 2016. what was the most difficult or controversial issue that you had to face in terms of a workplace regulation? guest: one of the things that took a long time to get out was regulation around silken. -- silicon.

when you see dust because of jackhammers or saws, silicon is getting in and it causes silicosis. that process was very slow and actually took 20 years to get that standard out. it was controversial because employers always think an osha standard is going to be hard to meet. they hire scientists to say things that are not true. that senator did come out in 2016. it has changed the way construction is done is that -- in that much of the machinery used has to pull silicon out of the air. it has been accepted by employers and construction workers and it is saving lives. host: do you think there are

lessons learned from your experience that may apply to the effort by the administration with new vaccination rules? guest: absolutely. osha's standards are always well thought through. very expert people spending a long time working on it and before the standard come out, generally people say this is undoable and we will not be able to meet this standard but what we see time and time again is these are very reasonable standards. they are not burdensome on businesses. you will see that with this standard as well. host: let's hear from the president last week on that upcoming rule that osha will issue. [video clip] >> they labor department is going to soon issue an emergency rule with companies with more than 100 employees to implement vaccination requirements among their workforce.

every day we see more businesses implement thing vaccination requirements, and the mounting data shows that they work. this is an organization that has implement the requirements, seeing vaccination rates rise by an average of 20% or more, to well over 90% of the number of employees vaccinated. let's be clear. vaccination requirements should not be another issue that divides us. host: david michaels, the president stressing the word requirements. he doesn't say mandate in that short comment. guest: in fact, osha is not issuing a vaccination requirement or mandate. as i said, osha's laws say employers have to provide a safe workplace. potentially infectious workers

are hazardous to other workers. the theory behind this rule, which fits directly in osha's roundhouse is that the employer has to make sure that anybody who enters the workplace, workers, that they are not spreading disease. what osha will tell employers of over 100 workers, they have to make sure their workers or vaccinated -- workers are vaccinated or regularly tested to make sure they are not infectious. companies may say osha isn't requiring working from home workers to be tested. -- those workers take the virus home to their communities, to their elderly relatives, and that is helping to drive this pandemic. host: they president calling an

emergency rule, anticipating this to me an emergency rule. typically how long do these emergency rules or regulations last? is there any way to guess or speculate how long this vaccination rule might be in effect? guest: the osha law gives osha authority to issue a rule for six months at a time. it also has to go through the normal process, which is what we went through with silicon. when you have a novel or new hazard, a very grave hazard as this hazard is, you can issue a rule very quickly, and you have six months to enforce it. that is what the law says. host: you were the head of osha during the obama administration. you advised the incoming biden administration on a number of

issues. did you have any role in advising the administration on the development of this rule? guest: i did not. i was on a national academy of sciences panel to develop an equitable framework for the allocation of vaccine. that was important, to point out the importance of workplaces and especially essential workers, workers and essential history -- essential industries who have to show up to work. particularly overrepresented are black and brown workers. i did not have a direct role in advising on this particular rule. host: there have been reports in the last couple of days, on the effectiveness of mandates issued by a private company. in particular, i'm talking about health companies, medical facilities, hospitals across the country. guest: that's right. there is a rule coming down from

a different federal agency, the center for medicare and medicaid services, which is essentially the system that provides medicare and medicaid funding. they say every health institution that has this funding will have to have all of their employees vaccinated. several states have put in rules like that. the health care system is moving very quickly to vaccinate all of its workers. we are seeing that only a very tiny percentage of workers are leaving the workplace because of this. when push comes to shove, there are lots of people who have said i don't want to get vaccinated, but when they are told if you want to keep your job, and obviously protect other workers, make sure you don't spread the virus to patients who could be killed by it, they get vaccinated. that is a great model, as president biden said. the vaccination rate is rising and it will continue to rise, and that is what we need to stop this pandemic. host: does this requirement ask

the state that workers need to be vaccinated or show proof of a negative test? guest: the osha requirement will say to employers, you must ensure that your workers are vaccinated or show a negative test. other rules coming out of the federal government will require vaccinations for certain groups of workers, but the osha rule will not. host: david michaels is our guest. we welcome your calls and comments. (202)-748-8000 for those of you in the eastern and central time zones. (202)-748-8001 for those of you in the mountain and pacific time zones. caller: good morning. earlier, we were talking about what was the hardest regulation that your guest had to work on, and he brought up silica. he made a statement that the reason it was so hard was because the industry was hiring scientists to lie.

