COVID-19 vaccines are proven to be very safe and effective at preventing COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths. Plaintiffs sincerely held religious beliefs that their bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit and that they are to glorify God with their bodies lays the foundation for everything they do, consume, or inject into their bodies, according to the Florida lawsuit. Mike Barry:Well, I mean, thats the beauty of the way that the law works, right? "We are grateful for the support of the Legislature and the Governor in the State's efforts to block the . This whole thing is really unprecedented, right? The Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), it doesnt, the sincerity issue is what everybody seems to be concerned with, right? All the things that, you know, that the Navy was doing to harass and punish sailors we basically wanted that to all stop, Mike Berry, a former Marine judge advocate and now vice president at First Liberty Institute, which represents the Texas plaintiffs, told Military Times on Wednesday. The same day the Pentagon set the deadline for the services, several of the branches -- namely the Army and Air Force -- began issuing their guidance, which stated they would remove or correct adverse actions in records related to vaccine refusal. A federal judge in Cincinnati has expanded a temporary exemption to a Department of Defense COVID-19 vaccine mandate to cover thousands of service members in the U.S. Air Force and Space Force,. None of the plaintiffs clarify whether they engage in any other behavior that might be seen as a desecration of that temple, whether its alcohol, drugs, unprotected sex or in the case of the Old Testament tattoos and piercings. Army leadership has been eyeing the possibility of a mandated COVID-19 vaccine this summer, including in a June information paper originating from the Army's health care operations directorate . Her work has appeared in Air Force Magazine, Inside Defense, Inside Health Policy, the Frederick News-Post (Md. "Former Soldiers may petition the Army Discharge Review Board and the Army Board for Correction of Military Records to request corrections to their records," the service's press release said. Feb. 23, 2023. For a population accustomed to having very little power over their personal decisions where they live, what they wear, how they cut their hair, how much they weigh the opportunity to have some control over their medical decisions is an enormous discovery. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. FILE - Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin speaks during a briefing at the Pentagon in Washington, Nov. 16, 2022. Another lawsuit, first filed by troops attached to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, has led to temporary protections for around 10,000 active-duty, Active Reserve, reserve and National Guard members of the Air Force and Space Force who requested a religious exemption from the COVID vaccine, although only those who have been denied an exemption would face immediate action. WASHINGTON Two months after the Pentagon began requiring all troops to get the coronavirus vaccine or face dismissal, the vast majority have now had shots, in part because none . In December, the Air Force announced it had discharged 27 people for refusing to get the COVID . Court documents show that two plaintiffs in Doster v. Kendall took the two-dose Covaxin vaccine, created in India, to comply with the Pentagons requirement. The next stop in the litigation is likely to be an appeal by the Department of Defense and the Biden administration to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit. Starbucks, for example, doesnt have a vaccine requirement. So for example, in a different context, somebody who says that theyre a Sabbath observer, and they cannot work on the Sabbath, but that theyre willing to trade ships with somebody, most of the cases Ive seen, theyre actually willing to take, what most people consider be a less favorable shift. Mike Barry:No, I think what happens is they become much smaller cases, right? The Air Force has approved 135 religious exemption requests out of thousands submitted so far. A vaccine lawsuit is filed in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, instead of regular state or federal courts like other drug injury claims. The Marine Corps separated 165 Marines over the past week due to their refusal to get vaccinated against COVID-19. When you treat people who have a medical exemption for more favorably than you treat somebody who has a religious exemption, that is textbook discrimination, and thats whats happening. Theres been a lot of great saints that have gone to prison, so Im willing to do that.. Otherwise, the courts are going to be flooded with thousands of lawsuits, he said. Plaintiffs do not believe that staying true to their faith means exposing themselves or others to unnecessary risk, according to the filing. Thats really prohibited by the by the courts considering these types of cases. The military's COVID-19 vaccine was repealed after the National Defense Authorization Act passed and was signed into law this month. Tom Temin is host of the Federal Drive and has been providing insight on federal technology and management issues for more than 30 years. ", -- Konstantin Toropin contributed to this report. In the Navy, none