Peter Hill: Stats shown illness up in the military after COVID vaccine If you want to swap with me, and they do that through the employer, or their employer offers that. She covers operations, policy, personnel, leadership and other issues affecting service members. "This guidance is a promise of what the Air Force is saying it will do," Bruns told Military.com. So I think that if one of these cases does end up in front of the Supreme Court, it will probably be addressed just on the narrow vaccine issue. But their. This disparity of treatment between medical and religious exemptions was constitutionally prohibited,OConnor said: As a brief preview, the vaccine mandate fails strict scrutiny. A timeline of when vaccines are due was left up to the . Service members file lawsuit over Pentagon's coronavirus vaccine Simply put, no actual fetal cells were used in the development of any of the COVID-19 vaccines the cells in question were replicated by scientists, in labs, from tissue harvested previously. In late August, Pfizers vaccine received full approval under the brand name Comirnaty. The government responded to the lawsuit by pointing out that immunization requirements are common in the military beginning with the Continental Army under George Washington and that vaccines and are essential to preventing the transmission of diseases in close quarters. 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.. The fetal cells were not used to produce either vaccine, National Geographic reported last fall. But in terms of the underlying legal issues that are raised, no, theyre exactly the same. Other service members have struck out on their own to fight the mandate. Ross said such questions were speculative and not at issue in the case before the court. By The Associated Press WASHINGTON A bill to rescind the Covid-19 vaccine mandate for members of the U.S. military and provide nearly $858 billion for national defense passed the House on. 26 Feb 2023 11:38:25 Judge Matthew McFarlands decision brings the case, Doster v. Kendall, closer to trial as a class-action lawsuit. 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. 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. But Islamic tradition does not discourage vaccination, and doesnt forbid abortion before 17 weeks gestation, with even more leeway if the health of the mother is in jeopardy or if there are life-threatening fetal abnormalities. 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. Based on his Roman Catholic Christian faith and absolute opposition to abortion, he cannot accept a vaccine that has been manufactured, or whose efficacy has been tested and proved, using aborted fetal cells, the Florida lawsuit alleges, on behalf of a Coast Guard pilot. National Vaccine Lawsuit Injury Attorney - Carlson Law Firm Telling Plaintiffs they must accept or receive a shot they oppose according to their sincerely held religious beliefs, or face court martial, dishonorable discharge, and other life altering disciplinary measures, disgraces the sacrifices these heroes have made, according to the lawsuit. 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 . Were going from a 50-step process to a zero-step process? Duncan asked. Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine syringes at a vaccination clinic in the Peabody Institute Library in Peabody, Massachusetts, on Jan. 26, 2022. There is no verifiable evidence that COVID-19 vaccines have killed, or will kill, more military personnel than the disease itself. The chief of Irans nuclear program, Mohammad Eslami, acknowledged the findings of the IAEA report. "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. -- Thomas Novelly can be reached at thomas.novelly@military.com. 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. 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Under the law, theres no requirement that you adhere to a major or even recognized faith tradition, he said. The new policy guidance to the services makes no mention of reinstating service members who were separated from the military for refusing the shot. Theres yet another lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the militarys COVID-19 vaccine mandate. Another difference is that the VICP is a no-fault compensation program. And in fact, he said, the exemption process is fraught in and of itself. Copyright 2023 Hubbard Radio Washington DC, LLC. Technology Artificial Intelligence Ask the CIO Automation Big Data CIO News Cloud Computing Cybersecurity IT Modernization Open Data/Transparency Reporter's Notebook Defense On DoD Army Navy Air Force We are hemorrhaging people like crazy, and were having a really hard time recruiting capable people to join our military. The . Here's the Army rule for vaccine refusals, which service leaders They are, theyre ignoring the law, theyre ignoring the Constitution. They will also have to make the case that vaccinating, or involuntarily discharging, every service member is the least restrictive means of keeping the force safe from COVID-19, rather than enforcing masking or social distancing or in some cases, grandfathering in troops who acquired some immunity after catching COVID-19. 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. 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. Attorney General O'Connor Sues Over COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate for In his order, OConnor granted an injunction against the Biden administration and the Department of Defense, preventing them from enforcing the vaccine mandate against any of the named service members who had applied for a religious exemption. The plaintiffs argue that violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the First Amendment. Air Force vaccine case will remain a class-action, appeals court rules The Navy began issuing guidance to sailors earlier this month. 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. And really, the greatest harm here is not just to our members of the military who are suffering under this, but its actually to our nation. Yet another lawsuit challenging military's - Federal News Network The judge agreed, issuing an injunction against discipline for the sailors on Jan. 3. The lawsuit, in which 14 men and two women serving in the military are named as plaintiffs, names U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, three U.S. military service secretaries and other. They argue that their. The U.S . It is a danger of, you know, the government saying, Well, hey, heres what your faith tradition teaches, you should follow that, " Griffin said. Assuming, maybe Im assuming too much. The Army reported about 1,300 religious requests, none of which have been approved, as well as six medical exemptions. Government lawyers argue the policy is in line with well-established principles of judicial noninterference with core military decision making, in their briefs. And I havent heard of a single Starbucks shutting down. 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. Bill Would Force Military To Reinstate Those Who Refused COVID Vaccine Other plaintiffs focus not on the abortion issue, but on several Bible passages that refer to the body as a temple. 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. Navy quietly rolled back punishments for SEALs seeking religious Air Force discharges 27 for refusing to get COVID vaccine : NPR - NPR.org 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. But it may not take a lawsuit for the issue to change the environment when it comes to mandatory vaccination. The Pentagon has not provided any public updates or said when the formal policy will be issued. Theyre usually willing to accept that and say, look, yeah, Im happy to. The lawyers for the biggest lawsuit against the service said that, after the Navy's policy change on deployment, they were "still assessing the impact of this policy on our Navy SEAL clients and more than 4000 class members," according to a statement released Thursday night. While it allowed service members to apply for religious exemptions to the mandate, it has not granted a single one. 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? The decision sets the stage for a future trial or, possibly, the case winding its way up to the Supreme Court. Kevin Stitt with Fox News ads 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. 3 min read POINT PLEASANT, NJ A U.S. Marine from Point Pleasant who was discharged. Everyone who joins the military must receive a slate of several vaccines to enter, including chickenpox, rubella and hepatitis A. While it allowed service members to apply for religious exemptions to the mandate, it has not granted a single one. 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. The Justice Department intends to appeal the Texas ruling, while a temporary injunction in the Florida case expires Friday. The Navy comes in second with a total of 469 separations, which includes 50 this past week. Produced by Will Reid , Rob Szypko . AFLDS has also pushed ivermectin and. The Supreme Court is historically, they only address the legal issues that are brought before them, right. 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. I mean, all of it is just fraught with ideological purpose, and suspected purpose.. Top Pentagon officials do not plan to alter their current "lawful orders" requiring the coronavirus shots for troops, unless they are granted waivers for medical or religious purposes, the. The latest lawsuit challenging DoD's COVID-19 vaccine mandate says the Air Force's process makes religious accommodations almost impossible to get. In other words, its usually ill-advised to take an opinion on one subject or one issue, and then try to extrapolate and say and that and say, Well, that should apply across the board to all issues. They had been told to get certain vaccines or other things without even be notified of a religious objection.. Dr. Lee Merritt, a self-described Navy surgeon, stated during an . And so of course, that means you have to bring different lawsuits on behalf of people, depending on what branch of the military that theyre in.