Federal vaccine mandates will get high court audience

WASHINGTON (CN) — The Supreme Court agreed Wednesday to hear multiple challenges to President Joe Biden’s vaccine mandates for large companies and health care workers, though it declined to order emergency relief.

Both the government and the groups opposed to the vaccine had applied to the court only days earlier. While the government is fighting two federal injunctions that bar enforcement of the vaccine mandate for health care workers in half of the country, a group of businesses and red states are fighting the Biden administration's impending vaccine-or-test mandate for large private businesses.

Rather than grant the stays, the court agreed to hear oral arguments in both cases. This is similar to a move the justices made with a Texas abortion case last month. In a pair separate orders released late Wednesday, the court consolidated four applications for arguments on Jan. 7. 

Enforced through the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the vaccine-or-test mandate applies to businesses with more than 100 employees. It is set to take effect on Jan. 4, three days before the court will hear arguments in the case. The mandate was announced in November and initially enjoined by a federal judge — only to be reinstated with a Sixth Circuit reversal last week. 

Over a dozen applications were filed to challenge OSHA’s mandate since Monday, but the court agreed to hear cases only from the National Federation of Independent Business and 27 Republican-led states. 

On the same day the justices consider the OSHA mandate, they will also tackle Biden's rule that says health care facilities receiving federal Medicare and Medicaid funds must require employees to be vaccinated.

Because of rulings from the Fifth and Eighth Circuits, the Biden administration’s vaccine mandate remains in effect in 25 states. Last week the Fifth Circuit vacated what had been a nationwide injunction out of Louisiana against the health care mandate; the panel said the injunction secured in Louisiana should apply only to the 14 states that sued. Two days later, the Eighth Circuit upheld an injunction issued in Missouri for another 10 states. The 25th state where the mandate is on hold is Texas, thanks to yet another ruling.

Here it is the U.S. government seeking a stay of the lower court injunctions, insisting that the mandates will save lives. 

“The secretary explained that this vaccination condition was necessary to protect Medicare and Medicaid patients — who are particularly vulnerable — against infection with Covid-19 by staff members who could safely and conscientiously obtain vaccination,” U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar wrote in a Dec. 16 application. “And he stressed that adding the condition in light of the start of the winter season was critical to preventing outbreaks of the kind that had devastated Medicare- and Medicaid-participating facilities earlier in the pandemic.” 

The challenges come as a new variant is ripping through the country causing cases to rapidly rise as the country heads into the winter months. 

Biden addressed opposition to mandates in a speech on Tuesday. 

“I know vaccination requirements are unpopular for many and not even popular for those who are anxious to get them,” Biden said. “My administration has put them in place not to control your life but to save your life and the lives of others.” 

Follow @KelseyReichmann

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