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. Military officials announced this week that, after months of warnings, they have . The lawsuits dont mention other vaccines these troops received either in their childhoods or during service the chicken pox, rubella and hepatitis A vaccines are all required that used descendent fetal cells in development. Trident Order #12 also implemented the COVID-19 vaccine mandate at the command level for Naval Special Warfare forces, setting a deadline of compliance for October 17, 2021," the SEALs' legal team . Only the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is manufactured using fetal cell lines. Lawmakers expressed frustration with the news . 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. 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. They include the small risk of myocarditis, which has anecdotally occurred in 1,626 U.S. residents out of more than 200 million fully vaccinated, with the highest risk in men under 24. And is there somewhere else we can assign them where maybe theyre at less risk of of COVID transmission or they start looking at the data, right, the actual CDC data and the COVID day they start look kicking it around and saying, You know what? 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. When I meet my maker, Im going to be held responsible for the decisions Ive made, and Id much rather go to prison, Stapanon testified in March. It is a danger of, you know, the government saying, Well, hey, heres what your faith tradition teaches, you should follow that, " Griffin said. They are, theyre ignoring the law, theyre ignoring the Constitution. 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 . FILE - Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin speaks during a briefing at the Pentagon in Washington, Nov. 16, 2022. The Florida case began with a Navy and Marine Corps officer in 2021, but has soon ballooned to 36 plaintiffs from all military branches as well as some civilian Defense Department employees. Through much prayer and reflection, Plaintiffs have sought wisdom, understanding, and guidance on the proper decisions to make concerning these COVID-19 vaccines, and Plaintiffs have been convicted by the Holy Spirit that accepting any of the three currently available vaccines is against the teachings of Scripture and would be a sin, according to a Florida lawsuit first filed in late 2021, then amended on Feb. 7 with additional plaintiffs. The three coronavirus vaccines currently available in the United Statesthe Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, and, as of Saturday, the Johnson & Johnson versionsare approved on "emergency use. Those records are supposed to be cleared by March 31, according to the guidance. The service members sued this week to vacate a Pentagon vaccine mandate for all those in the military, arguing they face imminent harm if a court order isn't issued temporarily blocking the. And yet were short, were saying that were having a hard time recruiting people. Underthat law, the government may substantially burden a persons exercise of religion only if it demonstrates that burden is (1) in furtherance of a compelling governmental interest; and (2) is the least restrictive means of furthering that interest. They argue that their 1st Amendment rights are being infringed upon, because their sincerely held religious beliefs prevent them from receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. U.S. Military Service Members with Natural Immunity File Lawsuit over COVID Vaccine Mandate. I think one of the militarys concerns is whats the limiting principle here? Editors note: This story has been updated with information from the hearing. All 16 service members joined the lawsuit anonymously, listing in the filing only their currently assigned bases and statuses in the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, or reserve components. Right? And in one instance, I saw one of the head people for recruiting in the military said, Were having a really hard time identifying, basically people who are eligible to serve in the military. 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. 11. But although the Air Force has approved hundreds of medical and administrative exemptions, they have only approved a very small handful of religious exemptions and even the ones that theyve approved by their own admission, they are only for Air Force members who are basically already separating or are already on their way out. And so all of them have requested religious accommodations from the vaccine mandate, which is, of course, something that DoD regulations and even federal law, clearly permit and allow. Of course, that came because of a federal judges ruling. Jared Serbu: Got it. The lawsuit emerges as the latest development in an ongoing fight between state leaders and the federal government as Gov. Our lawsuit is certainly centered on religious exemption, but our lawsuit is broader than that to block the mandate in general of a non-FDA approved product, Staver said. Feb. 23, 2023. Jared Serbu: Yeah, theres a ton. The vaccine mandate for military personnel was put in place in August, with a deadline of Sept. 15. The Pentagon has not provided any public updates or said when the formal policy will be issued. But in terms of the underlying legal issues that are raised, no, theyre exactly the same. More than 8,400 troops were forced out of the military for refusing to obey a lawful order when they declined to get the vaccine. Any sailors who submitted a religious exemption for the COVID-19 vaccine can continue in the Navy under the injunction, according to NAVADMIN 102/22. 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 complaint also brings up the issue of Food and Drug Administration licensure. Three of the event's witnesses doctors Jay Bhattacharya, Martin Kulldorf, and Marty Makary are part of a small group of medical experts known as the Norfolk Group. It took four years and was licensed in 1967. Mike Barry:No, really, I mean, this is happening across the entire Department of Defense. Attorneys for the unvaccinated Navy personnel argued in briefs to the 5th Circuit that Austins memo and other Defense Department actions show that the Navy still intends to treat unvaccinated personnel like second-class citizens because of their religious beliefs.. Their lawyers have called a sham with applications being categorically denied., The Defense Department denied the process was onerous and said the Navy has a compelling interest in requiring vaccinations for personnel who often operate for long periods in confined spaces that are ripe breeding grounds for respiratory illnesses.. They have similar objections to their Texas counterparts, from opposition to abortion to concerns about modifying their bodies. Punishing SEALs for simply asking for a religious accommodation is purely vindictive and punitive. (Susan Walsh/AP, File). In January of last