A sign held by a healthcare worker reads “Last Year’s Heroes, This Year’s Unemployed” at a protest at St. Catherine of Siena Hospital in Smithtown, New York, on Sept. 27, 2021.
Raychel Brightman | Newsday | Getty Images
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday denied an emergency bid to block enforcement of New York’s coronavirus vaccine mandate for health care workers.
The legal challenge was filed by a group of 20 doctors and nurses who argued that the state’s vaccine mandate violates the First Amendment to the Constitution because it fails to include a religious exemption.
The request for an injunction had been presented to Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who is assigned to handle cases from New York.
Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch and Samuel Alito — three of the court’s six-member conservative majority — said in the order that they would have granted the bid to block the mandate.
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