Biden’s vaccination mandate for government employees is maintained

A federal appeals court on Thursday upheld President Biden’s mandate to vaccinate all U.S. government employees against COVID-19.

The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans overturned a lower court’s ruling, saying Biden’s September mandate requiring federal employees and contractors to be stabbed was legal.

Trump-appointed US District Judge Jeffrey Brown ruled in January that Biden’s executive order exceeded his authority. His ruling came after the Supreme Court overturned a Biden order that required workers at large private companies to be vaccinated or tested regularly.

The Supreme Court allowed the federal government to mandate vaccinations for most healthcare workers as the Omicron variant of the coronavirus surged across the country.

White House attorneys successfully argued that the president has the same authority as a private company CEO to impose vaccination guidelines on federal employees, pointing out that a dozen other federal judges declined to overturn Biden’s order before Brown issued a statewide injunction .

The Biden administration said 98 percent of federal employees had either been vaccinated or had requested a religious or medical exemption. Those who had not complied would now be fired.

According to the CDC, nearly 82 percent of Americans over the age of 5 had received at least one dose of the vaccine as of Thursday.

With AP wires