Paxton’s office joined the Florida-led brief headed for the Ninth Circuit.
QUICK FACTS:
- Attorney General Paxton has joined a Florida-led amicus brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco regarding vaccines for government workers.
- The brief supported Arizona’s efforts to overturn the vaccine requirement for federal contractors.
- The Biden Administration contends that the rule would preserve the U.S. labor market in their defense of the requirement.
- However, Texas and other states point out that it would likely have the opposite effect by making the existing national labor shortage worse.
FROM THE BRIEF:
- “[R]oughly two-thirds of the unvaccinated say they would quit their job in response to a vaccine mandate. Instead of addressing the alleged threat of temporary labor shortages caused by periodic sick leave, the mandate threatens contractors with mass terminations and resignations,” the brief states.
- “[T]he President did not possess credible evidence at the time he issued the Executive Order that increased vaccination among employees would meaningfully reduce COVID transmission—and that has only become more clear with respect to newer variants,” the brief states.
BACKGROUND:
- A federal court partially lifted the ban on the Biden administration’s COVID vaccine mandate for contractors in August of this year.
- The court found that a lower court went too far in blocking the vaccination requirements across the nation, but also predicted that a challenge to the mandate would likely succeed.