year, a federal judge in Texas barred the Navy from taking any action against the Navy plaintiffs for being unvaccinated. Each week, Defense Reporter Jared Serbu speaks with the managers of the federal government's largest department. The military's COVID-19 vaccine was repealed after the National Defense Authorization Act passed and was signed into law this month. Given the prevailing public health guidelines and the state of the virus, there is currently no intention to require universal vaccination of all service members, Ross said. The Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines do not need fetal cell lines for development or production but were tested on fetal cell lines replicated from a fetus aborted in the 1970s to ensure their efficacy. OConnor ruled that the blanket denial of their religious waiver requests amounted to a violation of the service members rights under the First Amendment andthe Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The lawsuit filed by Air Force members and other federal employees claims that "the US Constitution and numerous federal laws make it unlawful to compel persons to be vaccinated." The plaintiffs. Pfizer Inc wants to intervene in a Texas federal lawsuit seeking information from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration used in licensing the company's COVID-19 vaccine, a litigation move that . At 1,038, the Marine Corps leads the military branches for the most separations. 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,. More than 800 unvaccinated service members have been ousted from the Air Force so far. The new policy guidance to the services makes no mention of reinstating service members who were separated from the military for refusing the shot. And then if you come back and you say, oh, no, but my exemption is a medical exemption [see Contraindications and Precautions]not a religious exemption, then the military says, Oh, well, in that case, we welcome you with open arms. This disparity of treatment between medical and religious exemptions was constitutionally prohibited,Judge Reed OConnor said. The Supreme Court ruled in March 2022 that the sea service was allowed to reassign sailors who had refused the shot and filed exemption requests to nonoperational commands. For the Texas case, its more likely those sailors will receive religious exemptions, but that they wont necessarily change the way the military mandates vaccines or reviews exemptions. The free exercise of religion, even in the military, it triggers the strongest protection available in the law.. The policy does allow commanders to "implement Health Protection Measures at any time or manner deemed necessary in support of operational safety and effectiveness." ", -- Konstantin Toropin contributed to this report. Theres a case to be made for turning these lawsuits into class action matters, Staver said, so that individual service members dont have to sue or just another case. All of the military services are currently reworking their policies to adjust separation and promotion records for service members who refused to get the COVID-19 vaccine, after the Pentagon ended the inoculation mandate last month. The Navy granted another 500 administrative exemptions, including temporary waivers for sailors planning to leave the service or in the middle of a permanent change-of-station move, for example. However, vaccine opponents note that commanders can still make decisions on how and whether to deploy unvaccinated troops, under a memo signed last month by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. Already, a soldier and Marine have filed a lawsuit arguing that service members who have already recovered from COVID-19 and therefore have natural immunity should be exempt from vaccine mandates, according to the Army Times. Circuit Court of Appeals panel that federal court injunctions against the mandate are still needed, in part because decisions on deployments and assignments can still be made based on vaccination status. msn back to msn home news Skip To Navigation Most of the plaintiffs express some sort of Christian faith, though the vast majority of denominations have no formal ban on vaccination. The NAVADMIN, referencing the injunction, prevents adverse action against sailors who will not get the COVID-19 vaccine and submitted a religious exemptions request. . In the filing, attorneys argue that the plaintiffs are facing criminal conviction and dishonorable discharge, which would strip them of any veterans benefits. In fact, as of Dec. 17, the religious accommodation requests of at least 29 of the 35 naval plaintiffs had been flatly denied. The number of exemptions has fluctuated over the last several months as some people decided to get the shots or leave the service instead of seeking accommodation. Biden appointee behind unlawful military vaccine mandate to step down. 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. So that, right now that number is several thousand. [Many] didnt even know that there was a religious exemption option, because they had never been informed of it, Staver said. And theyre discriminating against people in the military. "There are no current COVID-19 vaccine restrictions on deployments or assignments for the Marine Corps as a service," Capt. 2:41 . While in Texas, the sailors offered descriptions of their jobs, in Florida, the biographical information goes into training, deployments and expertise, attempting to make the case that their involuntary discharges would be a huge loss. CBC News reached out multiple times to Galati, who is listed as the spokesperson for the lawsuit in a press release issued by Vaccine Choice Canada. 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. "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. 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. Mike Barry:Well, I mean, thats the beauty of the way that the law works, right? New family, former Corvias employee join lawsuit against Fort . The Heritage Foundation, a petitioner in the case challenging the private-sector vaccine mandate,has asked the courtto invalidate the governments order. A federal appellate judge has dealt another blow to the military's coronavirus vaccine mandate by allowing a high-profile class-action lawsuit against the Air Force to move forward. Dr. Lee Merritt, a self-described Navy surgeon, stated during an . Johnson & Johnson uses cells replicated from a fetus aborted in 1985 to produce its vaccine, but those cells are filtered out from the final product. As of Tuesday, the Air Force had denied about 6,800 initial religious waiver requests and 3,600 appeals, and has not ruled on nearly 3,500 more cases. I think that a process that is not a sham looks a little bit something like the military regardless of what branch were talking about, takes an honest look and says okay, what is this persons job or their function?

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