5th Circuit ruling affirms injunction against COVID-19 vaccination mandate for federal workers

A federal appeals court has affirmed a lower court’s decision to block the Biden administration’s COVID-19 vaccination requirement for federal workers, finding that the administration had overstepped its authority.

The full New Orleans-based Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals on March 24 sided with plaintiff Feds for Medical Freedom,  a group of 8,500 federal workers who opposed the executive order on mandatory vaccinations and any effort to disclose their vaccine status. The courts have jurisdiction over pre-enforcement challenges involving the vaccine mandate, the appeals court said.

“The ruling agreed that the Biden administration lacked authority (through the U.S. Constitution or the Administrative Procedure Act) to issue the vaccine mandate in September 2021 for all federal employees,” Feds for Medical Freedom said in response to the ruling.

“… It should be noted that federal employees and contractors who have exercised their right to refuse vaccination have been subjected to workplace harassment, ridicule, demotion and termination,” Feds for Medical Freedom President Marcus Thornton said in a prepared statement. “The court’s ruling … demonstrates that treatment was not only unprofessional and immoral, but premised on an illegal executive order, as well.”