After nearly three years of struggle, these essential workers feel they were heard
and understood by the jury and are overjoyed and relieved by the verdict.
~Kevin Snider, Chief Counsel Pacific Justice Institute
Remember the vaccine mandate “No Jab, No Job”? For six courageous people, today justice arrives against that unjust mandate.
Nearly four years after the onset of Covid, an eight-person federal jury in California took a stand for religious freedom. The lawsuit against the San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District (BART) was filed after they denied every request from employees seeking religious exemptions from the company’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate. After two days of deliberation, the jury sided with the six former employees who brought the lawsuit, awarding them over $1 million each for a total of approximately $7.8 million. This incredible victory for religious freedom could have implications in countless other states, including Washington.
During the hearing, the jury listened to testimony from several of the former employees, one of whom worked at BART for over 30 years, and determined all six met the burden of showing a genuine conflict between their deeply held beliefs and the vaccine requirement. The jury found that BART failed to show that their company would have undergone undue hardship by allowing the accommodations – which is the only legal reason a religious exemption request can be denied. Not only were the employees denied religious accommodation, but several of them were unceremoniously fired as well.
“The rail employees chose to lose their livelihood rather than deny their faith,” Pacific Justice Institute Chief Counsel Kevin Snider commented. “That in itself shows the sincerity and depth of their convictions. After nearly three years of struggle, these essential workers feel they were heard and understood by the jury and are overjoyed and relieved by the verdict.”
This is not an unfamiliar story to those who lived in Washington state, where COVID-19 mandates were some of the strictest and most unreasonable in the nation, per the imposition by Governor Jay Inslee. We will never forget his rampant use of emergency powers to instate strict lockdowns, mask mandates, social distancing, vaccine requirements, and proof of vaccination to enter many buildings — in addition to his micromanagement of church services and threatening pastors with fines and even jail time.
Per OpenVaers.com, the number of deaths caused by the Covid vaccine is nearly 38,000. (VAERS, or Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, is a government database co-managed by the FDA and the CDC.)
Inslee’s use of emergency powers lasted 975 days, despite empty rhetoric to “flatten the curve in 14 days” – that is, his mandates lasted 2+ years, not 2 weeks. To see the pushback in Seattle, click here. To see FPIW’s article documenting this historic era, click here.
Thousands of individuals were fired or discriminated against for refusing to take the vaccine. Kathleen Moriarty, for instance, was fired after 18 years at the Port of Seattle. The state-issued vaccine requirement impacted all state employees. Across the nation, countless people lost their livelihoods during a time of uncertainty and political upheaval in our nation. We hope this victory in California is representative of victories to come for the many people who were unjustly fired and discriminated against due to COVID-19 mandates in Washington. (See the Washington Civil Rights Council for more.)
At FPIW, one of our main priorities is defending religious liberty in Washington. You can learn more about our stance by reading our Issues Booklet, which can be found here. If this is a topic you are passionate about, please consider joining our team of DEFENDERS to advocate for your values in the public square and beyond.
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