of more than 4,000 religious exemptions had been approved, but there were about 252 temporary and 11 permanent medical exemptions. In one of many ongoing federal lawsuits challenging COVID-19 vaccine mandates across the country, Judge Reed O'Connor of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas issued a group . Mike Barry: Probably not at the Supreme Court level. The World Health Organization approved Covaxin for emergency use in late 2021, making it a viable option for airmen who object to the three main U.S. shots. The new policy guidance to the services makes no mention of reinstating service members who were separated from the military for refusing the shot. Other plaintiffs focus not on the abortion issue, but on several Bible passages that refer to the body as a temple. And yet they say, you know what, we now believe that its okay, for our employees to not be vaccinated, its okay for our customers to not be vaccinated. Assuming, maybe Im assuming too much. Were pleased that the court has acted to protect our brave warriors before more damage is done to our national security. The government has since filed a notice that it plans to appeal the decision. U.S. Military Service Members with Natural Immunity File Lawsuit over COVID Vaccine Mandate. Those records are supposed to be cleared by March 31, according to the guidance. The Pentagon directed all the services to "formally rescind any policies, directives, and guidance implementing those vaccination mandates as soon as possible, if they have not already done so," according to a Friday press release. 2:14:14 Pentagon exploring back pay for troops kicked out of military over vaccine mandate. Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine syringes at a vaccination clinic in the Peabody Institute Library in Peabody, Massachusetts, on Jan. 26, 2022. However, in a strange turn of events, while Bolsonaro was eating Mickey Mouse-shaped pancakes in Orlando, a group of Bolsonaristas (supporters of Bolsonaro) attacked the Brazilian Supreme Court, Congress, and Presidential Palace in Brasilia and called for a military coup.Lula blamed Bolsonaro personally for the attacks; Moraes quickly moved to suspend Brasilia's governor and security chief . Two Eglin Air Force base officers are among the plaintiffs in a federal lawsuit challenging the COVID-19 vaccine mandate for U.S. military personnel. Nov. 2, 2021. According to the First Liberty Institute, the public interest law firm representing the service members, each of the denials appeared to be identical, suggesting the Navy had not taken any of the religious exemption requests seriously. Ho and Judge Kyle Duncan noted that the administration had only reluctantly ended the military mandate after December congressional action, but Ross assured the panel that there are no plans to bring back the requirement. Well, what if somebodys not really sincere? Copyright 2023 Hubbard Radio Washington DC, LLC. Nor do they mention the host of common medications that also use these stem cells, including Tylenol, Advil/Motrin, aspirin, Tums, Pepto Bismol, Benadryl, Sudafed and Claritin. This disparity of treatment between medical and religious exemptions was constitutionally prohibited,Judge Reed OConnor said. But in terms of the underlying legal issues that are raised, no, theyre exactly the same. Additionally, "promotion records will be corrected by the [Department of the Air Force] who will remove or redact all adverse actions related to vaccine refusal," according to a Friday press release. So thats usually unwise, and so practitioners who are in front of the Supreme Court frequently like us, we usually know not to do that. The government has recently ordered imminent punitive action against those men and women of faith who cannot in good conscience take these experimental vaccines, and this order stops the government in its tracks, Adam Hochschild, a lawyer with the Thomas More Society and lead counsel in Air Force Officer v. Austin, said in a release. And to say, basically, no, you will do this because we said so and if you dont, were gonna kick you out. They become the exception and not the norm. The suit was initially filed by a group of Navy SEALs but later expanded to include all vaccine-refusing sailors. And they have different ranks, different different job responsibilities in the Air Force, a number of them are actually pilots in the Air Force. Read all Military Times coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic here, Tens of thousands of part-time soldiers face discharge for missing COVID vax deadline, Federal judge shields another unvaccinated airman from punishment, New vaccine may be option for troops with religious concerns, Bids to weaken military COVID vaccine mandate stall in Congress, Veterans Affairs drops mask requirement for all agency medical offices, Officials OK some hand and neck tattoos for airmen, Guardians, Perennial pilot shortage puts Air Force in precarious position, Healthy eating on a budget for busy military spouses, The impossible choice facing many of Americas military families, Tax scams How to report them Money Minute, Capitol Hill weighs action on two controversial topics: medical marijuana and abortion, Lockheed wins hypersonics contract | Defense Dollars, Go inside a secret nuclear fallout bunker sealed for decades, Another Air Force fleet grounded over fears plane tails may