On Tuesday, Liberty Counsel filed a response brief opposing Maine Governor Janet Mills’ attempt to dismiss litigation against her for unlawfully denying religious exemptions and terminating seven state health care workers for not abiding by the state’s unconstitutional COVID-19 shot mandate. While Governor Mills argues the repeal of the state’s mandate moots the case, Liberty Counsel argues that the state forced “unconstitutional injury” on the health care workers by making them choose between their livelihoods or their religious beliefs which the state has not guaranteed will not happen again in the future.
The brief notes that Maine’s “voluntary cessation” of the mandate “is not enough to shield the discriminatory mandate from review.”
The brief states, “…the change in policy is neither permanent nor irrevocable. State Defendants have not made it ‘absolutely clear’ that they will not return to their former discriminatory and unconstitutional ways… This hedging precludes any mootness argument.”
Governor Mills has already attempted to stay this litigation but U.S. District Judge Jon Levy ruled on August 25, 2023, that proceedings in Alicia Lowe, et al., v. Janet Mills, et al may continue for discovery.
Judge Levy wrote, “‘…a party should not be able to evade judicial review, or to defeat a judgment, by temporarily altering questionable behavior.’” He noted that the defendant has the “‘formidable burden of showing that it is absolutely clear the allegedly wrongful behavior could not reasonably be expected to recur.’”
Liberty Counsel represents seven health care workers in Maine who have sincerely held religious beliefs that prevented them from complying with Governor Mills’ unconstitutional shot mandate. Their lawsuit against Governor Mills, health officials of the Maine Department of Health and Human Services, Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and five of the state’s largest hospital systems, challenges the Maine law that requires employees of designated Maine health care facilities to be vaccinated with the COVID-19 shot. Governor Mills ordered employers to deny all religious exemptions and ignore the federal employment law known as Title VII that affords employees the right to request reasonable accommodation for their sincere religious beliefs. Governor Mills also threatened to revoke the licenses of all health care employers if they did not abide by her rule.
Liberty Counsel Founder and Chairman Mat Staver said, “Simply repealing the state’s COVID shot mandate for health care workers does not moot this case. Not just the mandate, but the subsequent firing of health care workers over their religious beliefs is a clear and open violation of the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Governor Mills is trying to get away with a hit-and-run where she issued this terrible mandate and now wants to escape responsibility for her actions.”
