The United States is likely to see greater inflation risks from record-high housing prices as demand continues to outstrip the number of newly-built homes while bottlenecks in supply chains slow construction, Federal Reserve Governor Michelle Bowman said on Monday.
“I anticipate that these housing supply issues are unlikely to reverse materially in the short term, which suggests that we are likely to see higher inflation from housing for a while,” Bowman said.
Sales of new single family houses in the United States jumped 14% in the month to September as buyers tried to beat a potential hike in interest and mortgage borrowing rates despite record high home prices, Commerce Department data showed.
The median selling price for existing-homes in the United States rose 17.8% in July from a year earlier to hit a record high of $359,900, according to the National Association of Realtors.
The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller US National Home Price Index said its 20-city indicator showed a 19.7% year-over-year gain in August, barely changed from the 20% reading in the previous month.
“Because housing costs are a large share of living expenses for most people, these increases are adding to current inflationary pressures in the economy,” Bowman said. “Indeed, we are already seeing sizable increases in rent and owners’ equivalent rent in many parts of the country.”
The US economy shrank by 3.5% for all of 2020 due to shutdowns and other disruptions caused by the COVID-19 crisis. Growth this year has been spotty, with an annualized 3.5% expansion in the first quarter, 3.6% in the second and 2.0% in the third.
Besides uneven economic growth, the Federal Resrerve has faced three other problems. The first is inflation as wages and the prices of almost everything have soared from the lows of the coronavirus pandemic, especially pump prices of gasoline now at seven-year highs. The second is slower-than-expected employment growth, with at least 5 million of the about 21 million jobs lost last year not having returned due to conditions forced by the pandemic. The third is the continuous disruption in supply chains as the output of building materials and electronic components remains challenged.
“Before this past year, the pace of construction of new homes was below its long-run average for more than a decade,” Bowman said. “The supply chain bottlenecks … are slowing down construction further. These issues affect the rental market too: The multifamily rental market is at historic levels of tightness, with over 95 percent occupancy in major markets.
”Dire housing shortages in the United States since the financial crisis of 2007-2008 and last year’s coronavirus outbreak have sent home prices to record highs.
Despite the grossly inflated market and a huge mismatch of demand versus supply, many buyers remain hopeful of locking in before the Federal Reserve raises interest rates sometime next year in what would be its first hike since the COVID-19 outbreak in March 2020.
Mom warns other parents about lack of accountability after after consent procedures ignored.
A furious mom in California is warning other parents after a CVS pharmacy allowed her teen son to get a Covid-19 injection without her consent.
The incident took place at a CVS in Davis back in July, but the outraged mom says she’s revisiting the story to warn other parents as vaccines for youngsters recently received emergency use authorization.
“[My 16-year-old son] was like, ‘My arm hurts,’ and I said, ‘What happened?’” mom Amanda Arroyo recalled to local media. “And he was like, ‘I had my COVID shot,’ and I was like ‘Wait, what?’”
CBS Sacramentoreports: “Arroyo claims the pharmacist told her she was just trying to vaccinate as many people as possible in the community to keep people safe.”
The mom says she’s worried there could be lasting side effects from the experimental Covid shot, which did not undergo research trials to determine long-term outcomes.
“There is a law in place, there are procedures that are not being followed,” Arroyo said, adding she’s “really concerned at the fact that I don’t know what this is going to do to him.”
In the state of California there are three ways a minor can obtain permission for a vaccine, all of which involve a parent or guardian consenting to the medical procedure.
The mom says none of the consent procedures were followed and no one was held accountable.
“He’s 16 years old. I completely understand that, but I, in no way, shape or form gave consent for him to get the vaccine and I was not present when it happened,” Arroyo said. “I want the pharmacist to be held responsible for her actions and her negligence.”
In a statement to CBS, CVS Health senior manager for corporate communications Amy Thibault claimed they were looking into the matter, stating, “We’re aware of Ms. Arroyo’s concerns and apologized to her when she contacted us initially. We’re committed to complying with all vaccination regulations and are in the process of looking into this matter further.”
