Supreme Court Issues Two Vaccine Mandate Rulings in January 2022
The U.S. Supreme Court, ruling primary on the power of the federal government to impose vaccine mandates upon U.S. workplaces, ruled on January 13, 2022, in two linked cases that the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services could proceed with vaccine mandates for U.S. healthcare workers, but wider mandates could not be imposed via federal authority over U.S. workplaces without further Congressional authorization.
In the end, this does not prevent private sector employers from imposing their own vaccine policies if they so choose. Further, these rulings do not control state-level vaccine rules and regulations, including mandates.
The U.S. E.E.O.C. has issued guidance on these policies under existing discrimination laws. My article on the EEOC guidance is linked here.
In the above decision, Biden v. Missouri, the Supreme Court upheld the federal goverment's more narrowly tailored imposition on healthcare workplaces. In Nat. Fed. of Indep. Businesses v. Dept. of Labor, the U.S. Supreme Court held that OSHA, the workplace safety division of the U.S. Dept. of Labor, could not generally impose a vaccine requirement on larger-sized U.S. workplaces without more specific linking of the vaccine mandate to industry and/or workplace specific hazards faced.
This is a very brief summary of the above legal opinions.
The U.S. E.E.O.C. has issued guidance on these policies under existing discrimination laws. My article on the EEOC guidance is linked here.
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Mosson Law, LLC