Political shifts and changes from Washington D.C. to jobsites around the country

By Emma Peterson.

Trent Cotney shares insights on how the 2025 political landscape is affecting the roofing industry.

In a new Roofing Road Trips® episode, Heidi J. Ellsworth caught up with Trent Cotney to talk about how contractors and businesses are being impacted as the 2025 political landscape continues to evolve. If you don’t know Trent, he’s a partner at the Adams and Reese law firm with a focus on roofing litigation and arbitration. Over the course of his career, he has established himself as a dedicated representative of the roofing industry, both behind the scenes with his NRCA work and on the front lines advocating in Washington D.C. for policies that support our community.  

With the new presidential administration coming into office this year, there have been a lot of shifts and changes that will and already are affecting roofers. Trent has had a front row seat for this and shared some of what he is seeing. “There are pros and cons. One thing that caused me to kind of take a step back a little bit is the tariffs. We’re already seeing a short term impact, like some movement within steel because of the 25% tariffs on them,” he shared. Beyond making it harder to get some materials, these tariffs also create generalized economic uncertainty, which can make it harder to operate a business as consumers tend to be more hesitant.  

There are also the changes to immigration which is especially relevant in the construction industry. Trent explained, “The other biggest issue is immigration. In general, we’ve had almost a tolerance type policy to immigration as it stands now and as an industry we've become very reliant on foreign labor to help supplement our workforce. So, that’s things like W-2, 1099 or sub crew workers. With immigration changes, we've already had a lot of reports of ICE raids occurring and I think it's going to have an impact on the availability of labor and as a result is going to cause labor rates to increase.”

But the story is not all challenges, there are some changes and shifts that could help contractors out. Trent elaborated, “For pros, regulation is always something that is costly and difficult for roofing contractors to navigate. We’re seeing the curtailing of some of that regulation, which will probably benefit roofing contractors.” In addition to that, there are some changes to how tax bills play out, like the elimination of tax on overtime.  

At this point, Trent’s main advice to contractors is to be patient and proactive. He recommended looking into things like drafted contract provisions and litigation along with credit managers. These types of stressful, changing markets have been weathered by the industry before, particularly in 2004, and we can do it again.

Read the transcript or Listen to the conversation to hear more of Trent’s insights on how the political landscape is affecting the roofing industry.