Posted on 09/23/2021 7:59:13 PM PDT by lightman
The Biden administration’s threat of a vaccine mandate – which happened two weeks ago now – was likely a shock to many of the 100 million American workers who will be immediately impacted, but the waiting, while the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) develops the requisite rules, is, as they say, the hardest part.
While employees in the private and government sectors anxiously await word on exactly how they might be punished if they are hesitant to have vaccines with dubious effectiveness injected into their bodies, state legislators, small business advocates, health care workers, unions, and even Black Lives Matter, have begun to push back.
In short: there are already lawsuits galore with more waiting in the wings the minute OSHA hands down its rules. OSHA, it appears, is aware of the legal landscape and is crafting rules that are meant to withstand challenges like the one Job Creators Network, a small business advocacy group, told Townhall they will file the minute the rules are released.
Elaine Parker, President of the Job Creators Network Foundation (JCNF), said in a statement last week the organization has created the JCNF Legal Action Fund to “defend small businesses from attacks that hurt their ability to succeed…President Biden’s small business vaccine mandate is a great example of where the JCNF Legal Action Fund can make a meaningful difference in successfully defending small businesses.”
Parker told Townhall the Biden administration has crafted disingenuous messaging surrounding the vaccine mandate meant to appeal to average Americans by making it sound like larger businesses will be the ones primarily affected.
“But the reality is this is about businesses with 100 or more employees and remember: The Small Business Administration defines a small business as one that has under 500 employees,” Parker said. “Can the federal government force businesses to carry out a national vaccine mandate for them? The burden (of answering that question) is going to fall on small businesses.”
Parker’s group is hardly alone in their intention to fight the mandate in court. So far, 24 states are threatening legal action, while other lawsuits have come from students at universities, state trooper unions, firefighters, teachers, and health care workers, among others. The last in that list has some legal scholars noticing the judge’s decision in a New York case, in which plaintiffs are arguing for a religious exemption, has some merit.
Governments must abide by the U.S. Constitution’s safeguards for the free exercise of religion, something that doesn’t apply to companies in the private sector, legal observers said. The U.S. Supreme Court raised the bar on those protections with rulings on pandemic restrictions on crowd levels in houses of worship.
Depending on how it’s written, the OSHA rule also could draw allegations from workers—or closely held corporations with religious ownership—that it violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, said Nathan Chapman, a law professor at the University of Georgia who focuses on religion. That law allowed a company to deny its workers the Affordable Care Act’s health coverage for contraception based on the religious objections of the employer’s owners, the Supreme Court said in its 2014 decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby.
Meanwhile OSHA watches and waits, recognizing whatever final rules they write must address the potential legal challenges now being floated. One potential limiting principle is that OSHA must start with the idea that COVID-19 presents a “grave danger” in the workplace.
OSHA has been working quietly behind the scenes on an emergency temporary standard that can stand up to legal challenges. Their strongest position will be establishing the need for a mandate to protect employees against the "grave danger" of COVID-19.
"OSHA is very aware this is something that's being looked at with tremendous scrutiny," said Helen Rella, an employment attorney with Wilk Auslander. The more clearly the agency is able to articulate the dangers of COVID and provide detailed steps to mitigate it, the stronger its position against constitutional challenges.
"They are going to anticipate ... challenges and they want to head that off at the pass," Rella said, predicting the final emergency temporary standard will be very detailed.
Those fighting the OSHA rules may also come armed with growing evidence that the current vaccines may reduce transmission but do not prevent infection, dramatically reducing the potential efficacy of mandates.
Either way, Parker says her group is focused on what they see as a war on small business rather than a war on the virus.
“[The Biden administration] can't control [small businesses]; they can't corral them; they can't bully them,” Parker says. “We are rallying small business owners once again to push back on all these terrible policies that are coming after them.”
Just petition the Supreme Court for a stay and relief. Stop colonizing federal agencies with vaccine police. You’ll never be able to extricate them once they start.
“ Their strongest position will be establishing the need for a mandate to protect employees against the “grave danger” of COVID-19.”
A virus with a 99.8% chance of survival is a “grave danger?” I would laugh, but from what we have seen, the courts will uphold that.
Sans Vasoline...
Perhaps some former seals can assist with the installation of random pairs of cement shoes. Who knows? Fed Justice is peoccupied with perversion anymore.
If they can get enough Vax Pimps to troll the threads on places like Free Republic, it will make it a lot easier.
>If they can get enough Vax Pimps to troll the threads on places like Free Republic, it will make it a lot easier.<
Exactly.
Dear OSHA:
I am shocked, shocked, that you would continue to subject employees to Covid infection dangers from customers.
If employees are to be protected from unvaccinated employees, it seems prudent to protect employees from the far greater danger of unvaccinated customers.
Dear OSHA:
The workers at a 20-person restaurant face a far greater risk of Covid infection than the three workers of a drive-up only branch of a large bank with say 2,000 employees.
Your cutoff of 100 employees is totally arbitrary and has no logical basis .
Dear OSHA:
Your desire to “keep everyone safe” from a disease that is 99.5% survivable (albeit with some age and largely preventable comorbidity caveats) is totally DELUSIONAL!
“every employer covered under the Act
furnish to his employees
employment and a place of employment
which are free from recognized hazards
that are causing or are likely to cause
death or serious physical harm to his employees.”
https://www.osha.gov/laws-regs/oshact/section5-duties
Dear OSHA:
The Covid vaccines are the most dangerous vaccines commonly available to the American public.
To fundamentally condition continued employment on the physically intrusive injection of products that are far from being “free from recognized hazards
that are causing or are likely to cause
death or serious physical harm” to the employees OSHA intends to coerce flies directly in the face of the statutory mandate of Congress to OSHA.
Fixed it.
I am a pro-vax person, however Congress has set the high standard of “free from recognized hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm” and Joe Biden and OSHA have no legal authority to coerce employers to violate Congressional legislation.
+1
I CHOSE to get vaccinated....my CHOICE.
If the vaccination is even half of what it is claimed to be I really don’t give a rat’s rump whether anyone else is vaccinated or unvaccinated, masked or unmasked, coughing or calm, close or distant!
I am pro VOLUNTARY vax.
I am barely tolerant VOLUNTARY mask.
I am anti MANDATORY vax.
I am vehemently anti MANDATORY mask.
How does OSHA deal with manufacturers that remove guards over belts, shears and saws while painting all of the machines grey in reaction to demands for responsibility for liabilities? How does OSHA deal with companies that allow old buildings to become flooded during storms, causing welders and grinders to be electrocuted? Granted, those companies have retaliated by moving many manufacturing operations to China and maintaining large lobbies to get away with it.
“A virus with a 99.8% chance of survival is a ‘grave danger’?”
If one looks at the language:
grave danger -> danger that can cause someone to wind up in a grave
(even a danger that stands a .2% chance of putting someone in a grave is a ‘grave’ danger.)
[Note: Since so many have already died, the risk is now far less.]
serious danger -> danger that is associated with blood loss.
I like to use language in a rather strict manner. I find my local school district’s policy of frowning on student dictionary use highly objectionable.
Dear OSHA, Pack sand. a worker.
THIS should help!
QUESTION: WHY THE HELL DOES A RUSSIAN DOCTOR HAVE TO TELL US THIS??
2 MINUTE VIDEO
https://www.bitchute.com/video/pqJhacfeW6nJ/
From the article:
“Those fighting the OSHA rules may also come armed with growing evidence that the current vaccines may reduce transmission but do not prevent infection, dramatically reducing the potential efficacy of mandates.”
Good points.
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