White House Tells Businesses to Follow Vaccine Mandate Despite Court Block And Won’t Rule Out Mandating For Domestic Air Travel

President Joe Biden’s White House has advised businesses with 100 or more employees to follow his vaccine mandate despite the temporary halt from a federal court of appeals.

“People should not wait,” White House Deputy Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre toldreporters on Monday. “They should continue to move forward and make sure they’re getting their workplace vaccinated.”

This past September, President Biden announced that the Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) will mandate that private companies with 100 or more employees implement vaccine requirements or require weekly negative tests.

The president waited nearly two months before releasing the details of his plan, which would not have even taken effect until January of 2022. A company in violation of the mandate could be fined $136,532.

The president’s plan encountered a roadblock on Saturday when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit Court issued a temporary stay blocking the mandate while considering a permanent injunction.

White House Won’t Rule Out Mandating Vaccine For Domestic Air Travel

The Biden White House has refused to rule out extending its vaccine mandate to cover domestic air travel.

On the day that U.S. airports re-opened to fully vaccinated international travelers for the first time in 20 months, the possibility that Americans using them would also have to be fully jabbed remains open.

After she was asked about vaccine mandates for domestic travel, White House Deputy Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre responded, “We say this all the time – everything is on the table.”

“We just don’t have an announcement to preview right now on this,” she added. “So I don’t have anything more to share on the domestic travel.”

The option is being kept on the table despite a vaccine mandate imposed on businesses with over 100 employees being temporarily suspended by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals over the weekend.

The administration has also previously suggested that it could try to extend the mandate to businesses with under 100 employees, impacting millions more companies.

Any attempt to ban unvaccinated Americans from domestic travel will further exacerbate a $300billion hit on the economy caused by the suspension of international travel.

Around 20 per cent of Americans remain unvaccinated while 70 per cent have received both doses of the jab.