U.S. Court in Texas Dismisses Challenge to Health Care Worker Vaccine Mandate
- January 21, 2022
The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas dismissed January 19 without prejudice Texas’ challenge to the administration’s vaccination mandate for health care workers following the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling last week allowing the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to enforce the requirement in 24 states where two other injunctions had been in place.
The court previously granted the Texas a preliminary injunction in its challenge to a CMS interim final rule requiring COVID-19 vaccinations for health care workers in hospitals and other facilities and settings that participate in Medicare and Medicaid.
The Texas injunction, however, wasn’t before the Supreme Court, which on January 13 held CMS did not exceed its statutory authority in issuing the IFC to protect the health and safety of Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries. Biden v. Missouri, Nos. 21A240 and 21A241 (U.S. Jan. 13, 2022). The Court’s decision applied to the 24 states where federal courts in Missouri and Louisiana had preliminarily enjoined enforcement of the health care worker vaccine mandate.
The Biden administration appealed the injunction in Texas last week, but the state also moved for dismissal after the Supreme Court’s decision.
With the dismissal of the Texas challenge, the mandate is now enforceable nationwide.
CMS issued January 14 guidance setting new compliance deadlines in the 24 states where the injunctions had been in place. The guidance requires health care workers in those states to be fully vaccinated by March 15. CMS subsequently issued additional guidance on January 20, setting slightly later compliance deadlines for Texas now that an injunction is no longer in place there. The remaining states, where no injunctions were in place, are subject to earlier compliance deadlines that CMS included in guidance issued in late December.