Federal Judge Blocks Federal Employee Vaccine Mandate
In a ruling issued by a federal judge in the Southern District of Texas, the Biden Administration is unable to enforce Executive Order 14043 (EO), mandating vaccination for federal employees. The ruling halts all impending disciplinary actions.
The court did not decide the ultimate issue of whether the mandate is lawful, but rather held that the plaintiffs have enough of a chance to succeed on that issue and would face irreparable harm while awaiting a judicial decision that the EO’s enforcement should be halted while the court decides the case. The court opinion doubted the President has the authority to order the vaccination of federal employees, stating while the executive has broad powers over employment policy, those powers are not broad enough to authorize the EO.
“This case is not about whether folks should get vaccinated against COVID-19 — the court believes they should. It is not even about the federal government’s power, exercised properly, to mandate vaccination of its employees," wrote Judge Jeffrey Brown, "It is instead about whether the president can, with the stroke of a pen and without the input of Congress, require millions of federal employees to undergo a medical procedure as a condition of their employment. That, under the current state of the law as just recently expressed by the Supreme Court, is a bridge too far.”
In his decision, Judge Brown cited the recent U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in overturning the Occupational Safety and Health Administration's (OSHA) vaccine mandate for large private employers, which clarified that OSHA could impose workplace safety standards, but not broad public health measures.
“To ensure compliance with an applicable preliminary nationwide injunction, which may be supplemented, modified, or vacated, depending on the course of ongoing litigation, the Federal Government will take no action to implement or enforce the COVID-19 vaccination requirement pursuant to Executive Order 14043 on Requiring Coronavirus Disease 2019 Vaccination for Federal Employees,” stated the Safer Federal Workforce Task Force, in response to the decision.
The pause is not likely to have a significant impact as approximately 98 percent of federal employees are already compliant with the mandate, and more than 93 percent have verified they are vaccinated. Although, the department-based disciplinary actions facing 40,000 feds have been halted.
Objecting to the injunction, the Justice Department has already issued an appeal of the ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.