US judge blocks Biden wage rule for construction projects
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[June 25, 2024]
By Daniel Wiessner
(Reuters) - A federal judge on Monday temporarily blocked a Biden
administration rule expanding the cases in which construction
contractors are required to pay workers prevailing wages that apply to
$200 billion of federally funded infrastructure projects.
U.S. District Judge Sam Cummings in Lubbock, Texas, said the U.S.
Department of Labor lacks the power to impose prevailing wage
requirements when government agencies do not explicitly include them in
contracts and to extend them to truck drivers who work on construction
sites.
"Presidents and their agencies ... do violence to the Constitution when
they attempt to unilaterally amend Acts of Congress to suit their policy
choices," wrote Cummings, an appointee of Republican former President
Ronald Reagan.
Cummings blocked the rule, which took effect last October, from being
enforced nationwide pending the outcome of a lawsuit by Associated
General Contractors of America, a major construction trade group.
The Labor Department and Associated General Contractors did not
immediately respond to requests for comment.
A New Deal-era law, the Davis-Bacon Act, tasks the Labor Department with
establishing wage floors for federally funded construction projects,
which are based on the prevailing wages for certain jobs in specific
geographic areas.
Today, prevailing wages apply to more than 1 million construction
workers on $200 billion worth of projects.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2024/Jun/25/images/ads/current/siu_sda_050324.png)
The Biden administration rule revived a method for calculating those
wages that excludes many lower-paid workers and leads to higher wage
floors, which was abandoned by the Reagan administration in the 1980s.
Other trade groups are challenging those changes in a separate pending
lawsuit.
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![](../images/062524PIX/news_t47.jpg)
Highway construction known as "Project Neon" is shown in Las Vegas,
Nevada, U.S., August 28, 2018. Picture taken August 28, 2018.
REUTERS/Mike Blake/File Photo
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2024/Jun/25/images/ads/current/longview_lda_HEROES_2024.png)
The rule made several other key changes including giving prevailing
wage standards the "operation of law," meaning they are always in
effect and agencies no longer have to explicitly include them in
contracts, and expanding the definition of "mechanics and laborers"
covered by the law to include truck drivers who make deliveries to
work sites.
Associated General Contractors challenged those two provisions in a
lawsuit filed in November, saying they went beyond the Labor
Department's powers to set the level of prevailing wages.
Cummings on Monday agreed and said the rule would cause irreparable
harm to construction businesses, including pricing some of them out
of federal contracts, if it remains in effect.
In adopting the rule, the Labor Department said it was necessary to
modernize prevailing wage regulations to reflect changes in the law
and the economy.
That was echoed by unions and other supporters of the rule, who said
it would guarantee workers fair pay and deter wage theft,
particularly on the growing number of clean energy construction
projects.
(Reporting by Daniel Wiessner in Albany, New York; Editing by Alexia
Garamfalvi and Leslie Adler)
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