U.S. District Court Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle threw out the CDC mask mandate on public transportation because the agency did not explain why it needed to extend the mandate for another 15 days and overstepped its boundaries.
Mizelle concluded: “But the Mandate exceeded the CDC’s statutory authority, improperly invoked the good cause exception to notice and comment rulemaking, and failed to adequately explain its decisions. Because ‘our system does not permit agencies to act unlawfully even in pursuit of desirable ends,’ id., the Court declared unlawful and vacates the Mask Mandate.”
The mandate applies to people 2-years-old and up:
The ruling from U.S.. District Court Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle, came in a case brought in Florida federal court by Health Freedom Defense Fund, Inc. and frequent air travelers Ana Daza and Sarah Pope against the administration. Judge Mizelle determined that the mandate violated the Administrative Procedure Act by being outside the scope of the CDC’s authority, was “arbitrary” and “capricious” and not going through the required notice and comment period for federal rulemaking.Mizelle examined the section of the Public Health Services Act of 1944 that was the basis for the mandate. That law allows the CDC “to make and enforce such regulations” deemed “necessary to prevent the introduction, transmission, or spread of communicable diseases from foreign countries into the States[.]” To achieve this, the law says that CDC can utilize “inspection, fumigation disinfection sanitation, pest extermination, destruction of animals or articles found to be so infect or contaminated as to be sources of dangerous infection to human beings, and other measures[.]” The administration, the judge noted, has claimed that the mask mandate falls under “sanitation.”The judge noted that one could view “sanitation” as being an active measure to clean or as a preventative measure to keep something from getting dirty or infected, but through an examination of the statutory language, she determined it was the former.”The context of [the statute] indicates that ‘sanitation’ and ‘other measures’ refer to measures that clean something, not ones that keep something clean,” Mizelle wrote. “Wearing a mask cleans nothing.”The judge also noted that the CDC’s reasoning was flawed because the sanitation power only applies to property, not to people.
The CDC argued the agency did not have to follow the “standard notice and comment process for rulemaking” because its mandate is not a rule and qualifies for the “good cause exemption.”
Mizelle said no: “The CDC’s failure to explain its reasoning is particularly problematic here. At the time when the CDC issued the Mandate, the COVID-19 pandemic had been ongoing for almost a year and COVID-19 case numbers were decreasing. This timing undercuts the CDC’s suggestion that its action was so urgent that a thirty-day comment period was contrary to the public interest.”
Health Freedom Defense Fund… by Mary Elizabeth
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