Last week, Infowars reported on a school in Hawaii that’s blocking parents from attending a vaccine drive for children aged 5 to 11 – but in that case, parents were still asked for their consent.
National File has exclusively released the full 112 pages of the diary our whistleblower identified as belonging to Ashley Biden
Since Saturday night, National File has published dozens of pages from what our whistleblower has identified as the 2019 diary of Ashley Blazer Biden, the 39-year-old daughter of Democrat presidential candidate Joe Biden. The diary was started while the author was in a drug rehabilitation facility in Florida, and details her romantic interests, crumbling marriage, struggle with drug and sex addiction, and family life as her father began to run for president.
With limited redactions to protect the identities of private individuals, National File can now publish the full 112 page diary our whistleblower has identified as belonging to Ashley Biden.
National File obtained this document from a whistleblower who was concerned the media organization that employs him would not publish the materials in the final days before the presidential election.
READ THE DIARY IDENTIFIED BY OUR WHISTLEBLOWER AS ASHLEY BIDEN’S:
National File’s whistleblower also has a recording of Ashley Biden admitting the diary is hers, and employed a handwriting expert who verified the pages were all written by Ashley. National File has in its possession a recording of this whistleblower detailing the work he did to verify its authenticity.
In the recording, the whistleblower also adds that his media organization chose not to release the documents after receiving pressure from a competing outlet.
National File has already reported several revelations from the diary, including the fact that the author believes she was sexually molested as a child and shared “probably not appropriate” showers with her father, the months of entries detailing the author’s struggle with drug abuse, the entries that detail the author’s crumbling marriage with multiple affairs, the entries showing the family’s fears of a potential scandal due to her brother’s new home, and those that show a deep resentment for her father due to his money, control, and emotional manipulation.
The first lawsuits have been filed following the Astroworld Festival performance by rapper Travis Scott, in which eight people died. Scott and fellow rapper Drake have been accused of negligence and helping cause the stampede.
Astroworld Festival attendee Kristian Paredes (23) filed a lawsuit this weekend accusing Scott and guest star Drake of stirring up the crowd and sparking the deadly chaos. Parades is seeking over $1 million in damages.
Drake “came on stage alongside Travis Scott and helped incite the crowd,” the lawsuit claims, and the two rappers continued to perform even “as the crowd became out of control” and “mayhem” ensued.
“The crowd became chaotic and a stampede began leaving eight dead and dozens including Kristian Paredes severely injured,” the lawsuit continued, alleging that many attendees “begged security guards hired by Live Nation Entertainment for help, but were ignored.”
Parades’ attorney, Thomas J. Henry, accused the two rappers of not only being “aware of the hectic crowd but also that injuries and potential deaths may have occurred.”
“Still, they decided to put profits over their attendees and allowed the deadly show to go on,” he claimed, calling the festival a night of “fear, injury and death.”
Parades faults not only the rappers themselves, but everybody who was linked to the organization of the event, suggesting that the deaths were the result of “negligence, carelessness and recklessness.”
Another attendee, Manuel Souza, is also suing Scott and the organizers of the festival. In his lawsuit, Souza called the incident a “predictable and preventable tragedy” which took place due to “a motivation for profit at the expense of concertgoers’ health and safety.”
Souza’s attorney, Steve Kherkher, accused Scott and the organizers of having “consciously ignored the extreme risks of harm to concertgoers,” and said that in some cases they even “actively encouraged and fomented dangerous behaviors.”
Attorney Ben Crump – who is most known in the US for his work on civil rights cases, including the deaths of George Floyd, Trayvon Martin, and Michael Brown – also announced on Sunday that he was representing victims of the “tragic and preventable event.”
In a statement, Crump said, “We are hearing horrific accounts of the terror and helplessness people experienced – the horror of a crushing crowd and the awful trauma of watching people die while trying unsuccessfully to save them.”
Crump called on other attendees of the festival who were harmed to contact his law firm.
Scott’s partner, Kylie Jenner, claimed on Sunday that they had been unaware of any deaths at the festival “until the news came out after the show.” However, videos of the festival showed attendees unsuccessfully pleading with staff to do something as the chaos increased. One video showed Scott dancing as police and medical officials tried to resuscitate a concertgoer directly below.
