Statement From Citizens for the Extension of the James Zadroga Act on the Trump Administration Firing of Dr. John Howard, Director of NIOSH and Administrator of the World Trade Center Health Program, Along With Nearly All the Staff of NIOSH

In another example of chainsaw incompetence, the Trump Administration has fired Dr. John Howard, the Director of the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) and the Administrator of the World Trade Center Health Program (WTCHP)—along with hundreds of NIOSH staff who perform critical health and safety missions.

Earlier this year, cuts to the WTCHP were reversed by the administration. But many aspects of the Health Program depend on NIOSH infrastructure which has now been eliminated—including Dr. Howard himself.

Dr. Howard, a Trump Administration appointee (reappointed to his 4th six-year term as Director of NIOSH by former Health and Human Services Secretary Azar in 2021) was terminated effective today as part of Health and Human Services Secretary Kennedy’s dismissal of hundreds of employees of NIOSH, effectively shutting down the critical worker safety mission of NIOSH and crippling the WTCHP.

While early news coverage of the layoffs (“RFK Jr.’s layoffs expected to gut worker safety agency NIOSH, officials say”–CBS) asserted that only 800 jobs have been terminated, the remaining positions are expected to be terminated shortly as well. All NIOSH positions are to be eliminated except for WTC Health Program and Radiation Injury Compensation Program staff. These terminations include 400 positions in Morgantown (WV), 390 positions in Pittsburgh (PA), 414 positions in Cincinnati (OH) and 89 positions in Spokane (WA)

The firings mean that all other NIOSH programs, including the Firefighter Cancer Registry, Firefighter Fatality and Investigation Program, the Program that handles certification of all respirators that protect all workers from firefighters to health care workers, research to prevent fatal falls on construction projects, and mine safety and health research to protect mineworkers from black lung and mining injuries are all being eliminated.

So, the 86 remaining World Trade Center Health Program staff (down from 93 at start of Trump administration but below its statutory authorized level of 138) and the Radiation Exposure staff, which are the two mandatory spending programs, have so far remained at the job. But these cuts to NIOSH will be devastating to the World Trade Center Health Program and must be stopped. The first step must be restoring Dr. Howard as NIOSH Director immediately.

BACKGROUND

So, what is the impact of these cuts to NIOSH staff?

First, the WTC Health Program Administrator Dr. Howard is gone.

Dr. Howard had been the Director of NIOSH since being appointed to his first six-year term by HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson in the Administration of President George W Bush in 2002. It was Secretary Thompson who put Dr. Howard in charge of responding to the health issues of 9/11 responders and survivors years before the Zadroga legislation was passed. Dr. Howard was reappointed by HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius for a second term in the Obama administration and reappointed again in 2016 for a third term and in 2021 for a fourth term by President Trump’s then-HHS Secretary Alex Azar. So, with over a year left in his current six year term, Secretary Kennedy has terminated Dr. Howard who has led the effort in responding to the health issues facing thousands of responders and survivors across the country for over 20 years.

But losing Dr. Howard is not the only impact to the WTC Health Program these terminations will have. While the WTC Health Program staff were not terminated, the WTC Health program relies on the other components of NIOSH to do its work.

For example, there are NO doctors on the staff of the WTC Health Program. The program has used the doctors at NIOSH for to fulfill the requirements of the statute that MDs sign off on the certifications of 9/11 conditions including cancer as a condition of the statute to allow for a responder or survivor to receive treatment for their conditions. Secretary Kennedy’s actions mean that responders and survivors who develop cancer will not be able to receive treatment under the Program.

Another issue is “determinations” on petitions to add new conditions to the program. That work is done by the epidemiologists fired by Secretary Kennedy. While they are not on the WTC Health Program staff, the research epidemiologists of NIOSH have provided the staffing for the review of pending petition determinations. The petitions that are pending on covering autoimmune conditions and cardiac conditions that were slated to be determined in March 2025 cannot be reviewed because the research epidemiologists at NIOSH are among those terminated.

Under the Zadroga Statute, the WTC Health Program is supposed to issue nearly $20 million annually in research grants on how to improve health care for those impacted and whether to add additional health conditions that should be covered. These grant awards decisions are made with the work of the NIOSH staff that have been terminated. Normally these grants would have been announced last month—but were not.

This decision to decimate NIOSH staff was done without explaining how the WTC Health Program will be run, who will handle their contracts, who will handle their communications, their human resources, their grant making, or who will approve certifications for treatment.

To be clear, the Trump Administration has been working against the thousands of injured 9/11 responders and survivors since before it took office on January 21, 2025. Just last December, Elon Musk and then President Elect Trump effectively killed the provision in spending legislation that had been agreed to by the House and Senate to fix the upcoming deficit the WTC Health Program is facing and subsequent cuts to services in a few years that will be during the Trump Administration.

Then in February, the Administration terminated 16 members of the staff of the WTC Health Program, creating widespread outrage and one of the first major reversals for the Elon Musk-led DOGE when these cuts in staff were eventually rescinded by President Trump before they could impact the programs services. Now we have the firing of Dr. Howard and the NIOSH staff that support the program.

Additionally, the continuing pause in all public communications by Centers for Disease Control, including the World Trade Center Health Program staff with the public, and work on grants and contracts has impacted many of the normal functions of the program and will delay research on 9/11 conditions and improvements in program contracts to better serve the program members.

After cutting this program’s staff directly a few weeks ago and having to rescind those cuts under pressure, we would have thought that the Trump Administration or the new HHS Secretary, Robert Kennedy Jr. would have learned their lesson and would have thought before cutting, but that, sadly, was not the case.

Doctor Howard needs to be rehired as NIOSH Director, and these cuts need to be restored.