April 23, 2025 - A West Virginia coal miner is taking legal action against the Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. in regard to the recent layoffs at the National Institute for Occupational Safety & Health (NIOSH) in Morgantown.

Harry Wiley, a coal miner from Kanawha County, filed the lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia earlier this month after he was personally affected by the layoffs.

In the suit, Wiley says that RFK, Jr. — with no advance notice — terminated most of the critical employees, including the chief medical officer, who oversaw a coal mine dust lung disease (CMDLD) screening and job transfer program, which puts he and other miners’ health and safety in jeopardy.

Wiley says that in order to prevent black lung from developing into totally-disabling progressive massive fibrosis, the federal mine safety statutes since 1969 have afforded American coal miners a medical screening and epidemiological surveillance program, along with a unique right to transfer to a non-dusty job if they begin developing early signs of occupational lung disease. This program is commonly known as Part 90, referring to its implementing regulation, the lawsuit states.

After learning that he might be developing coal workers’ pneumococcus in November 2024, Wiley applied for the Part 90 program in hopes of transferring to a non-dusty job. He mailed the form and radiological imaging of his chest as required and has received no response as of the time of the filing, the suit states, and is still currently working in underground coal mines.

Without the Respiratory Health Division, NIOSH is unable to process all the incoming and pending Part 90 applications, such as Wiley’s, the suit states.

The suit requests that RFK, Jr. comply with his statutory duties and restore all personnel in the Respiratory Health Division of NIOSH “who are integral to carrying out the epidemiological surveillance and job transfer provisions of the Mine Safety and Health Act of 1977.”

Also on Tuesday, Senator Shelley Moore Capito urged RFK, Jr. to bring back the NIOSH employees to support the coal industry in the Mountain State.