Grabell and Yeung at propublica: meatpackers and Trump exec order to keep meat industry going
"In late April ... President Donald Trump issued a controversial executive order aimed at keeping the plants open to supply food "
"the nation’s meatpackers who were being urged, or ordered, to suspend production by local health officials worried about the spread of the coronavirus."
"Just a week before the order was issued, the meat industry’s trade group drafted an executive order that bears striking similarities to the one the president signed"
"The draft that Julie Anna Potts, the president of the North American Meat Institute, sent to top officials at the U.S. Department of Agriculture"
“Trade associations of all types routinely suggest legislative language, comment on proposed rules, and other provisions that are shared with the government,”
“All policy is shaped by people who have a stake in it ... But I can’t think of something that was so direct between the stakeholder asking for action and getting it.”
"The United Food and Commercial Workers union, which represents workers responsible for the majority of U.S. beef and pork production, said no one from the White House or the USDA sought its input before the executive order was issued."
" many state and local health officials view the order as superseding their authority or decided to back off in the face of political pressure from the Trump administration."
"Since the order, however, COVID-19 infections among meatpacking workers have multiplied. "
"a strong and consistent message from the President or Vice President like that delivered by the Governor of Nebraska yesterday is vital: being afraid of COVID-19 is not a reason to quit your job and you are not eligible for unemployment compensation if you do."
"as state and local health officials sought to order JBS to shut down its Greeley, Colorado, plant, the company appealed to Gov. Jared Polis and then to Vice President Mike Pence."
"State health director Jill Hunsaker Ryan told the head of the county Health Department that she had received a call from Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention."
"“JBS was in touch with the VP who had Director Redfield call me,” she wrote in an email, first reported by The Denver Post. “They want us to use CDC’s critical infrastructure guidance, (sending asymptomatic people back to work even if we suspect exposure but they have no symptoms) even with the outbreak at present level.”"
"Tyson and National Beef made similar appeals to the Kansas Department of Agriculture when the state Health Department wanted workers to stay off the line for two weeks if they had come in contact with a positive COVID-19 case, public records first reported by The Kansas City Star and The Wichita Eagle show. The state’s secretary of agriculture coordinated with meat companies and the director of the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, who then agreed to follow the less-strict CDC guidance.:
" the Bear River Health Department in northern Utah, where nearly 400 JBS workers have tested positive for COVID-19, told the press it couldn’t shut the plant down because of the executive order."
"In Virginia, state health officials had initially recommended that poultry companies close their plants for two weeks ... But the state backed off “to maintain the critical food production infrastructure.” "
"the National Chicken Council wrote to the USDA with complaints that the county Health Department in Chattanooga, Tennessee, was requiring testing of all employees at poultry plants in the area. This would have the effect of closing down the plants, the trade group warned, because they were already short-staffed and testing could cause fear among the remaining workers."
"Smithfield also went to the USDA for help dealing with a local public Health Department in Kane County, Illinois, which had closed the plant days before Trump’s executive order was issued. "
https://www.propublica.org/article/emails-show-the-meatpacking-industry-drafted-an-executive-order-to-keep-plants-opensidd