Newhouse Introduces Legislation To Protect Critical Workers

In an effort to protect workers from what he calls the Administration’s overreach, Dan Newhouse recently introduced the Exemption for Critical Workers Act. The Chair of the Western Caucus said HR 5978 would provide an exemption for federal workers in the supply chain identified as “critical” or “essential” from President Biden’s vaccine mandate. Newhouse said early in the pandemic, these jobs were deemed vital and many of those workers continued to work, despite putting their own health at risk. Newhouse added because of the President’s executive order, many of those same workers now face termination if they don’t comply.

“I want to make very clear that I hear those people.  My position is they do not deserve to be fired and I stand with them in this effort to allow them to continue to perform that critical work that we need.”

Newhouse’s proposal would impact anyone the Department of Homeland Security defines as “essential and critical infrastructure workers”, including Food and Agriculture, Transportation and many others.

Click Here to read HR 5978.

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