i don't quite understand that statement, we are told that we need to trust the science but with him and osha, they have proof that scientists are lying to them. cannot go both ways? guest: you've raised a quick question. i've written a couple books on this question. there is an industry called the product defense industry, and they hire mercenary scientists, just as there are some scientists saying covid is not spread by people or that vaccinations don't work, there are always some scientists who will say things out of the mainstream. you have to think about those scientists. what happens in regulation, and this is true for occupational regulation and environment a regulation, there is a small industry of people who will say that chemical just isn't dangerous. it is the tobacco model. they hired physicians and scientists who wore white

coats and said there is no proof tobacco causes lung cancer. that same model is used widely by many industries who want to avoid regulation. following the science is a shorthand for saying, let's look at what the science says and take it seriously. host: our guest is a professor of epidemiology at the george washington school of public health, and a professor of occupational safety. what are the issues you are addressing in that class in particular these days? guest: these days, i teach environmental and occupational policy, which is how do we take the science we know and apply it to public health protections in the workplace and the environment? there is a very thin line, we should separate those two. the exposure inside the factory gates are usually worse than

outside. i have a piece coming out this week with dr. robert bullard, talking about workplace environmental justice because the issues we talked about around environmental justice, people living near factories are probably worse in the factories where workers have the worst exposure. it is true across the board that workers are often forgotten. just yesterday, the environmental protection agency announced a major program to control these fats chemicals -- these pfaats chemicals. these workers are still exposed to them in the workplace. host: let's go to our next caller in ohio. good morning. caller: good morning. i have an issue with tracing the

spread of covid, because you can't really say where you got it from. if you go to the doctors, all they can say is that you got it and they can't tell you where you got it, how you got it, and then finally about the everything is supposed to be free. it's not free. i don't believe it is free. host: in terms of getting your vaccine? caller: yes. getting the vaccine might be free to us, but the government is paying these pharmacies to develop this, and i believe that is how it started. as far as the workplace, you can't trace it. it doesn't work, it's not effective. host: we will hear from our guest. guest: you actually can trace who spread the virus from

person-to-person. it requires some scientific work. it is called genomic sequencing and there are very important studies done in hospitals and meatpacking plants that can show exactly the exact variant of the virus that went from person-to-person. that is how we know how this spread occurs within the workplace. we learned early in the epidemic, the cdc was saying it is only droplets which don't travel very far. that travel six feet and if you wear a mask, you are fine. studies showed one person infected another person dozens of feet away or yards away because we could see exactly, that was the virus that spread from one to the other. there is a lot of great science being done. host: i want to ask you about the potential conflict brewing between the state of texas and the federal government on the issue of vaccine rules and mandates.

the latest executive order coming out of the governor of texas, governor greg abbott. he said no entity in texas can compel the receipt of a covid vaccine by an individual, including employee or consumer who objects to such vaccination for any reason, including prior recovery from covid-19, i hereby suspend all relevant statutes to the extent necessary to enforce this prohibition. he said it is yet another instance of federal overreach. the biden administration is now bullying many private entities into imposing covid-19 vaccine mandates, causing workforce disruptions that threaten texas's continued recovery from the disaster. this could be a potential legal battle between osha and the state of texas, could it not? guest: there is so much wrong and what he said, the list is extensive. first of all, it is clear that

federal rules and regulations preempt or trump in state law or regulation, whether or not the texas legislature passes it or the governor just pronounces it because he thinks he can. this a premise he clause of the constitution -- the supremacy clause of the constitution. if they went to court, the federal government would probably win. in an emergency situation, a public health situation, the governor can say everybody has to wear a mask or obligor workers have to be vaccinated, but there is no anti-emergency situation where he can say you can't require vaccinations. he is not the king of texas. the texas legislature will have to pass that law, and then of course osha has supremacy over that. the other issue is that he doesn't get what goes on in terms of covid and how it is spread.

right now, the economy is not able to move back to normalcy because so many workers are afraid to go to work. the census bureau does a huge survey every two weeks and there are about 3 million workers out in the workplace right now -- they are out of the workforce because they are afraid of getting or spreading covid. employers are having tremendous difficulty getting people to come to work and this is an important issue. people have to feel like it is safe to get to work and they have to be able to come in every day and not get sick. it is worth talking about that the theory or philosophy behind governor abbott, governor desantis, these are people's right, they have the right to turn down the vaccination. it's an individual choice, and i get that. i think of it the same way as an individual choice to get really drunk so you can't drive safely. it is your choice to get -- to

imbibe as much alcohol as you want but it is not your choice to get in the car and drive, because obviously you can hurt more than yourself. you can hurt somebody else. that is criminal. people go to jail and they should. i've lost friends. everybody knows somebody who was hurt by a drunk driver. the thing about covid is it is even worse. you could say you don't want to be vaccinated, but if you get sick, you may be healthy and you may have very little effect from that virus but you could spread it to others. colin powell died yesterday. someone spread that virus to him. he didn't get it from nowhere. perhaps it was somebody vaccinated, perhaps it was somebody unvaccinated who spread the virus to him. because he had a damaged immune system, he died. you not being vaccinated impacts

people who are frail or elderly, who have worse immune systems. furthermore, your hospitalization, even though you say you don't care, those are filling up hospitals so people who desperately need medical care can't get it because hospitals are filled with unvaccinated people who got covid. this idea that you don't need to get vaccinated and i forcing people to be vaccinated, you are slowing down the economy, the opposite is true. we need to make sure everybody is not ended so we can get back to functioning normally. host: this new osha rule coming out on vaccines does not tell employers what they must do with employees who don't get vaccinated or refuse to comply with tests, does it? guest: that's right. many of us can work at home. obviously if you work in blue-collar jobs or construction, you can't do that but the employer will figure it out. if they are not willing to be

tested or vaccinated, you've got to find something else for them to do. you can pay them if you want to. osha is not going to tell you what to do about that. the underlying rationale behind this is to get people vaccinated. that is what the government wants because that is what society needs you to do. when everybody is vaccinated, we will be able to control this epidemic. host: this is a federal regulation, a few viewer in florida asked this question. how many states and local government workers will be impacted by the new osha rule? guest: that is a great question. osha came up around the time of increased federalism. it sounds -- it is the opposite of what it sounds like. it gives the states a great deal of power. the federal government has osha. oversight -- has osha oversight in 29 states.

there are 21 states that have their own state programs that cover all workers, including public-sector workers. it is a mosaic. about half of the country, the public sector workers will be covered in states like california or washington or oregon, where the state governments will have the same rules or perhaps more stringent rules. washington state has already said every public sector worker in washington state has to be vaccinated. that is why they fired the football coach at washington state university. other states like texas and florida are under federal osha's jurisdiction and the state government agencies and local government agencies are osha-fre e zones. it is unfortunate but those workers have no right to a safe

workplace. host: the head state -- the head could touch -- the head football coach at washington state was fired after refusing vaccines under state mandate. several other assistant coaches as well. wilmington, north carolina, we will hear from alexis. caller: good morning. i have a question. i did not pay attention to your name but you are the osha man. host: david michaels. guest: call me the osha man. caller: i would like to know -- i think you were sort of explaining it, but there is this big hubbub in chicago. mayor lightfoot has said anybody that is not showing up for duty with covid vaccine credentials can't work, and i think the

fraternal order of police have weighed in. how does osha fit in with all of this stuff? they are government employees, are they not? how does that work? guest: county police, chicago police are public-sector workers but they are not federal workers so federal osha has no jurisdiction over them. mayor lightfoot as their employer has said you have to get vaccinated to continue to work. illinois has a state osha plan that will likely issue a similar standard to osha's -- federal osha, saying all state and county agencies have to have either a vaccine or testing choice but in this case as the employer, mayor lightfoot has sibley said, if you want to work for the city of chicago, you have to be vaccinated. that is what many large employers have done.

united airlines did this. tyson, the mammoth food packer which had tremendous problems with covid, they negotiated with their union, that everybody would get vaccinated. the union was able to get additional time off, for workers getting that vaccination. unions can certainly negotiate around vaccinations and get something for their members, in exchange for agreeing to mass vaccination. there are lots of different ways to approach this but the employer can always say i want everyone here to be vaccinated and the experience of many employers like united airlines is relatively small number of workers simply refused to cooperate and will lose their jobs. the headline for united airlines was 600 workers will be forced to leave the workplace.

600 sounds like a lot but united has 67,000 workers. that is under 1% of their workforce. that is regular turnover. it turns out not to be a big deal when some workers say we will not cooperate. it makes headlines but for the most part these mandates by workers -- by employers are working. i wouldn't want to be stopped by a police man who sticks his head into my car and he is not wearing a mask and he is not vaccinated. that policeman has become a public health menace. host: one of the headlines out of the chicago situation from yahoo! chicago mayor says police trying to quote, induce an insurrection with vaccine mandate opposition. >> we're going to leave "washington journal" to fulfill our more than 40-year commitment to live coverage of congress. the u.s. house now returning from recess. later