A vote for the bipartisan infrastructure bill is a vote for Biden’s reconciliation legislation — the largest cradle-to-grave expansion of federal power since the New Deal.
At nearly midnight on Friday, 13 House Republicans gave Speaker Nancy Pelosi the votes she needed to pass the so-called “bipartisan infrastructure bill” — colloquially known in DC as the BIF. In doing so, these House Republicans, among them two members of the House GOP leadership team, all but guaranteed House passage of Joe Biden’s hotly partisan, $2 trillion reconciliation bill, which represents the largest cradle-to-grave expansion of federal power since the New Deal.
Over at National Review, Philip Klein called the move by these 13 Republicans “political malpractice,” and a “betrayal.” He’s right, particularly on the first point.
Republicans who supported the bill predictably justified their vote as one for “roads and bridges,” pointing to the benefits that the bill’s largest provisions — like the $47 billion in climate funding and the $66 billion for the failing Amtrak system, provided without any reform — will ostensibly bring to their districts.
As Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) told The Hill, “I thought it was good for our district, I thought it was good for our country.” Meanwhile, left-of-center commentator Andrew Sullivan huffed about the “fanatical tribalism” being applied to a bill about infrastructure.
That the BIF was a bill solely focused on infrastructure may have been true at the bill’s conception. But for months, a single and unavoidable political reality has been obvious: the substance of the bill hardly mattered. Rather, the infrastructure bill was but a chit, a chess piece, in forcing through passage of the larger, hotly partisan reconciliation legislation. Their fates were linked; one would not pass without the other.
This was a choice made very clearly, and very openly, by congressional Democrats. In June, Pelosi stated, “There ain’t gonna be no bipartisan bill, unless we have a reconciliation bill,” a sentiment she reiterated in October when she confirmed “the bipartisan infrastructure bill will pass once we have agreement on the reconciliation bill.”
House Progressives made the linkage of the two bills central to their strategy of leveraging concessions in the reconciliation legislation, refusing to provide votes for the BIF until their reconciliation demands were met (six of them ended up refusing to support passage the BIF, paving the way for House Republicans to be the deciding votes).
Even President Joe Biden tied the fate of the infrastructure legislation to the reconciliation bill. He did so explicitly in June, then said he didn’t really mean it after Senate Republicans expressed outrage (but then 18 of them voted to pass the bill in August, anyway), and then linked them again in October when he told House Democrats that infrastructure “ain’t going to happen until we reach an agreement on the next piece of legislation,” reconciliation the infrastructure bill.
So to claim that a vote for the infrastructure legislation was merely a vote for “roads and bridges,” devoid of any other major political context, is just willfully ignorant of the obvious and openly stated politics at work. A vote for the infrastructure bill was very clearly a vote for the reconciliation legislation. The inability to understand this reality raises not only questions of basic political acumen, but of the ability of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s leadership team to hold their conference together on consequential votes.
It’s worth unpacking a few of the provisions in the reconciliation bill that this group of Republicans will help make possible. Among them:
A 10-year amnesty for illegal immigrants, which includes work permits and driver’s licenses and cannot be undone by future administrations for a decade.
Facilitates enforcement of Biden’s vaccine mandate by increasing OSHA penalties on businesses up to $700,000 per violation and provides billions in funding for the Department of Labor to increase enforcement.
Mandates taxpayer coverage of abortion, leaving the long-agreed upon Hyde amendment out of the bill.
Provides half a trillion dollars in climate spending, including clean energy tax credits to subsidize solar, electric vehicles, and clean energy production, as well as federal spending on clean energy technology and manufacturing, all while limiting domestic energy production, thereby increasing dependence on Russia and China.
Provides roughly $400 billion for expanded government childcare and universal pre-K, which pumps millions into failed Head Start programs, excludes support for families who prefer at-home child-care arrangements, and by requiring that preschool teachers have a college degree, will reduce the availability of child-care options.
