Biden vaccine policies face Supreme Court test amid nationwide COVID-19 surge

With over 100,000 Americans hospitalized for COVID-19 as a result of the highly contagious Omicron variant, the Supreme Court will hear oral argument Friday in two sets of challenges to the Biden administration’s authority to take action to combat the pandemic. In the first case, National Federation of Independent Business v. Department of Labor, the justices will consider the Biden administration’s attempt to impose a vaccine-or-test mandate for workers at large employers. In the second case, Biden v. Missouri, they will consider a vaccine mandate for health care workers at facilities that receive federal funding.

The vaccine disputes came to the court last month on an emergency basis, a procedural posture in which the justices might have generally been inclined to dispose of them with a brief order without hearing argument. But the justices instead opted to fast-track the cases for oral argument on Jan. 7 on whether the mandates can remain in place while challenges to their legality continue in the lower courts. It was the third time this term that the justices moved highly charged and time-sensitive issues off the so-called shadow docket and onto the merits docket for full briefing and argument.