Two Texas trade groups have stepped onto the federal stage with a sweeping challenge aimed at the heart of workplace-safety regulation, arguing that the nation’s primary safety watchdog was built on an unconstitutional foundation.
Filed in Amarillo, the lawsuit contends that when Congress created the Occupational Safety and Health Administration more than half a century ago, it handed the agency a blank notebook and an overly generous pen. By allowing OSHA to craft any rule it finds “reasonably necessary and appropriate,” the groups argue, lawmakers effectively ceded core legislative power—without ever defining what those words were supposed to mean.
According to the Texas International Produce Association and the Texas Vegetable Association, that vague mandate has ballooned into a mountain of regulatory requirements that sweep across entire industries. Their lawsuit seeks to not only strike down Congress’s delegation of rulemaking authority but also freeze enforcement of OSHA’s current standards.
OSHA did not respond to a request for comment.
This isn’t the first time critics have tried to rein in OSHA’s reach. A previous challenge—launched by a furnace-servicing company in 2021—failed in federal appeals court, which concluded that OSHA’s powers were properly tethered to identifying significant workplace risks and addressing them narrowly. The Supreme Court declined to revive the case, though two conservative justices voiced strong objections.
The new Texas case will land before the lone federal judge in Amarillo, an appointee known for decisions that often align with conservative legal theories. Any appeal would travel to the 5th Circuit, a court whose reputation for skepticism toward federal regulatory power is well-established.
In recent years, multiple agencies have faced similar structural attacks, and the Supreme Court’s shifting stance on agency authority has invited a fresh wave of challenges. From securities regulation to labor oversight, the landscape of federal power is undergoing an unmistakable re-examination—and OSHA is now squarely back in the crosshairs.
The case: Texas International Produce Association v. Occupational Safety & Health Administration, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, No. 2:25-cv-0261.
