- A group of 20 Republican AGs led by Mississippi AG Lynn Fitch and Alabama AG Steve Marshall sent a letter to the Biden Administration expressing their concerns about the federal government’s mandatory vaccination requirement for federal contractors across the government supply chain.
- The advocacy letter contends that the mandate is inconsistent with actions taken elsewhere by the federal government to combat COVID-19 and fails to account for industry-specific factors that might increase exposure to risk. In addition, the AGs assert that the mandate’s ambiguous language and short deadlines leave contractors with little choice but to require their entire workforce to be vaccinated in order to comply with the mandate’s obligations.
- The letter goes on to say that the federal contractor vaccine mandate is inconsistent with the forthcoming new Department of Labor emergency temporary standard, which seeks to have employers with over 100 employees ensure that their workforce is vaccinated.
- The AGs assert that adding a vaccine mandate amid the ongoing national supply-chain crisis could have disastrous consequences and they strongly urge the president to instruct the Task Force and federal agencies to halt any efforts to implement the federal contractor mandate.