coal miners

From federal rulemakers all the way down to Kentucky lawmakers, 2025 was full of regulatory wins for mining companies. Meanwhile, health researchers confirm that deaths from black lung disease are rampant in the mine industry.

Last year, the federal government issued a new rule requiring self-insured coal mines to prove they can cover 100% of future black lung disease costs. Two Democrats say they’ve heard the Trump administration isn’t following the rule.

During the Biden administration, the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration created a safety rule long-sought by black lung associations. Days before it could be enforced, a lawsuit froze enforcement and little has changed since.

Lawyers and experts say the sole doctor has become the decisive voice for whether miners can receive worker’s compensation from the coal companies employing them.

Kentucky first-term congressman Rep. Morgan McGarvey is working with a group of Washington Democrats to make benefits for black lung victims more accessible, but the legislation lacks bipartisan support.

It’s been almost forty years, but many former miners with the disease are still fighting to maintain funding for the benefits that keep them alive.

A group of Ohio Valley senators says a watchdog agency’s recent report shows that federal regulators must do more to protect coal miners from silica dust,…

The nearly two-month blockade of a Kentucky railroad track is coming to an end as unpaid coal miners end their protest in order to take new jobs, start…

Curtis Cress sat in the gravel beside a railroad track in Harlan County, Kentucky. Tall and thin with a long, black beard, Cress is every bit a coal…

As laid-off miners block coal trains in Kentucky, protesters are also taking a caravan to court in West Virginia to prod their bankrupt employer, who they…