Texas State Attorney General Ken Paxton made a visit to Abilene's Republican Party on Tuesday, the day after filing a third lawsuit against the Biden Administration’s vaccine mandates. Paxton’s latest lawsuit challenges the requirement that workers at facilities receiving Medicare or Medicaid funding have at least one COVID-19 vaccination shot by December 6, 2021.
Ten other states have joined the suit. At Tuesday night's meeting Paxton said he was glad for their help. And he told the audience this is not the time to be afraid, "If the Federal government can tell you that you are going to lose your job unless you get a vaccine, let me ask you what can they not tell you to do? I mean name something else that they wouldn't be able to not tell you to do if they wanted to. So, it's a big line to cross once we say 'yeah you can tell us to do that'.”
An audience member asked what Texas' Plan B would be if the challenges continue to be struck down in court. Paxton responded by saying he doesn't know what Plan B is, but Plan A is what they're doing right now, "which is winning”.
In another challenge to the Biden Administration's vaccine rules, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals stayed an OSHA rule requiring large companies to vaccinate employees or test them weekly beginning in January. On Tuesday the Sixth Circuit Court announced it will hear the appeal.