The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld a ruling that shields airmen from COVID-19 vaccine mandates. The U.S. Air Force had asked the court to toss out a decision that protected the rights of service members, but the court denied that attempt.
The Air Force wanted to remove the court’s injunction since the Department of Defense (DOD) rescinded the vaccine mandate last December. However, the appeals court decided the DOD’s elimination of the mandate was not enough to warrant dissolving the protection.
As CBN News reported in December, the appeals court unanimously upheld a class-wide injunction protecting the rights of more than 10,000 U.S. Air Force personnel. They were being threatened with discipline or discharge because they refused to take the COVID-19 vaccine due to their religious convictions.
The three-judge panel had ruled that the U.S. military’s vaccine mandate violated their religious freedom under the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 (RFRA).
In the order for Hunter Doster, et al. v. Hon Frank Kendall, et al., the Sixth Circuit affirmed the lower court’s decisions in an opinion by Judge Eric E. Murphy, joined by Judges John K. Bush and Raymond M. Kethledge, and denied the federal government’s appeal to force the entire class of Air Force members to receive COVID-19 shots. . . . (read more on CBN)
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