A host of new taxes, and a giant tax cut for the rich: by including a repeal on the cap for the state and local tax deduction, Democrats will provide a $30 billion net direct tax cut for the top 5 percent of earners, largely in blue states where the state and local taxes are much higher.
The “Build Back Better” reconciliation legislation is a bill that transforms the role of the state in every aspect of an individual’s life, while expanding key Democratic priorities like amnesty, abortion, cheap foreign labor, a dysfunctional health care system, and invasions of financial privacy. And consideration of the bill in the House wasn’t made possible by the Democrats in the majority, but by House Republicans.
There are those, like Sullivan, who will still bemoan that political polarization has taken over even relatively popular policies like infrastructure. But politicizing the infrastructure bill was the clear and unambiguous choice that Democrats made when they linked the two bills. To expect most Republicans to be as tin-eared and politically naive (or, like Rep. Adam Kinzinger, as openly tied to Democratic priorities) as the group of 13 is ridiculous. It’s asking them to act against their own self-interest.
Democrats drafted a partisan reconciliation bill with no Republican input, full of provisions they knew Republicans wouldn’t support, and then hijacked an otherwise bipartisan bill to ensure passage of its much more expansive and partisan cousin. This was a specific choice Democrats made, and Republicans are not responsible for it — nor should they be expected to vote for a bill that is the stated gateway to related legislation with which they profoundly disagree.
Regardless, the infrastructure bill now goes to the president’s desk. Eighteen Republican senators helped pass it in August, and so did 13 House Republicans (for a total of 31), knowing full well they were also voting on the amnesty-filled, abortion-funding, financially-snooping, cheap-labor loving reconciliation bill, gave it the required boost. Betrayal, as Klein noted, is not too strong a term.
Although six House Democrats from the progressive wing of the party voted against passage of the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi passed the bill late Friday night with the help of 13 Republicans. Hidden inside the 2,300 pages of this complete boondoggle of a bill are numerous dangerous provisions that would have our founders rolling in their graves.
Shortly before the vote, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise of Louisiana warned colleagues about several of the most egregious initiatives contained in this legislation.
Scalise, holding up a copy of the unwieldy bill that lawmakers had only received the night before, reminded his colleagues of Biden’s promise that passage of his agenda would not cost Americans earning under $400,000 one dime.
“He breaks the promise right here,” Scalise said. “In the bill, a tax, according to the American Gas Association, will increase household electricity rates by 30 percent. And by the way, that’s low-income families that pay that tax the hardest.”
Democrats had originally put amnesty for illegal immigrants into their larger Build Back Better bill. Because there is no Republican support in the Senate for this legislation, they hoped to pass it through the process of reconciliation.
However, in September, Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth McDonough ruled that amnesty could not be included in a reconciliation bill because it has nothing to do with either spending or revenue. So they added it to the infrastructure bill instead.
Scalise told colleagues: “Millions of additional people will get amnesty in this bill. And it comes at a time where President Biden is negotiating — initially he said he wasn’t — and then the White House had to go back up and say the Justice Department is negotiating half a million dollar checks to people who came across our border illegally and then they’re going to give amnesty to millions more people. Estimates are seven million more people.”
“Can you imagine the flood that will come over when they hear that you can get a half a million dollars a person if President Biden gets his way?” he adds.
Scalise was referring to reports that the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, and Health and Human Services are in talks to give $450,000 per person to immigrants who were separated from family members at the border during the Trump Administration. Questioned about these payments by Fox News’ Peter Doocy last week, Biden said the story wasn’t true. He was later “corrected” by White House officials who confirmed that negotiations are ongoing.
Next, he addressed the addition of 87,000 IRS agents. “They call this infrastructure. They call this equity. Whatever they want to call it, it’s an army of IRS agents that are going to comb through your bank account. … Why? Because they’ve got to generate hundreds of billions of dollars to spend on more inflation-inducing spending. …”
“According to this Penn-Wharton account [a budget model], you’re going to have over $4 trillion of spending with $1.5 trillion of new taxes. By the way, that’s $2.5 trillion of additional debt. The President says there’s no cost – no cost, just … $2.5 trillion of debt.”
