WC Wisconsin News

Two Wisconsin-based manufacturing companies have joined the list of growing companies now suing the Biden administration and Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) over vaccine rules slated to go into effect early next year.

"The order is unconscionable,” Steve Fettig, secretary and treasurer of Tankcraft and Plasticraaft, told LaCrosseTribune.com. “OSHA does not know how to run our companies. We do. OSHA does not know how to keep our employees safe. We do. And we have done so successfully since the start of the pandemic without the interference of a federal bureaucracy. We respect our employees’ fundamental right to make their own private, difficult medical choices.”

With the vaccine mandate for private-sector workers set to take effect on Jan. 4 for businesses with 100 or more employees, the suit filed in the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago by the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty on behalf of the Darien-based companies challenges the legality of OSHA’s vaccine-or-test dictum for businesses.

Companies found in violation of the mandate face penalties of more than $13,000 per violation, or fines topping $136,000 for any willful violation.

As part of their suit, both Tankcraft and Plasticraaft argue they’ve been forced to “decide between two impossible choices, namely 'if they imposed the mandate, they will lose employees who do not wish to be vaccinated or tested weekly and precious days of productivity due to testing, vaccinations and vaccine side effects.'”

Biden moved to take action in early September, stressing his goal was to get more Americans vaccinated and finally gain control of the virus. The latest mandate is estimated to impact in the neighborhood of 100 million workers.

Under the OSHA rule, employers would also be required to pay workers for the time it takes to get vaccinated and provide sick leave for workers to recover from any side effects. As of Dec. 5, unvaccinated workers would also be required to wear masks.

Biden administration officials insist vaccinations have been effective, with only a small fraction of workers electing to leave their job instead of becoming vaccinated. But even before the final details of the rules were released, top officials from several Republican-led states warned of the damage such an order could cause including spurring greater skepticism of the vaccines and putting even more strain on an already tight labor market.    

"The holiday season is crucial for retail, and it's already busy," Retail Industry Leaders Association vice president Evan Armstrong told NPR.com. "We had already been operating with the talent shortage pretty much the entire year."

Previously, top law enforcement officials in Kentucky, Tennessee and Ohio announced challenges to the mandate just hours after the White House officially rolled out the new rules, pointing to them as a classic case of federal overreach that is both “unlawful and unconstitutional.”

Several other states have also joined forces in taking legal action and in a suit they filed individually Texas officials charge "The Biden Administration has repeatedly expressed its disdain for Americans who choose not to get a vaccine, and it has committed repeated and abusive federal overreach to force upon Americans something they do not want."