I have never heard of non exempt employees having more protections or having to be paid twice a month, in any US jurisdiction. Can you provide an example?

I have only ever heard of non exempt and exempt to simply distinguish employees that are owed overtime after 40 hours per week and employees that are not owed overtime after 40 hours per week.

There is no federal law about pay frequency, but pretty much all states require at least monthly, if not semi monthly or biweekly, regardless of exempt or non exempt nature of employee.

https://www.patriotsoftware.com/blog/payroll/pay-frequency-r...