AG Fitch joins 20 states in lawsuit to end mask mandate

 “It goes against reason and it is time for it to end,” Fitch said.

Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch joined Attorneys General from 20 other States in a multistate lawsuit against President Biden’s mandate that requires masks on public transportation and in transportation hubs.

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida, seeks declaratory and injunctive relief. The states argue that the mandate exceeds the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) authority.

Other states who have joined the lawsuit includes Florida, Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah, Virginia, and West Virginia.

“President Biden is using a failed interpretation of a quarantine statute to prop up a misguided mandate that harms states and businesses, as well as personal liberty,” Attorney General Fitch said. “Even states that have had strict masking guidelines are dropping them, but the President persists in forcing his mask requirements on everyone who travels. It goes against reason and it is time for it to end.”

The lawsuit states that since the COVID-19 pandemic began, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has made “unprecedented assertion[s] of power.” The Attorneys General argue that it has been seven months since the Supreme Court’s decision in Alabama Association of Realtors II made clear that the CDC cannot issue economy-wide mask mandates.

“More recently, even lockdown States like California have announced the end of their mask mandates. Still, the CDC unabashedly leaves its mandate intact,” the states said.

The Attorneys General ask the Court to:

• Hold unlawful and set aside the mask mandate.
• Issue permanent injunctive relief enjoining Defendants from enforcing the mask mandate.
• Issue declaratory relief declaring the mask mandate unlawful.
• Award Plaintiffs costs and reasonable attorney’s fees.
• Award such other relief as the Court deems equitable and just.

You can read the full lawsuit here.