“These IRS agents are going to have to account for over $200 billion to find money from your checking accounts,” he said. “That’s what they’re trying to do at dark of night.”
“No wonder they don’t want a CBO score [on this bill], no wonder they want to do this by dark of night. This is going to induce more inflation that’s hurting families all across America,” Scalise said.
In this bill Dems are trying to ram through: – Mass amnesty – 87,000 new IRS agents – Insane leftist mandates – Giveaways to union bosses – Natural gas tax that'll raise energy costs
Scalise listed two additional items in his Twitter post that time would not allow him to cover in his floor speech. The first was giveaways to union bosses.
According to the Labor Department, “Davis-Bacon Act and Related Act contractors and subcontractors must pay their laborers and mechanics employed under the contract no less than the locally prevailing wages and fringe benefits for corresponding work on similar projects in the area.” Locally prevailing wages are set by the Labor Department.
A White House fact sheet states that “the overwhelming majority of the funds in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act will be subject to Davis-Bacon requirements. … These requirements will protect wages for millions of workers, grow the economy, and support good-paying, union jobs.” (Emphasis mine.)
Stand for America has warned that tying federally funded infrastructure projects to the Davis-Bacon Act will make these projects substantially more expensive and will put unions at a distinct advantage to win these coveted government construction projects. They explain that “it’s mainly unionized companies that pay prevailing wage salaries, so they’re more likely to be chosen for federally-funded construction projects.”
According to their report, “Under Davis-Bacon, the government jacks up required wages. Studies show that prevailing wages can drive the costs of projects 20% higher than market cost. As of just a few years ago, carpenters’ prevailing wages in Nassau-Suffolk, New York, were 30% above market. Electricians and plumbers’ prevailing wages were 45.5% and 58.7% above market, respectively.”
The organization also discusses the union giveaways included in the Build Back Better bill, which they said are even worse.
The final grievance on Scalise’s list was “insane left mandates.” The bill contains an abundance of insane left mandates, so I’m not exactly sure which ones he had in mind.
I imagine he was referring to the legislation’s aggressive climate-change measures. Yahoo’s senior climate editor — yes, they have a climate editor — calls the spending in this bill alone “the largest climate change investment in U.S. history.”
For example, it includes $150 billion for clean energy advancement. This is a mere drop in the bucket when one considers Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s mind-boggling estimate of $100 to $150 trillion over the next 30 years to reach “net-zero” emissions. She delivered this stunning figure in her remarks to COP26 attendees last week. ZeroHedge had the story.
No need to worry, though. Yellen has assured us that this represents the “greatest economic opportunity” of our lives.
Scalise is right. None of these items are good for America. All are intended to move the country closer to becoming a socialist state.
The passage of the reconciliation bill would bring us to the brink. Let’s hope Sen. Joe Manchin, a moderate Democrat from West Virginia who has thus far withheld his tie-breaking support, either blocks it, which may be too much to hope for, or at least takes the most dangerous provisions out of the final bill.
This administration represents the greatest national security threat America faces today.
Florian Dagoury, currently the world’s best static freediving diver, was diagnosed with myocarditis and trivial mitral regurgitation after his second dose of Pfizer’s vaccine.
Florian Dagoury is a French freediver, now based in Thailand, known for holding his breath for 10 minutes and 30 seconds and is currently the world’s top holder in apnea.
The freediver noticed that his heart rate was way higher than normal and his breath-hold capacities went down significantly after he took the vaccine.
Ten days after taking the vaccine, he went to see a cardiologist and was told that it was a common side effect of the Pfizer vaccine and it will just pass. Forty days passed and still no progress, he went to see another cardiologist and he got diagnosed with Myocarditis and Trivial Mitral regurgitation.
Florian then shared his testimony on his Instagram page:
Just want to share my annoying experience after vaccination and perhaps have some testimonials from similar stories amount Freedivers. Did you get better?
