Beyond The Cover | Dismantle OSHA to Protect American Business

OSHA — the Occupational Safety and Health Administration — may not get as much attention as other alphabet-soup federal agencies such as the EPA, the FDA, or the IRS. Yet in the name of protecting safety and health, OSHA can inflict great harm on American businesses, particularly small businesses that do not have the resources to stay abreast of the agency’s myriad regulations. In this episode of Beyond the Cover, host Gary Benoit interviews Drew Dorans, the director of Human Resources for The John Birch Society, who wrote the feature article “Dismantle OSHA to Protect American Business” in the April 24, 2023 issue of The New American magazine. In  the interview, Dorans explains that even though we all want safety and health, the imposition of federal regulations that fall outside the boundaries of the U.S. Constitution is not the way to go about it. On the positive side, the U.S. Supreme Court’s Barlow decision prohibited OSHA from conducting warrantless searches of businesses in contravention of the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution. Yet many businessmen are unfamiliar with this decision— though they should be familiar with it in order to protect their rights. Finally, Dorans calls for abolishing OSHA and points to congressional legislation to do just that.