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A federal judge on Tuesday temporarily halted the Biden administration’s vaccine requirement for federal contractors nationwide in the latest blow to the government’s vaccine mandates.
The administration’s vaccine rule, which was one of the first to be announced earlier this year and applies to employees of contractors that do business with the federal government, sets a deadline for workers to be fully vaccinated by Jan. 18.
But the Georgia judge’s preliminary injunction Tuesday, which builds on a ruling from another court that halted the requirement across three states last week, blocks the administration’s enforcement of the vaccine requirement.
Cartoons on the Coronavirus
“The reason that we proposed these requirements is that we know they work and we are confident in our ability legally to make these happen across the country,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Tuesday during a briefing.
The decision from a judge appointed by former-President Donald Trump marks the latest setback to Biden’s vaccine rules, which have faced a multitude of legal challenges in recent weeks. Last month, in what was among the largest blows to the administration’s vaccine requirement effort, a panel of judges at a federal appeals court temporarily blocked the Biden administration’s rule for workers at large companies, citing “cause to believe there are grave statutory and constitutional issues with the Mandate.” And while the case has been assigned to a different court for further review, the government has suspended enforcement of the rule for the time being.
New York City on Monday took a vaccine mandate for private companies into its own hands, as the federal vaccine mandate stalls in court, even going a step farther than the Biden administration’s vaccine rule for large private companies by requiring all private employers to mandate vaccinations for workers by Dec. 27 across roughly 184,000 businesses in the city.
“New York City will not give a single inch in the fight against COVID-19,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a statement. “Vaccination is the way out of this pandemic, and these are bold, first-in-the-nation measures to encourage New Yorkers to keep themselves and their communities safe.”