The Supreme Court last night announced it will hold a special hearing next month to consider challenges to the Biden administration’s pandemic efforts affecting millions of workers, a nationwide vaccine-or-testing requirement for large employers and a separate coronavirus vaccine mandate for health-care workers, the Washington Post reported. Both policies have been at least partially blocked from going into effect by lower courts after challenges from Republican-led states, and from business and religious coalitions. It is highly unusual for the justices to schedule such hearings on emergency requests. Both will be considered Jan. 7, the Friday before the court was to resume its normal schedule of oral arguments. One of the cases involves a rule from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) that requires employers with 100 or more workers to have staff vaccinated or tested on a regular basis. The other is from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, and it requires vaccination for workers at facilities that receive federal funds tied to those programs.