fall off, Pentagon orders engine vibration fix for entire F-35 fleet worldwide, Minot firings due to failed nuclear safety inspection, Air Force advisers study use of satellites for tracking moving targets. Religious freedom laws are set up to avoid a circumstance where the Navy, or the military or the government, is doing a faith test, to determine whether or not you really believe what youre supposed to believe, Griffin said. The problem here is that the government is simply unwilling to offer any compromises. The US military has approved religious exemptions to its Covid-19 vaccine mandate for 15 service members out of approximately 16,000 requests, according to the latest data from the services. Yes, many of them have brought that and its a rubber stamp rejection, he said. Staver, the attorney for the Florida plaintiffs, said his clients have shared their exemption rejection letters, which do not detail specifically why their requests werent approved. The Florida case, in a 187-page complaint, takes measures much further. Pope Francis has called vaccination against COVID-19 a moral obligation and an act of love., Frequently people let themselves be influenced by the ideology of the moment, often bolstered by baseless information or poorly documented facts, he said in January, adding that vaccines are not a magical means of healing, yet surely they represent, in addition to other treatments that need to be developed, the most reasonable solution for the prevention of the disease.. And now people will be able to take the analysis Supreme Court used and say, Okay, the way that they analyzed this issue, that might give us some indication of how they would analyze other issues, right. Everyone who joins the military must receive a slate of several vaccines to enter, including chickenpox, rubella and hepatitis A. While vials contain the same formula, some have made the argument that because providers are still giving the emergency-use Pfizer version, no one can be compelled to get vaccinated until the Comirnaty-labeled vials are in circulation. Both cases are in a wait-and-see phase, where judges have granted injunctions against any discipline for vaccine refusal while the government responds to requests for information. Although certain COVID-19 vaccines are associated with a slightly increased risk of blood clotting or heart inflammation, COVID-19 itself is associated with a higher rate of these and other conditions. The plaintiffs argue that violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the Theres yet another lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the militarys COVID-19 vaccine mandate. Austin ends the militarys COVID-19 vaccine mandate, Ex-soldier, a neo-Nazi, gets 45 years for plot to ambush his own unit, Issues with the Armys Europe-based equipment trigger readiness alarms, Veterans Affairs drops mask requirement for all agency medical offices, How the Marine Corps is preparing for era of contested logistics, Tax scams How to report them Money Minute, Capitol Hill weighs action on two controversial topics: medical marijuana and abortion, Lockheed wins hypersonics contract | Defense Dollars, Go inside a secret nuclear fallout bunker sealed for decades, Perennial pilot shortage puts Air Force in precarious position, Pentagon again denies helping Ukraine attack targets inside Russia. On Friday, President Joe Biden signed the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2023, which repeals the COVID-19 vaccine mandate for service members. And what if this is political ideology masquerading as as religious piety? In the Ohio case, 2nd Lt. Hunter Doster of Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and more than a dozen other plaintiffs argue the Air Force is forcing them to lose their livelihoods or violate their religious beliefs by receiving vaccines they say are impure or have ties to abortion. About 97% of the Department of the Air Force is fully vaccinated, though a larger share of active duty airmen and guardians have gotten the jab compared to their Guard and Reserve counterparts. And at least in the Starbucks is that Ive been in recently where theyve been packed in like sardines. Hey you have the Friday night shift, right? Right? There is no military exclusion from our Constitution. More than 60 service members have joined lawsuits against the U.S. government, alleging that the militarys process for awarding religious vaccine exemptions is a sham. Essentially, while the Marines applied for exemptions on religious grounds, they were already entitled to a much more straightforward administrative exemption for troops soon to leave service or not currently with their units, which is likely the reason they were approved. The fetal cells were not used to produce either vaccine, National Geographic reported last fall. The prospect of dishonorable discharges has been a concern for some against vaccine mandates, but that type of discharge can only be handed down through a court-martial conviction. The judge agreed, issuing an injunction against discipline for the sailors on Jan. 3. That means that this is quickly becoming a national security concern. NEW ORLEANS Federal appeals court judges closely questioned a Biden administration attorney Monday on the consequences military personnel might face for refusing COVID-19 vaccinations, even though Bidens vaccine mandate for military personnel has been rescinded. The Texas lawsuit argues that the Navy Department is blanketly denying all religious requests, making the process a sham. Troops who refuse mandatory COVID-19 vaccines will likely also face courts-martial for the same offense, said Zaid, who represented Task & Purpose in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit to force . Jared Serbu: Last thing, theres a lot of these vaccine cases, even just military vaccine cases floating around in various district courts and circuits the moment. So that, right now that number is several thousand. Similar suits have been brought throughout the country by service members across the military branches. The latest lawsuit challenging DoD's COVID-19 vaccine mandate says the Air Force's process makes religious accommodations almost impossible to get. But what we cant do is say, well, because they ruled this way, in this case, this is how theyre going to rule in all cases. The plaintiffs argue that violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the First Amendment. Lawyers are waiting to see if a federal court in Georgia will stop the vaccine mandate nationwide through another class-action preliminary injunction as well. On Monday, Heather Hacker, an attorney for the Navy personnel, said the situation could be seen as worse now for them now that the older mandate policy has been rescinded, because current policy does not provide for a sailors religious objections to the vaccine to be considered when deployment or assignment decisions are made. (The Daily Signal is the news outlet of The Heritage Foundation.). Each of those shots also involves cell tissue derived from fetuses, as does one version of the rabies vaccine. But nevertheless, how many, I fly almost on a weekly basis for my job. The Pentagon formally dropped the requirement in January following a December vote in Congress to end the mandate. The Navy lawsuit is one of several ongoing legal challenges to the military branches' policies on religious exemptions to the DoD COVID-19 vaccine mandate. On Jan. 10, the DOD officially rescinded its Aug. 24, 2021, and Nov. 30, 2021, memoranda mandating that all members of the U.S. military, including the National Guard and Ready Reserves, take the emergency use authorization COVID-19 shots or face discharge and other disciplinary measures. They argue that their. Is there any assurance on the record, that there will be no deployment decisions based on vaccination? Judge James Ho, one of three judges hearing the case asked Department of Justice lawyer Casen Ross. OConnormade note of thisin his order, calling the process for seeking a religious exemption nothing more than theater, stating that the Navy merely rubber-stamps each denial, and stressing that the record overwhelmingly demonstrates that the Navys religious-accommodation process is an exercise in futility.. Kevin Stitt has pushed back on the COVID-19 vaccine mandate for the military that would apply to the Oklahoma National Guard. Indeed, Defendants employed such measures during the prior year before COVID-19 vaccines were made widely available.. A group of lawsuit plaintiffs, including four Air Force officers and a Secret Service agent, have asked a federal court to block the Biden administration's coronavirus vaccination mandates,. Another claimant, a Muslim Marine Corps captain, who said that his religious beliefs that require him to abstain from participation in that which is haram forbidden including the destruction and commoditization of innocent human life as exemplified by the use of human fetal cell lines derived from abortions, according to the lawsuit. Earlier in the case: Eglin AFB officers part of federal court challenge to military vaccine mandate Related:Motion to halt military COVID-19 vaccine mandate fails; federal trial date set The 18 . If the court certifies the class does the class become all unvaccinated airmen or everyone whos been denied a religious exemption? More than 1.14 million out of the 1.4 million active military members have been fully vaccinated as of Wednesday, according to DoD data. "This guidance is a promise of what the Air Force is saying it will do," Bruns told Military.com. US Military To Face COVID-19 Vaccine Lawsuit February 18, 2023. I think one of the militarys concerns is whats the limiting principle here? (U.S. Navy) Two service members filed a class action lawsuit against Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to halt a mandate that all troops receive the coronavirus vaccine and create an exemption. More than 1 million Americans have died from COVID-19 since the virus began spreading in December 2019, and the U.S. has recorded around 89 million cases. Mike Berry, general counsel for First Liberty Institute,said: Forcing a service member to choose between their faith and serving their country is abhorrent to the Constitution and Americas values . And yet were short, were saying that were having a hard time recruiting people. Just because of the just incredibly political nature of, of all of it, from the virus to the vaccine to the mandates, Marshall Griffin, a retired Coast Guard judge advocate who now practices privately, told Military Times on Monday. Theyre burdensome, but the person says, But you know what, at the end of the day, Im not have to inject something in my body that violates my religious beliefs. Only the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is manufactured using fetal cell lines. Military leaders have long argued that to maintain unit health and troop readiness, troops have for decades been required to get as many as 17 vaccines, particularly those who are deploying overseas. A dozen U.S. Air Force officers have filed a lawsuit . The U.S . In late August, Pfizers vaccine received full approval under the brand name Comirnaty. We are hemorrhaging people like crazy, and were having a really hard time recruiting capable people to join our military. 