Judge stops federal COVID-19 vaccine mandate in Medicare, Medicaid facilities in 10 states

By Joe Mueller | The Center Square

U.S. District Judge Matthew T. Schelp on Monday ordered a preliminary injunction against the Biden Administration, stopping mandated COVID-19 vaccinations for health care workers in Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) facilities.

“Because it is evident CMS significantly understates the burden that its mandate would impose on the ability of healthcare facilities to provide proper care, and thus, save lives, the public has an interest in maintaining the ‘status quo’ while the merits of the case are determined,” Schelp wrote in a 32-page memorandum and order in the U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Missouri.

Agência Brasília

“The truth is COVID is with us and there is always going to be a variant,” Missouri Republican Attorney General Eric Schmitt said. “But I think the people have had enough of the government locking people down. They have had enough of government instituting mask mandates and vaccine mandates.”

Missouri Republican Attorney General Eric Schmitt led a 10-state coalition filing the lawsuit on Nov. 5 to stop the CMS vaccine mandate. On the courthouse steps in St. Louis, Schmitt, a candidate for the seat of retiring Republican U.S. Senator Roy Blunt, stated many will benefit from the ruling.

“This is a significant ruling and the first of its kind in the country,” Schmitt told reporters. “What the court said today was CMS and the Biden administration has no statutory authority to do this, none whatsoever.”

Starting in late October, Schmitt led coalitions of states in filing three lawsuits against federal vaccine mandates – for federal contractors and federally contracted employees, for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s mandate on private employers with 100 or more employees, and CMS.

The Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans blocked the private-sector OSHA mandate earlier this month.

Schmitt said Monday’s ruling will help all Missourians and all served in CMS facilities.

“Our office may have led the charge on this, but it is the health care workers in Missouri and across the country, it’s the rural hospitals here and elsewhere facing certain collapse due to this mandate, and it’s the patients of those hospitals who are the real winners today,” Schmitt said.

Judge Schelp stated five times in the ruling that it’s likely Schmitt and the coalition will ultimately succeed if the ruling is appealed. The ruling only applies to the 10 states in the lawsuit — Alaska, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming.

“I would expect this to be appealed and I would expect this to go all of the way to the Supreme Court,” Schmitt said. “But the fact is we won.”

The ruling stated CMS lacked clear authorization from Congress to mandate the COVID-19 vaccine. Currently, CMS doesn’t require any vaccinations for health care workers.

“CMS failed to adequately explain its contradiction to its long-standing practice of encouraging rather than forcing — by governmental mandate — vaccination,” Schelp wrote. “For years, CMS has promulgated regulations setting the conditions for Medicare and Medicaid participation; never has it required any vaccine for covered facilities’ employees – despite concerns over other illnesses and their corresponding low vaccination rates.”

Schelp also stated CMS violated its own regulations by not accepting comments on policies.

“Moreover, the failure to take and respond to comments feeds into the very vaccine hesitancy CMS acknowledges is so daunting,” Schelp wrote.

Schelp highlighted the vaccine mandate’s negative impact on staffing at rural hospitals.

“As an example, for a general hospital located in North Platte, Nebraska, implementation of the mandate would result in the loss of the only remaining anesthesiologist,” Schelp wrote. “Understandably, without an anesthesiologist, there could be no surgeries – at all. Thus, such a loss irreparably causes a cascading effect on the entire facility and a wide range of patients. Other examples show the mandate’s far-reaching implications not just on the administration of health care itself, but the functioning of the facilities in general.”

Schmitt said the virus will always be present and the federal government needs to understand citizens and their rights.

“The truth is COVID is with us and there is always going to be a variant,” Schmitt said. “But I think the people have had enough of the government locking people down. They have had enough of government instituting mask mandates and vaccine mandates. Every time there’s an overreach, we’re going to push back.”

Bureaucrats who have never driven the back roads of Missouri or visited its rural hospitals have no idea of the effects of the vaccine mandate, Schmitt said.

“Here in flyover country, we’ve had enough and we’re going to fight back every single time they try to take our freedoms away,” Schmitt said.