After my 2nd dose, I noticed that my heart rate was way higher than normal and my breath hold capacities went down significantly. During sleep, I’m at 65-70bpm instead of 37-45bpm. During the day I’m now always over 100bpm instead of 65bpm, even when I sit down and relax. Once I even reach 177bpm while having dinner with friends !!!! 10 days after my 2nd jab, I went to see a cardiologist and he told me it’s a common side effect of the Pfizer vaccine, nothing to worry about, just rest it will pass. 40days after 2nd jab, I had no progress so I went to see another cardiologist and got diagnosed with Myocarditis and Trivial Mitral regurgitation! Which is basically an inflammation of the heart muscles caused by the immune system and some tiny leaks of blood from the valves that no longer close properly. I’m now struggling to reach 8min breath hold, 150m dyn and I even have a strong urge to breathe doing 40m dives. 30% decrease on my diving performance roughly.
My first thought and recommendation to Freedivers around the world are to choose a vaccine that is done the old fashion way like Sputnik, Sinovac, Sinopharm, etc…instead of those new mRNA vaccines.
Christian groups from various states reportedly fight back against President Joe Biden’s “tyrannical” vaccine mandate.
The Christian Post reported that “multiple religious liberty-focused legal organizations” have filed a lawsuit against the Biden Administration in behalf of religious organizations from Texas and from South Dakota due to the threat of fines that will be imposed on employers or employee’s termination for non-compliance to Biden’s vaccine mandate.
The First Liberty Institute filed a petition in behalf of religious organizations American Family Association, Answers In Genesis, and Daystar Television Network last Friday, November 5, at the United States Courts of Appeals for the Fifth and Sixth Circuits. The petition requests the judges to “review and set aside” the mandate before it is implemented.
While the Alliance Defending Freedom filed a lawsuit in behalf the Sioux Falls Catholic Schools which does business as Bishop O’Gorman Catholic Schools and the Christian Employers Alliance and Home School Legal Defense Foundation. The said religious organizations joined the lawsuit filed by the States of Arizona, Arkansas, Alaska, Iowa, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming.
Previous reports indicated that around 11 Republican governors, including the states mentioned, as well as Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Utah, and West Virginia, have filed a lawsuit against Biden’s vaccine mandate.
ADF Senior Counsel Ryan Bangert, who also filed a lawsuit in behalf of The Daily Wire, raised in a statement last Thursday that the mandate is “unlawful” and intrusive on the part of employers to their employees. Bangert underscored that the president has “no authority” to impose the vaccines in such a manner.
“The Biden administration’s decision to mandate vaccines through an OSHA emergency rule is unlawful and compels businesses like The Daily Wire to intrude on their employees’ personal health decisions. The government has no authority to unilaterally treat unvaccinated employees like workplace hazards or to compel employers to become vaccine commissars, and we are asking the 6th Circuit to put a stop to it immediately,” Bangert said.
As reported last week, The Daily Wire was the first to file a lawsuit against Biden for his “tyrannical” policies, which is but a “gross overreach” since he “lacks the authority” to do so and, thus, has robbed Americans of their freedom. The Daily Wire strongly expressed non-compliance to the vaccine mandate.
The string of lawsuits come in reaction to the Biden Administration reinforcing its vaccine mandate through new policies released each by the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Medicare and Medicaid Services the Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) in a statement last Thursday, November 4.
The mandate is imposed on companies with 100 or more employees with the provision of paid leaves and a deadline of compliance on January 4, 2022. Employees who do not comply are required to wear masks while at work and to submit COVID-19 tests weekly. Medicaid and Medicare participants are similarly required to get the vaccine but no exemption was provided.
Daystar Television Network, which is the business name of the Word of God Fellowship, was among those who filed an emergency petition in the Fifth Circuit Court. There are more than ten petitioners who filed the request, which included airlines, legal entities, and corporations from various states.
The said emergency petition was actually granted by the Fifth Circuit Court on Friday “pending expedited judicial review” out of the judges believing that “there are grave statutory and constitutional issues with the Mandate.” The judges then ruled that “the mandate is hereby stayed pending further action by” the Fifth Circuit Court.
To Scott Troogstad, government control over people’s lives has spread like a fire since the pandemic.
Small businesses owners were deprived of livelihood, students could not go to schools, faith believers were forbidden to pray at their churches—and now, that fire has reached his own firehouse.
In October, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot ordered all city workers, including nearly 5,000 Chicago Fire Department (CFD) workers, to report their vaccination status by mid-October and get fully vaccinated by end of December. Failure to comply could mean losing jobs, Lightfoot warned.
Troogstad and his team had worked around the clock to respond to COVID-19 patients throughout pandemic, putting their own lives at risk. Some contracted COVID-19 and beat the virus after days or weeks of headaches and fever. Yet now, they were told they could not serve the city anymore, not until they get the shot.
That was a last straw that set him off on a bumpy journey of civil disobedience.
“Finally, we got to a point where the government encroachments started to affect everybody. We got to the point where people are going to rise up. When I say ‘rise up,’ I mean nothing more than simply not comply,” Troogstad told The Epoch Times.
He did not report his vaccination status, nor did he submit a vaccination exemption request—he became a member of a fighting minority who will not comply in any way, shape, or form.
By mid-October, roughly three out of ten CFD employees refused to report their vaccination status by the deadline.
Other reasons for noncompliance include unwillingness to disclose medical information, protecting union bargaining rights, confidence in natural immunity, and safety concerns with the vaccination, according to interviews with a few CFD firefighters and a paramedic by The Epoch Times.
“If I don’t take a stand right now, I couldn’t look my children in the eye. That’s the way I feel about it—we are at a point where you have to act to preserve the American freedom for our children,” Troogstad said.
His fight came at a personal cost.
He was put on no-pay status, along with a few dozen other CFD employees. To him, that means a monthly paycheck loss of around $8,00o as a fire captain, and a potential loss of his health insurance in the coming weeks.
His wife, who still works, has health issues and relies on monthly medication costing $5,000. He also supports two children, a son in college and a daughter in high school.
“My wife, I, and my kids are on the same team. I believe the moment we stand in is bigger than anything for us personally,” Troogstad told Epoch Times, almost coming to tears.
“It is time for us to start acting like Americans and reclaim our position as the government. I have nothing but faith in God. It will be a bumpy road, but I will be fine,” he said.
It is a fire he cannot put out with a fire engine and a hose. It is a fire he can fight with legal tools, he said.
On Oct. 21, a day after he was put on no-pay status, Troogstad filed a federal civil lawsuit along with 113 CFD employees and 21 city workers against the city of Chicago over the vaccine mandate.
The lawsuit alleges the vaccine mandate violates city workers’ constitutional and fundamental rights and asks the court to render it void and grant monetary remedies. It also challenges Illinois Governor JB Pritzker’s statewide vaccine mandate on health care workers and other employees.
It is the type of lawsuit commonly seen across the country, where state and federal judges are asked to reconcile the competing interests of public health and personal freedom during an unprecedented pandemic.
In Troogstad’s case, federal judge John Lee on Oct. 29 denied the request for a temporary order to halt the city’s vaccine mandate, basing his ruling on two legal precedents.
In the coming weeks, Judge Lee will consider the request for a preliminary order to halt the city’s vaccine mandate, after an examination of more evidence and arguments from both parties.
By Nov. 1, hundreds of previously noncompliant CFD employees changed course and complied with the mandate; a few decided to do so after being placed on no-pay status.
But Troogstad is staying the course. He tries to keep up his hope about the lawsuit, while at the same time looking around for jobs.
His last CFD bi-weekly paycheck arrived on Nov. 5, and it says $600. His side gig at Northern Illinois Public Safety Training Academy training firefighters helps pay some of the bills.
But he needs to look for a job that comes with health benefits to cover his wife’s expensive medication. Any job he could find probably pays half of his fire captain income, he said.
“I am very disappointed that my 22-year career dedicated to fire service came to a screeching halt over this. If there’s a legal remedy, I would love to go back to the fire department and continue to serve Chicagoans.
“If I lose the fight, it will break my heart. But God has and will set me on a path, and I’ll continue to follow that path wherever it leads me,” Troogstad told The Epoch Times.
