"State Rep. Tom Gann, R-Inola, filed House Bill 1003X, nicknamed the 'Liberty Bill,' this week to end what he calls 'shocking abuse' after receiving 'numerous' calls from constituents who face loss of employment due to vaccine mandates," Fox News reported last week.
In a statement, Gann noted: "Following Oklahoma's successful, landmark opioid settlement against the drug makers, it's inconceivable that any employer would ask employees to subject themselves to an EUA injection from that same industry."
The lawmaker hit on a familiar theme -- that the vaccines have yet to receive full approval and that some are still being utilized under emergency authorization. One vaccine, from Pfizer, has received Food and Drug Administration approval but it isn't widely available as of yet.
Gann included a portion of the legislation in his statement which says residents don't have to "participate in any way in any form of health care services contrary to his or her conscience," according to local outlet KTUL.
"Well, as a government official, our first and foremost duty is to preserve the individual rights for the people, and that's what this law is all about. When this abuse is taking place in the state of Oklahoma, we have to stand up and protect the individual liberty," said Gann, the outlet continued.
"When this abuse is taking place in the state of Oklahoma, we have to stand up and protect individual liberty," he added.
Gann was among several GOP lawmakers in the state who sent a letter to Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt in July requesting an executive order to prohibit vaccine mandates for Oklahoma health care workers.
"These employees are the heroes that stood on the front line of the pandemic caring for those that had fallen ill to COVID-19. The quickest and most effective way to protect these workers is an executive order prohibiting these mandates," said the letter, which was signed by 20 state legislators.
Gann's bill comes following Joe Biden's executive order in September mandating that all federal workers and federal contractors, along with businesses that have 100 or more employees implement a vaccine mandate for all workers or subject them to weekly testing.
The legislation comes after a federal appeals court blocked Biden's order, according to Bloomberg Law:
Citing “grave statutory and constitutional issues,” the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit put the newly minted workplace mandate rule on hold Saturday pending further litigation.
The order comes a day after the Occupational Safety and Health Administration officially published its vaccinate-or-test regulation, which was met by a flurry of lawsuits from Republican state attorneys general, companies, and other organizations seeking to block it. The emergency temporary standard is supposed to last just six months, heightening the significance of any delay before the rule gets full judicial review.
The Biden administration filed a counter-motion and claimed that the court's order was premature.
"Accordingly, there is no need to address petitioners’ stay motions now, and the Court should lift its administrative stay and allow this matter to proceed under the process that Congress set forth for judicial review of OSHA standards," administration lawyers argued in the filing last week.
When Biden issued his initial order Sept. 9, he actually blamed the COVID pandemic on "unvaccinated" Americans, though the virus had already produced a number of variants (which generally happens when you put out vaccines because viruses virus -- that's what they do).
"The virus will not go away by itself, or because we wish it away: We have to act. Vaccination is the single best pathway out of this pandemic,' he went on to say earlier this month.
"And while I would have much preferred that requirements not become necessary, too many people remain unvaccinated for us to get out of this pandemic for good. So I instituted requirements – and they are working," he lied.
"They protect our workers and have helped us reduce the number of unvaccinated Americans over the age of 12 from approximately 100 million in late July when I began requirements to just about 60 million today."
Sources include:
Please contact us for more information.
