Meatpackers lobbied to stay open as COVID-19 spread, congressional probe finds

At the height of the pandemic, the meat processing industry worked closely with political appointees in the Trump administration to stave off health restrictions and keep slaughterhouses open even as COVID-19 spread rapidly among workers, according to a congressional report released Thursday.

Meat companies pushed to keep their plants open despite company leaders knowing that workers were at high risk of catching the virus, the report by the House's Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis found. The lobbying led to health and labor officials watering down their recommendations for the industry and culminated in an executive order that President Donald Trump issued in the spring of 2020 designating meat plants as critical infrastructure that needed to remain open.

Food workers were hit disproportionately early in the pandemic, with one study finding that having a beef or pork processing facility nearby more than doubled a U.S. county's per capita coronavirus infection rates.