Businesses: $700,000 Fine for Not Complying With Vax Mandate
Analysis by Dr. Joseph Mercola
October 19, 2021
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STORY AT-A-GLANCE
> Buried in the massive $3.5 trillion “reconciliation” bill are unconstitutional fines for employers who don’t mandate COVID-19 jabs or regular COVID-19 testing of their employees > Fines on employers could run as high as $70,000 for serious infractions and $700,000 for each “willful” or repeated violation The unconstitutional fines as a mechanism for vaccine enforcement would bankrupt all but the largest businesses > Calling the vaccine mandate for businesses “tyrannical,” the No Taxation Without Congressional Consent Act, introduced September 30, 2021, would prohibit the federal government from imposing a fine, fee or tax on individuals or businesses for violating a COVID-19 vaccine mandate > Buried in the massive $3.5 trillion "reconciliation" bill is an unconstitutional vaccine enforcement mechanism that threatens to bankrupt businesses unless they force their employees to get a COVID-19 injection. If the measure is enacted into law, even employers that respect their employees' rights to health freedom and informed consent would be left with an impossible decision — mandate COVID-19 jabs or essentially go out of business due to unbearable fines.
The White House announced in September 2021 that companies with 100 or more employees would have to ensure staff have gotten a COVID-19 injection or were tested regularly for COVID-19. The Labor Department's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is to be in charge of enforcing the rule, which will affect more than 80 million U.S. workers.1
In order to carry out this draconian measure, OSHA plans to use an Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) — a drastic measure used to accelerate new orders that has only been attempted 10 times in the agency's 50-year history. OSHA would also be able to enforce fines of up to $13,600 per violation of the rules — but the new measure tucked into the reconciliation bill raises the fines for noncompliance astronomically.
Before we get any further, it should be noted that the mandate doesn’t actually exist yet, in that it hasn’t been sent to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs for approval, and it’s not yet a legally enforceable mandate. Still, by announcing it as though it’s an inevitable rule, it may have the same effect of triggering workers to get vaccinated — or allowing companies to enact mandates under the veil of the government “mandate.”2
$700,000 Fines for Businesses That Don't Force Injections
On page 168 of the 2,465-page bill3 is wording that should send an authoritarian chill down the back of anyone who believes in health freedom. It outlines fines for employers that "willfully," "repeatedly" or seriously violate the labor law, including by not requiring COVID-19 jabs or regular COVID-19 testing. As Forbes reported:4
"The increased fines on employers could run as high as $70,000 for serious infractions, and $700,000 for willful or repeated violations — almost three-quarters of a million dollars for each fine. If enacted into law, vax enforcement could bankrupt non-compliant companies even more quickly than the $14,000 OSHA fine anticipated under Biden's announced mandate."
In case you missed it, that $700,000 fine is for each violation, meaning it would bankrupt all but the very largest corporations if they don't fully comply with COVID-19 jab mandates or take on the cost of weekly COVID-19 testing of their employees.
Currently, the fines only apply to businesses with 100 or more employees, but there's nothing stopping them from changing it to 50 employees — or one employee. Anything could happen at this point. Some, such as Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, have called on businesses to "openly rebel" against the OSHA rule. But as Forbes put it:5
"It's one thing to defy a $14,000 fine. It's quite another to risk incurring hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines. One or two disgruntled employees, for example, could bring an employer $70,000-$140,000 in OSHA fines. If considered 'willful,' as per Rep. Roy's tweet — just three 'violations' could quickly become a $2.1 million OSHA fine."
The Mandate Doesn’t Actually Exist
As mentioned, the mandate that President Biden announced is currently a “mirage.”6 Speaking with The Federalist, a spokeswoman for the Indiana Occupational Safety and Health Administration explained, “There is nothing there yet that gives employers any mandate. The president made an announcement on this asking OSHA to do it, but we’ve not yet seen anything come from it yet.”7
An ETS may take six months to go into effect even after the mandate is put in the Federal Register — which hasn’t happened yet. OSHA’s COVID- 19 Healthcare ETS also makes no mention of vaccine mandates at this time.8 ETS rules are also often overturned in court. In the last five decades, courts have challenged six of the 10 ETS standards that have been suggested, with five of the six getting overturned.9
However, using the ETS for the “mandate,” the Federalist pointed out, “allows the Biden administration to push its demands faster and without any public input or requirement of responding to public input, which is normally required of even legally laughable federal rule making like this one would be.”10
This may be why more lawsuits haven’t been filed to challenge the mandate — there’s nothing to challenge just yet. It’s also worth mentioning that less than 2% of U.S. businesses will be affected by the mandate, as more than 98% of U.S. businesses have fewer than 100 employees, exempting them from the mandate. Still, those 2% account for about two-thirds of U.S. employees, so they’re a sizeable minority.11
Many of these large corporations have already put injection mandates into place or were planning to. The “mandate” announcement allows these mega-corporations to mandate the jabs without having to be the bad guy.
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