Senator Murray Statement on Trump Attempt to Dismantle Longstanding Labor Agency Combating Illegal Employment Discrimination

Washington, D.C. - Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), a senior member and former Chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, issued the following statement on President Donald Trump's Executive Order attempting to eliminate the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs' (OFCCP) authority to fight discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin in federal contracting. OFCCP is an agency within the Department of Labor (DOL) that was established in 1965 and plays a unique and vital role in combating unlawful employment discrimination for federal contract workers. Federal contract workers make up about one-fifth of the entire U.S. labor force, doing essential work in nearly every sector imaginable-from construction, to research, to IT, to radioactive and toxic waste cleanup, including at the Hanford site in Washington state.

"Donald Trump wants taxpayer funding to go to employers who illegally discriminate-that's the clear message from his Week One move to try and gut core civil rights protections and eliminate the core authority of an agency to protect the rights of federal contract workers and combat illegal employment discrimination. It makes no sense to hamstring an agency that has, for six decades, played an essential role in upholding American workers' basic civil rights and holding corporations accountable for illegal discrimination-and it's a dark signal to working people about where the Trump administration's priorities lie."

Throughout her career, Senator Murray has championed workers' rights and fought to combat employment discrimination, including as the top Democrat on the Senate labor committee from 2015-2022-among other things, Senator Murray fought back against a proposed DOL rule by the Trump administration that would allow federal contractors and subcontractors to justify discrimination against women, LGBTQ+ people, and members of certain religious groups on ideological grounds. Senator Murray first introduced the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act-comprehensive labor legislation to protect workers' right to stand together and bargain for fairer wages, better benefits, and safer workplaces-in the 116^th Congress, and also leads the Bringing an End to Harassment by Enhancing Accountability and Rejecting Discrimination (BE HEARD) in the Workplace Act, comprehensive legislation to prevent workplace harassment, strengthen and expand key protections for workers, and support workers in seeking accountability and justice.

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