Amicus Briefs
Health Freedom Defense Fund v. Carvalho
CASE SUMMARY
NCLA urges the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit allow the plaintiffs’ lawsuit in Health Freedom Defense Fund v. Carvalho to proceed. The plaintiffs launched a lawsuit against the Los Angeles Unified School District’s Covid-19 vaccine mandate for employees in 2021. A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit reversed the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California’s dismissal of this lawsuit, holding that the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1905 Jacobson v. Massachusetts decision applies only to vaccines that prevent a disease from spreading. The panel found the plaintiffs had alleged facts that, if true, established that the Covid-19 vaccines do not stop transmission and so are not governed by Jacobson. NCLA asks the en banc Ninth Circuit to affirm this interpretation of Jacobson, which is consistent not only with the decision in that case but prior and subsequent Supreme Court jurisprudence as well.