2:41 . Meghann Myers is the Pentagon bureau chief at Military Times. VICP provides compensation for injuries and deaths caused by The lawsuit also fails to mention an established precedent regarding vaccines in religious traditions. He spoke with a reporter last Wednesday but did . Its really the same thing in the military context with this vaccine, where theyre saying, Look, teleworking or, doing a lot of these other measures, right, social distancing, masking, testing, whatever the case might be. Staver believes the Florida case case has a good chance of making it to the Supreme Court, potentially invalidating all government mandates for COVID-19 vaccination. In a hypothetical alternate universe where it were the Navy and the Air Force, the rest of the services had an exemption process or a waiver process that did look more credible to you and to the court, do you lose these cases? Military service members have. More:Dark money group targets Oklahoma Gov. The vaccine mandate for military personnel was put in place in August, with a deadline of Sept. 15. Dr Terry Adirim, the government bureaucrat behind the infamous and unlawful Pentagon vaccine mandate, will "leave her post in the coming days," reports FedScoop. 11. The lawsuit emerges as the latest development in an ongoing fight between state leaders and the federal government as Gov. The latest data from the military show that roughly 30,000 active-duty service members remain unvaccinated against COVID-19, despite a Defense Department mandate issued in August and deadlines. President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. condemned the mid-morning attack. Why is the DoD ignoring natural immunity when the CDC and other epidemiologists and medical experts have all generally agreed natural immunity is a real thing. The service branches must notify the Pentagon that they've made the changes no later than March 17. Mike Barry:Well, First Liberty Institute represents nine Air Force members who are challenging the Air Forces enforcement of its vaccine mandate. Rachel Cohen joined Air Force Times as senior reporter in March 2021. All of the military services have released vaccine refusal policies, none of them involving judicial or non-judicial charges for simply staying unvaccinated. A ruling in that case, issued this past November by the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, upheld previous wins by attorneys representing the service members over the last year and took aim at the Air Force's process of approving religious exemptions. Were going from a 50-step process to a zero-step process? Duncan asked. The Air Force Department had received more than 12,000 religious exemption requests, denying over 3,000 of them and with roughly 2,000 still in adjudication. Still, the organization said Covaxin is still a safe and effective product. What the government will have to prove, in both cases, is that while its granted thousands of medical and administrative exemptions though many of those are temporary that the high bar for approval of religious exemptions is necessary for keeping the force healthy and deployable. It is not yet clear how the various services will handle pending lawsuits that sprang up in the years following the Pentagon's COVID-19 vaccine mandate. The Marine Corps confirmed to a California congressman that two of those Marines were preparing to leave the service, while another one is doing a Training With Industry assignment. While the Jan. 3 victory applies only to the named naval personnel in the lawsuit and not to the entire vaccine mandate issued by the Department of Defense, for religious freedom advocates and faithful Americans, the victory is a breath of fresh air and a much-needed reminder that individuals who have selflessly committed themselves to the defense of the Constitution and its enshrined liberties are sometimes the very people whose rights need defending the most. Researchers cultivate these cells for generations, using their derivatives to create or test all manner of pharmaceutical products. Mike Barry: I think theres almost 30 now. Our military, I mean, you can open any news feed that you want. Follow him on Twitter @TomNovelly. Members face the same injury: violation of their constitutional freedom by defendants clear policy of discrimination against religious accommodation requests, wrote McFarland, of the U.S. District Court of the Southern District of Ohio. Other service members have struck out on their own to fight the mandate. The mandate treats comparable secular activity (e.g., medical exemptions) more favorably than religious activity. The Navy already denied these exemptions, but O'Connor. So our lawsuit is really predicated on on the argument that this is all a sham, that the Air Force is not following the Constitution.
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