Biden’s “Pandemic Over” Declaration Notwithstanding  

Unvaccinated U.S. Air Force pilots who’d sought religious accommodations to federal vaccine mandates have remained grounded while those who sought medical exemptions have been returned to—or were never removed from—active flight duty.

Before a national television audience, Joe Biden openly declared “The pandemic is over. We still have a problem with COVID. We’re still doing a lot of work on it. It’s—but the pandemic is over.”

Biden's assertion weighs now on an ongoing class-action lawsuit that seeks to grant relief to over ten-thousand unvaccinated active-duty, reserve, and National Guard Air Force and Space Force members who submitted religious exemptions to the Pentagon’s vaccine mandate and were either summarily denied or await decisions still.

The U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has ordered the Air Force to halt disciplinary or separation measures enacted against the plaintiffs while the suit is heard.

By way of response to the court’s injunction, a USAF spokesperson stated: "The Department of the Air Force is complying with the court order to pause all disciplinary and adverse actions for those refusing the COVID-19 vaccine who submitted a timely religious accommodation request and fall within the definition of the court's certified class.”

Notwithstanding the Air Force’s purported beneficence, plaintiff attorneys allege that despite the Sixth Court’s order, unvaccinated pilots continue to suffer discrimination. Attorney Chris Wiest explained that the USAF, for purpose of keeping its religiously inclined pilots grounded, is attempting to invoke language deriving of a Supreme Court case on behalf of unvaccinated Navy SEALS seeking religious accommodation.

In March 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court set forth that the U.S. military has broad discretion to make deployment, assignment, and other operational decisions. The Navy subsequently undertook the specious practice of predicating deployments and duty assignments on vaccination status. The Air Force is currently endeavoring to do likewise. Ergo, the Sixth Court’s injunction has thus far had no bearing on the fates of USAF pilots pulled or suspended from flight duty because of their religious opposition to a vaccine mandate deemed broadly unconstitutional by SCOTUS itself.

Danielle Runyan, an Air Force reservist and counsel representing service members in both the Air Force and Navy SEAL class-action cases, states: "The Air Force continues to prevent its members with religious objections to taking the vaccine from performing many of their regular duties. The best example is that pilots who are unvaccinated for religious reasons have been grounded while pilots who are unvaccinated for medical reasons are flying. This will eventually lead to thousands of Airmen losing their careers because they will eventually be unable to promote to the next grade. There is nothing operational about these decisions, especially in light of the president announcing that the pandemic is over. In fact, this is a grave threat to our national security that should alarm every American.”

Congressman Don Bacon (Republican, Nebraska), a retired Air Force brigadier general, reports that he’s been in contact with numerous service members who’ve suffered workplace discrimination—including cessation of pension contributions, forced removal from specialized positions in which they’d served honorably and with distinction for decades, and outright harassment. “Based on the president’s recent statements on the pandemic, I’m personally not convinced we’ve struck the right balance between military risk and the Constitution,” Congressman Bacon remarked. “We need to consider the serious recruiting and retention problems now facing the military, and review actions taken against those who did not get the vaccine.”

In September 2022, the Pentagon's acting inspector general issued a report identifying "concerning denials of religious liberty accommodation requests from COVID-19 vaccination requirements." The report states: "We found a trend of generalized assessments rather than the individualized assessment that is required by Federal law and DoD and Military Service policies.”

The USAF’s refusal to comment on the inspector general’s report connotes the branch’s tacit repudiation of the document’s content, and substantiates counselor Wiest’s claim that: "The Air Force is trying to drive out people who have strong religious beliefs.”

FMI: www.af.mil