WASHINGTON — Labor Secretary Marty Walsh said Thursday that the federal government has “every right” to impose a vaccine requirement on private businesses to help with workplace safety.
State attorneys general who immediately announced lawsuits against the Biden administration over the workplace mandate should talk to employers in their state and fully read the rules, he said.
“I think it’s unfortunate that at this moment so many states — it just came out seven hours ago — haven’t had a chance to talk to their employers in their states to see what they feel about this,” Walsh said in an interview with McClatchy.
Several Republican-run states, including Florida, Texas and Missouri, said they planned to sue the administration over the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA, rule, which requires businesses with more than 100 employees to make sure their workers are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 or test negative weekly and wear a mask.
The administration says the rule that President Joe Biden first announced in September will cover 84 million workers. OSHA said Thursday that it will go into effect on Jan. 4 alongside a similar requirement for federal contractors.
There are 19 states that have filed lawsuits against the previously announced vaccination requirement for federal contractors. They are asking federal courts to issue an injunction that will stop the rule from going into effect.
Some of the same states said Thursday that they would sue over the mandate for private businesses, which comes with the potential for steep fines for noncompliance, once that rule is formally issued.
Walsh insisted that the Labor Department is on solid legal ground. Of the potential for a federal court to issue an injunction that would temporarily halt the measure, he said
“I can’t worry about that at this moment.”
He said his goal is to keep workers safe and that state attorneys general have the right to sue the administration.
“It’s the attorney generals’ rights,” he said. “If they want to do what they want to do, do it.”
Missouri’s Attorney General Eric Schmitt, in a statement announcing his state’s lawsuit, called it an “illegal, unconstitutional attempt by the Biden administration and the federal government to impose their will on” private businesses and their employees.
“The federal government does not have the authority to unilaterally force private employers to mandate their employees get vaccinated or foot the bill for weekly testing,” he said.
Walsh said that employers will not necessarily be paying for the COVID-19 tests their unvaccinated employees will be required to take each week.
“I don’t know if he’s read, fully read, the ruling there. If he reads the ruling, he’ll understand that the employer in some cases will not be footing the bill,” Walsh said, referring to Schmitt.
“But again, I’m not gonna really respond to hypotheticals. If that’s the route that the attorney general in Missouri or anyone takes, that’s the route they’re going to take, but the federal government has every right, every right, to put emergency temporary standards out to private businesses in the country.”
The emergency temporary standard, as submitted, said that OSHA had decided that employers do not have to pay for COVID-19 testing for employees who choose not to be vaccinated.
“OSHA only requires employers to bear the costs of employee compliance with the preferred, and more protective, vaccination provision, but not costs associated with testing,” it said. “The agency does not believe it appropriate to impose the costs of testing on an employer where an employee has made an individual choice to pursue a less protective option.”
Employees will also be responsible for purchasing their own face masks if they are not vaccinated, according to the rule.
