A Texas judge has blocked the federal Head Start early childhood program from requiring employees or students in the state to wear masks or be vaccinated to attend or teach in the program.
Judge James Wesley Hendrix ruled Friday that Head Start cannot require masks and vaccines in Texas, though he stopped short of granting the state and Lubbock Independent School District’s request that the mandates be blocked in the program nationwide.
“Because the court concludes that there is a substantial likelihood that the mandates do not fit within the Head Start Act’s authorizing text, that HHS failed to follow the [Administrative Procedure Act] in promulgating the mandates, and that the mandates are arbitrary and capricious, the court preliminarily enjoins their enforcement in Texas,” Hendrix wrote in his decision against Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, whose agency oversees the program.
US COVID POLICIES HURT CHILDREN THE MOST
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott celebrated the ruling as a win for his state, where he issued an executive order banning mask and vaccine mandates in October in response to the Biden administration’s command that all companies with more than 100 people require the vaccine.
“Texas just beat Biden again,” Abbott said on Twitter.
BREAKING: Texas just beat Biden again.
Another of Biden’s vaccine & mask mandates was just halted by a federal judge in Texas.
The Court writes: “It is undisputed that an agency cannot act without Congressional authorization.”
That would apply to all of Biden’s orders. pic.twitter.com/dqmDLGxR9j
— Greg Abbott (@GregAbbott_TX) January 1, 2022
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Head Start provides education and family support for low-income children to ensure readiness for school. Texas argued that requiring young children and toddlers to wear masks would be harmful to their development and that vaccine mandates would cause a shortage of staff.
The ruling is preliminary, and the mandate will continue to be fought in federal court.