Image courtesy of Agência Brasília

5 thoughts on “Judge stops federal COVID-19 vaccine mandate in Medicare, Medicaid facilities in 10 states

  1. If ONLY there WERE such a thing as viruses.
    The biggest hoax in human history.
    Pasteur lied, and on his deathbed confessed: I could never isolate a virus.
    CDC was FOIA’s for any – ANY- documentation of viruses having been isolated – EVER – and the CDC…amazingly…couldn’t find any proof viruses exist.
    Ignoring the elephant in the room is killing us, literally.

    Downloadable pdfs of CDC’s response, here:
    [https://www.drrobertyoung.com/post/cdc-now-admits-no-gold-standard-for-the-isolation-for-any-virus?utm_campaign=f8770c4c-3960-482b-b501-0f396eaf0a95&utm_source=so&utm_medium=mail&cid=1b0777ee-9848-47d7-97ac-8be31759b442]

  2. This is a very good start. Federal circuit judges deciding and citing Constitutional Law, time for bulldog attorneys worth their salt to load the Vermont dockets full to the brim with lawsuits! We the people can bring an avalanche of lawsuits upon every business, every Local, State, and Federal fascist who has pushed unconstitutional mandates upon the people. Any mandate must have evidence to justify violating the law of the land – the Truth is they don’t have any evidence to support – game over! We can end this now and they know it.

  3. Great news but where’s our incompetent AG little tj on the suit????
    Apparently he’s for nazi government overreach suppressing our freedoms and rights.
    I’m not sure if this will save my job at the medical center but I’m ready to be fired
    if that’s what they want to do over the illegal mandate.. As Jim said below the gov
    isn’t looking at any other methods to control the covid curd only the failed jab
    that’s increasing strains and not saving you from getting, spreading, dying from the
    crud… The jab has now killed 108 athletes out of 183 that have had heart reactions to the boosters and jabs.. it’s not coincidence and they had no heart problems before… wake up people

  4. There’s no need for vaccine mandates. Due to disinformation (that is, deliberate misinformation) regarding preventative treatments for Covid-19, all promising, cheap, safe treatments have been suppressed. Even melatonin, a cheap over-the-counter hormone and antioxidant, has shown great promise; in a recent study vitamin D has been shown to be efficacious against Covid with data measuring D levels before and after Covid (demonstrating that low vitamin D isn’t the result of Covid infection, as has been surmised by naysayers, but is instead correlated with high Covid hospitalization rates.) https://c19early.com/ Where is Dr. Fauci, here to protect public health? Where is the Vermont DOH, supposedly here to guide Vermonters through Covid? Is everyone is bed with pharma and the huge $$$ from vaccines and these new and expensive “miracle” drugs?

    We’re told that we’re in a potential crisis because of high Covid hospitalizations. There are 1295 hospital beds in Vermont and only 84 are occupied by Covid patients (data from data.rgd [dot]com,) which, if the authorities would promote early treatment, would likely not be there. It’s very simple: for those who don’t want the jab, they should be encouraged to take safe, effective medications against Covid-19. It’s a mystery why this is so hard. These medications/vitamins are remarkably cheap and remarkably safe, and the science and data– which we’re told the authorities are worshiping– are clearly on the side of their use. It must be that they mean only the science and only the data that big pharma wants to present to us, and if that’s the case, then they should come out and say it: we’re following the science and data approved by the pharmaceutical industry, which in the past has shown no compunction at all about lying to us. Please, just spill the beans and say it and get it over with and stop pretending you’re being objective about this. We already know this is one huge bag of BS and you’ll feel a lot better getting it out in the open.

    A recent article in the Atlantic magazine wants to gaslight us. It tells us that hospitals are facing shortages because nurses and doctors are burnt out over Covid and hospital treatment of workers: that’s why there’s a shortage, not because mandates are forcing personnel out. Is anyone in the mainstream telling the truth about anything? I used to work on a farm but I never encountered such manure as they’re trying to shovel on us now. Maybe they figure if they pile it on deep enough, they can bury us?

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