On November 17th, 2021, the Occupational Safety & Health Administration, also known as OSHA, announced they would not be enforcing the Biden Administration’s COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate. This decision came after a court order was upheld by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. OSHA will not be able to resume enforcement efforts unless court ordered.
Their statement can be found on their own website, but states; “On November 12, 2021, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit granted a motion to stay OSHA’s COVID-19 Vaccination and Testing Emergency Temporary Standard, published on November 5, 2021 (86 Fed. Reg. 61402) (“ETS”). The court ordered that OSHA “take no steps to implement or enforce” the ETS “until further court order.” While OSHA remains confident in its authority to protect workers in emergencies, OSHA has suspended activities related to the implementation and enforcement of the ETS pending future developments in the litigation.”
With more than half of the United States AG’s suing over the vaccine mandate, it would have made sense of OSHA to wait to implement any enforcement even if they hadn’t been court ordered. According to Human Events, at least 27 states have joined or filed their own lawsuit against the Biden Administration and OSHA as of November 8th, 2021.
There has been a lot of confusion with some headlines touting 19, 27, 26, or even just 9, but that’s because there are multiple suits among multiple courts. So when you hear that only a lower amount are suing, the reporter is likely only reporting about one of the five different lawsuits that are ongoing. To make matters even more confusing, among the 27 states suing, they are technically under 8 different courts but only 4 total had lawsuits filed in their systems.
The courts with those filings are the 5th (two separate filings), 7th, 8th, and 11th Circuit Courts of Appeals.
So which states are suing?
- Alaska – Republican Governor & Attorney Genera
- Alabama – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Arizona – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Arkansas – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Florida – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Georgia – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Idaho – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Indiana – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Iowa – Republican Governor & Democrat Attorney General
- Kansas – Democrat Governor & Republican Attorney General
- Kentucky – Democrat Governor & Republican Attorney General
- Louisiana – Democrat Governor & Republican Attorney General
- Mississippi – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Missouri – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Montana – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Nebraska – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- New Hampshire – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- North Dakota – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Ohio – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Oklahoma – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- South Carolina – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- South Dakota – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Tennessee – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Texas – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Utah – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- West Virginia – Republican Governor & Attorney General
- Wyoming – Republican Governor & Attorney General
On November 16th, 2021, it was decided that the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals would preside and consider whether or not the Vaccine Mandate is legal. How was this determined you might ask? “The Cincinnati-based court was selected Tuesday in a random drawing using ping-pong balls, a process employed when challenges to certain federal agency actions are filed in multiple courts.”
BREAKING: Enforcement of President Biden’s unlawful vaccine mandate has been suspended by OSHA. https://t.co/zKWV0hoACm
— The Conservative Advocate (@ConsrvtAdvocate) November 17, 2021
Federal law states that “cases challenging federal agency actions get consolidated upon the agency’s request if they are filed in multiple circuit courts.”
The man who got to pull the ping-pong ball from the bin was a clerk named John W. Nichols.
This story syndicated with permission from Liberty Leader
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