A federal judge in Georgia blocked the Biden administration's requirement that all federal contractors must receive the COVID-19 vaccine, the latest blow in a flurry of legal setbacks for the White House.
U.S. District Judge Stan Baker of Savannah, Georgia, issued the nationwide injunction against enforcing the mandate on Tuesday, Reuters reported . Baker ruled that President Joe Biden overstepped his authority when he issued the requirement that all federal contractors be fully vaccinated by Jan. 18. State attorneys general from Georgia, Alabama, Indiana, Kansas, South Carolina, Utah, and West Virginia, in addition to a trade group that represents contractors, filed the suit.
The Biden administration has faced a series of legal barriers to enforcing mandatory vaccinations in the workplace. The requirement for contractors, which applies to roughly a quarter of the U.S. workforce, was blocked from enforcement in a Nov. 30 ruling by Judge Gregory Van Tatenhove of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky. That injunction only applied to Kentucky, Tennessee, and Ohio, however.
