WASHINGTON D.C. – Today, the U.S. Supreme Court issued an order inviting the U.S. Solicitor General to file a brief to express the views of the federal government in Liberty Counsel’s case Does 1-2 v. Hochul. In the petition for writ of certiorari, Liberty Counsel is asking the High Court to review the case of three New York health care workers who were fired for refusing to take the COVID shot due to their deeply held religious convictions.

Historically, the High Court asks for the Solicitor General’s views if the issue touches on something that affects the scope of federal law. In this case, the health care workers are challenging a New York state law that conflicts with Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and its protections against religious discrimination in the workplace. The New York law requires hospitals to ignore Title VII’s command for employers to provide reasonable accommodations for religious beliefs.

The Supreme Court is far more likely to grant review of a case if the Solicitor General recommends doing so.

The current Solicitor General of the United States is D. John Sauer, who is the fourth highest-ranking official in the Department of Justice, and he represents the federal government in cases before the Supreme Court.

New York’s previously rescinded COVID-19 shot mandate required that state employers force employees to get the injection but unlawfully denied religious exemptions while approving medical exemptions. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals, contrary to other circuits, denied the health care workers’ claims for religious accommodation to the shot and gave precedence to the New York law over the federal Title VII law. This directly conflicts with other decisions from the Second, Fourth, Sixth, Seventh, Ninth, Tenth, and Eleventh Circuit Courts of Appeal, which ruled that state laws must yield to federal laws regarding discrimination requirements. Liberty Counsel argued that federal law is not “subservient” to state law and now SCOTUS has agreed to review this conflict that infringes on the religious rights of health care workers. 

Liberty Counsel is asking SCOTUS to determine which law takes precedence and to ultimately reverse a lower court’s dismissal of the case for an opportunity to take the case to the discovery phase and trial.

The two questions Liberty Counsel presented in the petition to the High Court are: 

1. Whether compliance with state laws directly contrary to Title VII’s requirement to provide a reasonable accommodation may serve as an undue hardship justifying an employer’s noncompliance with Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.  

2. Whether a state law that requires employers to deny without any consideration all requests by employees for a religious accommodation, contrary to Title VII’s religious nondiscrimination provision, is preempted by Title VII and the Supremacy Clause.  

In the petition, Liberty Counsel stresses the legal precedent regarding the Supremacy Clause where “federal law is supreme over any contrary state law.” For the Second Circuit to rely on New York’s state law prohibiting religious accommodations in this case to excuse noncompliance with federal Title VII law that requires religious accommodation “is simply unacceptable under the Supremacy Clause,” wrote Liberty Counsel.

In fact, a state law at odds with Title VII is no law at all, and it must yield to the demands of federal anti-discrimination law, noted Liberty Counsel. 

Liberty Counsel represents the three health care workers against Trinity Health, Inc., New York Presbyterian Healthcare System, Inc., and Westchester Medical Center Advanced Physician Services, P.C. 

Liberty Counsel Founder and Chairman Mat Staver said, “The U.S. Supreme Court inviting the Solicitor General to file a brief in Does 1-2 v. Hochul is an important move suggesting this case has significant implications for the interplay between federal and state laws. New York unlawfully forced health care workers to choose between their livelihoods and their religious convictions without any consideration for accommodation. With a conflict in the courts, the U.S. Supreme Court is asking the federal government to weigh in on how to potentially resolve the issue when state laws conflict with Title VII protections. It is time for those responsible for unlawful religious exemption denials and firings to undergo appropriate judicial scrutiny for their actions so the fired health care workers can receive long overdue justice.”

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