Employer COVID-19 vax mandates: Nonetheless authorized, however for a way lengthy?

April 18, 2023 – Whereas the clamor for vaccine mandates has subsided, many employers stay dedicated to having their staff totally updated with their COVID-19 boosters. However will they be capable of implement such a coverage?

The reply is: It relies upon.

Employer authority to implement obligatory COVID-19 vaccination insurance policies by no means derived from federal or state public well being emergency declarations, so the lifting of these declarations doesn’t straight influence an employer’s means to require vaccination. Nevertheless, employers ought to stay aware of particular person state legal guidelines.

Usually talking, non-public employers can proceed to require COVID-19 vaccination as a situation of employment, besides in states which have positioned restrictions on employer vaccine mandates. Sure state bans permit well being care employers to proceed to require vaccination. Nonetheless different states require vaccination in restricted circumstances, corresponding to well being care settings. Many states have outlawed public sector mandates altogether.

In states the place employer vaccination necessities usually are not banned, employers can proceed with vaccination mandates as long as their vaccine coverage applies neutrally to all staff and job candidates — simply as they’d neutrally apply different office coverage in accordance with Title VII and the People with Disabilities Act. Employers additionally should permit staff to request a incapacity lodging beneath the ADA or a spiritual lodging beneath Title VII. For instance, some states require employers to permit sure worker exemptions that transcend the spiritual and medical exemptions required by federal regulation (e.g., exemptions based mostly on staff’ COVID-19 “immunity”).

To maintain or to not hold

Employers can decide to finish their COVID-19 vaccination necessities and make COVID-19 vaccination voluntary. When selecting to go this route, employers ought to keep in mind their obligation beneath the Occupational Security and Well being Administration’s “Common Obligation” clause to supply a secure and healthful office, in addition to any state regulation COVID-19 office mitigation necessities.

Alternatively, employers can proceed to implement their COVID-19 vaccination necessities. Employers selecting this path ought to proceed to have interaction within the interactive course of — through which employers should interact with an worker requesting an lodging and decide if there’s a affordable lodging that may be supplied — and grant exemptions in a impartial method.

As mentioned under, employers that proceed to implement their vaccination necessities might quickly have a more durable time denying an worker’s lodging request on the premise of an “undue hardship” if the Supreme Court docket adjustments the “de minimis” customary. Below present federal case regulation, employers usually are not required to supply a spiritual lodging if it could impose an “undue hardship” on the employer (i.e., if it could impose “greater than de minimis price” on the employer’s enterprise operations). If the usual adjustments, and because the public well being and office security dangers related to COVID-19 diminish, such denials is probably not definitely worth the effort.

Oh DeJoy: the in-flux state of COVID-19 vaccine mandate litigation

The pending U.S. Supreme Court docket case, Groff v. DeJoy, looms massive within the background of all COVID-19 vaccination mandate litigation. The case entails a Christian United States Postal Service employee’s request for an exemption from engaged on Sundays. After initially accommodating the postal employee, the Postal Service incurred growing price and issue accommodating him and commenced subjecting him to escalating self-discipline. The postal employee ultimately resigned and sued the USA Postal Service for failing to present him a spiritual lodging beneath Title VII.

Each the district court docket and the third U.S. Circuit Court docket of Appeals held that the USA Postal Service didn’t have to accommodate the worker as a result of satisfying the worker’s calls for would have imposed greater than a de minimis price — and due to this fact impose an undue hardship. The Supreme Court docket accepted the case on the questions of (1) whether or not the de minimis price check is the correct customary for undue hardship beneath Title VII; and (2) whether or not an employer might reveal undue hardship merely by exhibiting that the requested lodging burdens the worker’s coworkers, slightly than the enterprise itself.

The Court docket will think about whether or not to alter the “undue hardship” customary in Title VII spiritual discrimination instances from the present “de minimis price” customary to the extra stringent “vital issue or expense” customary. The “vital issue or expense” customary already applies to incapacity lodging requests beneath the ADA, and it’s broadly anticipated that the Court docket will apply that customary to Title VII spiritual lodging requests.

Whereas employers can nonetheless implement their COVID-19 vaccination necessities, they might want to rigorously think about all spiritual and incapacity lodging requests. If the Supreme Court docket adjustments the “undue hardship” customary, it would turn into tougher to justify denying an worker’s request.

That mentioned, many of the litigation involving worker challenges to employer vaccination necessities are nonetheless of their early phases. These challenges usually contain discrimination and retaliation claims based mostly on faith and incapacity. The few court docket opinions which were issued recommend that worker challenges are likely to fail, as long as employers neutrally apply their vaccination necessities to all staff and correctly think about all lodging requests.

Notably, in instances the place the employer asserts the undue hardship protection, some courts have already begun staying proceedings in mild of the pending Groff v. DeJoy choice.

What employers ought to do if sued

Worker challenges are most probably to succeed when the employer doesn’t correctly interact within the interactive course of and think about whether or not the worker may be fairly accommodated, or when the employer applies the vaccination coverage or grants exemptions in a non-neutral method.

Subsequently, employers ought to guarantee they’ve correctly documented staff’ lodging requests and the ensuing interactive course of — together with any determinations that accommodating the worker would trigger an undue burden. Employers and their authorized counsel must also emphasize to the court docket that their vaccination coverage applies to all staff equally.

Opinions expressed are these of the writer. They don’t mirror the views of Reuters Information, which, beneath the Belief Rules, is dedicated to integrity, independence, and freedom from bias. Westlaw In the present day is owned by Thomson Reuters and operates independently of Reuters Information.