Dignity for Farmworkers and Food Chain Workers

[Inlcuded in plan:] And as climate change continues to lead to more extreme weather – like hotter summers and drier winters – the danger of wildfires and heat stroke will only become worse. In California’s Sonoma County, for example, farmworkers went to work to save the grape harvest while wildfires burned nearby, breathing in dangerous pollution from smoke. And despite heat being a leading cause of on-the-job death or injury among farmworkers, only two states – California and Washington – require farmworkers to have access to shade and water. That’s why I will fight to pass the Asunción Valdivia Heat Illness and Fatality Prevention Act, named in honor of a 53-year-old farmworker who died of heat stroke while working in the fields, to guarantee farmworkers access to shade and water while on the job, nationwide. And I will push to implement heat and air quality safety standards for agricultural labor, including protections against poor air quality due to wildfires, at the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA).