Fall 2025 GAWDA Committee Corner

The GAWDA Government Affairs Committee met in person during GAWDA’s SMC in Dallas and will also meet in person during the Annual Convention in Dallas, in conjunction with GAWDA’s Safety Committee. The Committee continues to work on its primary priorities:

1. The Food and Drug Administration issued a long-awaited final rule on medical gases on June 18, 2024. The new requirements go into effect on December 18, 2025. The final rule includes regulatory changes for product labeling, Current Good Manufacturing Practices, product certification, and post-marketing safety reporting. CGA’s Medical Gas Committee is providing additional advice on how to handle these issues. Through Tom Badstubner, GAWDA has provided compliance information to members on the new final rule.
2. The Trump Administration has issued an Executive Order requiring federal agencies to withdraw ten final rules for each new rule or proposed rule from that agency. In addition, agencies have been directed to provide a list of existing regulations that may be withdrawn or modified to be consistent with current Administration policy. The Administration has also ordered agencies to cease all activities of programs promoting Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and Environmental Justice.
3. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has issued a proposed rule to protect indoor and outdoor workers from heat illness and injury while on the job. If finalized, the rule would affect 35 million workers nationwide. The regulatory text shows that employers will have to have a written heat injury and illness prevention plan and monitor heat levels at each work site, both indoors and outdoors. OSHA would adopt two heat index thresholds that would apply nationally and would factor in humidity as well as temperature. One, at 80 degrees Fahrenheit, would require employers to provide drinking water and break areas that workers can use as needed. Employers would also need to have a plan for new and returning workers to gradually increase their workload so their bodies adjust to the heat. More protections would kick in at 90 degrees, including monitoring for signs of heat illness and mandatory 15-minute rest breaks every two hours. Employers would be required to check on people working alone every few hours and to issue a hazard alert, reminding their workers of the importance of staying hydrated. The Trump Administration is expected to amend the proposed rule, including eliminating the proposal to require paid rest breaks for workers.
4. Congress has rescinded waivers previously granted by the Environmental Protection Agency to the California Air Resources Board to impose stricter emissions requirements for internal combustion engines for commercial trucks, and ultimately to ban the sale or operation of non-Zero-Emission Vehicles after 2036. Resolutions of disapproval have been passed in the House and Senate to rescind the waivers under the Congressional Review Act and President Trump signed the resolutions into law. But there is a legal question as to whether the CRA applies to EPA waivers. Eleven states have filed suit to challenge the CRA recission action. If the court rules that the CRA does not apply to the waivers, the agency will have to go through a rulemaking to rescind the waivers.
5. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has implemented a rule to integrate the driver’s medical examination results into the Commercial Driver’s License database at the State level as of June 23, 2025. The rule will facilitate the electronic transmission of examination results (medically qualified, medically unqualified, and voided) and additional information (e.g., corrective lenses, hearing aid, medical exemption, skill performance evaluation certificate, etc.) from examinations performed for commercial learner’s permit and commercial driver’s license applicants and holders from FMCSA’s National Registry of Certified Medical Examiners to the State Driver’s Licensing Agencies to be posted on the Commercial Driver’s License Information System driver motor vehicle record. To date, 38 states are in compliance with the rule.
6. The FMCSA has revised the English Language Proficiency rule for CMV drivers to make it an out of service violation instead of just a fine. Drivers who cannot converse with roadside inspection personnel in English, or interpret common highway signs, are being placed out of service as of June 25, 2025.
7. The FMCSA has withdrawn a rulemaking to require all CMVs over 26,2000 lbs. GVW to use a speed limiting device that would have been set at a to-be-determined maximum limit. The agency said there was no compelling need for the rule, which would have imposed a nationally uniform speed limit for trucks.
8. The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration is considering developing standards for the safe operation of tanks containing hazmat on electric vehicles, with particular emphasis on Class 1, Class 7 and flammables in all gas, liquid, and solid states.