The Biden administration ordered U.S. companies Thursday to ensure their employees are fully vaccinated or regularly tested for Covid-19 by Jan. 4 — giving them a reprieve over the holidays before the long-awaited and hotly contested mandate takes affect.
The administration on Thursday also pushed back the deadline for federal contractors to comply with a stricter set of vaccine requirements for staff from Dec. 8 to Jan. 4 to match the deadline set for other private companies and health-care providers.
The newly released rules, issued by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration under the Labor Department, apply to businesses with 100 or more employees. All unvaccinated workers must begin wearing masks by Dec. 5 and provide a negative Covid test on a weekly basis after the January deadline, according to the requirements. Companies are not required to pay for or provide the tests unless they are otherwise required to by state or local laws or in labor union contracts. Anyone who tests positive is prohibited from going into work.
Companies also have until Dec. 5 to offer paid time for employees to get vaccinated and paid sick leave for them to recover from any side effects.
OSHA, which polices workplace safety for the Labor Department, will provide sample implementation plans and fact sheets among other materials to help companies adopt the new rules.
OSHA will also conduct on-site workplace inspections to make sure companies comply with the rules, a senior administration official said. Penalties for noncompliance can range from $13,653 per serious violation to $136,532 if a company willfully violates the rules.
The vaccine mandate, which covers 84 million people employed in the private sector, represents the most expansive use of federal power to protect workers from Covid-19 since the virus was declared a pandemic in March 2020.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the federal government’s health insurance plans for the elderly and poor, are also requiring the 76,000 health-care facilities that participate in the programs to ensure their workers are fully vaccinated by Jan. 4, affecting some 17 million employees, senior administration officials said. Facilities that violate the mandate could be at risk of losing their funding, they said
The Labor Department developed the business mandate under emergency authority that shortcuts the process for issuing new workplace safety standards, which normally take years. OSHA can use its emergency authority when the Labor secretary determines workers face a grave danger from a new hazard, in this case Covid.
Business groups had called for the administration to delay the mandate until after the busy holiday season, worried that workers would choose to quit rather than follow the rules, further disrupting already strained supply chains and a tight labor market.
Nearly every Republican state attorney general in the U.S. has vowed to take legal action to halt the mandate, calling it “counterproductive and harmful” in a September letter to the White House.
Republicans and industry lobbyists have contended that the current threat from Covid does not amount to a grave danger as claimed by the Biden administration. They point to the growing level of vaccination and natural immunity in the U.S. from previous infections, and mitigation measures already taken by many businesses in the workplace.
Covid has killed more than 750,000 Americans and infected more than 46 million, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. The virus is infecting more than 70,000 people a day on average, according to a CNBC analysis of that data.
The AFL-CIO, which represents the largest group of unions in the U.S., had pushed for even more sweeping protections to be included in the mandate, such as standards on ventilation and physical distancing where appropriate.
The Biden administration could now face legal challenges on two fronts, from those who want the mandate overturned and those who want it expanded.
It’s unclear whether the mandates will survive legal challenges. OSHA emergency safety standards have a mixed track record in court. Before the pandemic, the agency had not issued an emergency standard since 1983. Courts have postponed or fully overturned four of the 10 emergency safety standards issued by OSHA in its 50-year history. A fifth was partially vacated.
Breathing room for federal contractors
Along with the new rules for companies with 100 or more employees, the Biden administration said it will extend the deadline for a similar but stricter set of rules for federal contractors until Jan. 4.
The federal contractor rules don’t include a regular Covid testing option for employees.
Workers for those companies, which include Boeing, American Airlines, IBM and smaller contractors like food service firms, have to ensure workers are vaccinated or receive exemptions for religious or medical reasons.
Those rules have faced opposition from some workers and some labor unions.
For example, Southwest Airlines pilots’ union sought to block the implementation of the mandate, arguing it needed to be negotiated with the union. A federal judge in Texas, however, denied that request and dismissed the union’s lawsuit last week.
The union that represents American Airlines’ pilots wrote to Biden administration officials in September seeking an alternative to the mandate such as regular testing.
Executives at American and Southwest last month softened their tone over the vaccine rules, urging staff to apply for exemptions. Both carriers as well as JetBlue and Alaska said they would mandate vaccines, complying with the order.
American and Southwest have told staff they would need to receive their second shot of a two-dose vaccine by Nov. 24, the day before Thanksgiving and one of the busiest travel days of the year. Executives said they don’t expect the mandate will impact holiday travel.
The White House on Monday issued guidelines for federal contractors that gives those employers broad latitude in meeting the rules. However, Biden administration officials have said contractors don’t face a hard deadline, but they must show they’re making a good-faith effort to get staff vaccinated and have plans for masking and social distancing in workplaces.
