UPDATE The Labor Department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) on Thursday suspended enforcement of the Biden administration’s new rules ordering larger employers to either require that their workers get vaccinated against COVID or undergo weekly testing, reports CBS. OSHA posted the announcement on its website, on Thursday. It added it “remains confident in its authority to protect workers in emergencies.”
It appears smaller tower contractors would be exempt, because the rule was to have affected companies with more than 100 workers. NATE: The Communications Infrastructure Contractors Association, recently surveyed members on the issue. The association said several member companies feared losing employees over such a mandate, Inside Towers reported.
The agency’s decision to stop implementing and enforcing the new rule comes after a federal appeals court on Friday reaffirmed an earlier temporary halt to the administration’s vaccine rule and ordered OSHA to stop enforcing or implementing the regulation.
The future of the government directive remains uncertain, with the case headed to the Sixth Circuit Court in Ohio.
Meanwhile, businesses across the nation question what this means for the new vaccine rule. Under the original plan, by December 5, employers with more than 100 employees must choose whether their workers must get fully vaccinated or undergo weekly testing.
By January 4, those businesses must implement the rule — a timeline that doesn’t provide employers much leeway if the Sixth Circuit upholds the rule.
Also on Thursday, Rep. James (R-KY) introduced a bill that, if passed, would block Biden from requiring the employees of federal contractors to get vaccinated against COVID, according to Fox. The Fairness for Federal Contractors Act of 2021 would ban executive agencies from requiring federal contractors’ employees to get vaccinated and require the Government Accountability Office to report the ways in which a federal contractor mandate has created job losses and disrupted worker performance and the national supply chain within 180 days of the legislation’s passage.
“American workers should not be forced to get the jab to keep their job. President Biden’s authoritarian mandate on employees of federal contractors requiring vaccination or termination is unfair to those who support the federal government and jeopardizes services such as defense and border security,” Comer, ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, told Fox News in a statement.
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