The Western Division of the US District Court for the Western District of Tennessee issued a preliminary injunction on Friday to blocking Tennessee Governor Bill Lee’s executive order allowing parents in Shelby County to opt out of school mask requirements, asserting that plaintiffs established evidence demonstrating Lee’s order prevents children with health problems from safely [...]
The US District Court for the District of Columbia issued Thursday a preliminary injunction blocking the Biden administration from using Title 42 public health protections to expel migrant families at the border. Title 42 allows US Border Patrol and Customs to prohibit individuals who potentially pose a health risk from entering the country. Both the [...]
Ian Profiri is JURIST’s Staff Correspondent for Canada. He files this dispatch from Calgary. Late Wednesday evening, the Alberta government surprised Albertans by declaring a State of Public Health Emergency in a purported effort to protect what has become a fragile healthcare system in the wake of the fourth wave of Covid-19. At approximately 10pm [...]
Minnesota Judge Thomas Gillian denied concerned parents’ request on Tuesday to force all public schools within the state to mandate masks. Parents Advocating for Safe Schools (PASS), an association of Minnesota parents, filed suit against the state of Minnesota and Governor Timothy Walz, asking the court to order Walz to impose a statewide mask requirement [...]
JURIST is launching a new series of dispatches from major US states written by JURIST correspondents “on the ground” in those jurisdictions. JURIST Operations Director Ram Eachambadi files this report from Los Angeles. An almost teary-eyed “humbled and grateful” California Governor Gavin Newsom addressed his supporters and the media at approximately 8:50 PM on Tuesday [...]
UK law firm PGMBM initiated court proceedings on Monday against the government over the Hotel Quarantine Policy, requiring that returners from “red list countries” quarantine for 11 days in a hotel to reduce the spread of COVID-19. Currently, the stay costs approximately £2,285 per passenger, regardless of whether the person is double vaccinated. PGMBM claims [...]
US federal judge Robert Pratt temporarily blocked the state of Iowa on Monday from enforcing a state law that prohibits public schools from requiring masks. Consequently, school districts may continue to enforce their mask mandates. Earlier this month, the ACLU of Iowa and several parents filed suit in federal court to challenge Iowa’s public school [...]
A Florida appeals court has upheld Governor Ron DeSantis’ ban on school mask mandates. The move Friday came after a Florida circuit judge ruled last month to temporarily suspend the ban until the legal challenges against it were complete. As a result, the ban will remain in place until further appellate review. The order states [...]
US President Joe Biden announced a six-pronged plan on Thursday to combat COVID-19 at a time when the Delta variant is rapidly spreading throughout the country. The first part of the plan is to vaccinate as many of the 80 million unvaccinated Americans as possible. To meet this goal, Biden asked the US Department of [...]
The ACLU of Iowa and 11 parents of minor children across the state with disabilities filed a federal lawsuit on Friday challenging an Iowa law that bans school districts from imposing mask mandates in schools. In the last few days of the 2021 legislative session, the Iowa Legislature passed House File 847. House File 847 prevents [...]
