A divided panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on December 19, 2022, upheld a preliminary injunction of Executive Order 14042, halting the Biden administration’s effort to impose on federal contractors a variety of COVID-19 safety protocols. Over the dissent of Judge Graves, the Fifth Circuit concluded that the “Major Questions Doctrine”—the notion that “Congress [must] speak clearly when authorizing an agency to exercise powers of vast economic and political significance”—limited the president’s otherwise broad authority under the Federal Property and Administrative Services Act (commonly known as the Procurement Act), thus precluding enforcement of the contractor vaccine mandate here. The affirmed injunction prohibits “the national government from enforcing the Task Force Guidance and FAR Memo in any contract, grant, or any other like agreement by any other name, whether for services or product and whether existing or new, between [Louisiana, Indiana, and Mississippi] or their agencies and the national government.”
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