TUCSON, Arizona (LifeSiteNews) – Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich blasted the city of Tucson Tuesday for mandating COVID shots for city employees, declaring the action “illegal” and threatening to have the treasury remove state funding from the city if lawmakers do not overturn the mandate.
Arguing that “COVID-19 vaccinations should be a choice, not a government mandate,” Brnovich, a Republican, told Fox News that “Tucson’s vaccine mandate is illegal, and the city could be held liable for attempting to force employees to take it against their beliefs.”
State lawmakers passed a bill earlier in the year, S.B. 1824, prohibiting local governments throughout Arizona from “establishing a COVID-19 vaccine passport or requiring … any person to be vaccinated for COVID-19.”
The bill also disallowed “a business to obtain proof of the COVID-19 vaccination status of any patron entering the business establishment.”
“Any law or ordinance establishing a COVID-19 vaccine passport is void and is not enforceable against any person or business located in this state,” the bill reads.
However, Tucson voted to require city employees to receive at least one COVID jab by August 24, whereas Arizona’s law does not come into effect until September 29. Tucson’s mandate required employees to provide proof of COVID-19 vaccination or face five days of unpaid suspension.
Following Tucson’s vote, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey (R) issued an executive order outlining that any “county, city, town or political subdivision official that implements a vaccine mandate contrary to the authorities outlined in this order, is in violation of A.R.S. 36-114 and 36-184 and such actions are punishable by a class 3 misdemeanor and subject to legal action by individuals for violation of their rights under Arizona law.”
Accordingly, violations could result in $500 fines and up to one month in prison. Yet the city did not rescind the vaccine requirement.
In fact, Tucson Mayor Regina Romero (D) responded to Ducey’s executive order, characterizing the ruling as “legally meaningless” and accusing the governor of engaging in “a deadly game of one-upmanship.”
The Attorney General’s Office (AGO), which has been investigating the legality of Tucson’s vaccine mandate for weeks, stated that the mandate was in violation of state law, noting that “if the City of Tucson does not rescind its policy within the next 30 days, the AGO will notify the Arizona Treasurer, who will withhold the city’s portion of state shared revenue until it comes into compliance.”
AGO officials noted that the state funding amounts to “millions of dollars.”
“Additionally, the AGO believes the City of Tucson could subject itself to potential liability claims if it were to take adverse action against an employee who relies on E.O. 2021-18 and state law to refuse the vaccine,” officials warned. “Adhering to the rule of law in Arizona is not optional. It’s everyone’s responsibility, including the city of Tucson.”
A city official from Tucson responded to Brnovich’s office, telling Fox News that the AG “needs to put away the political science book and try reading real science.”
Steve Kozachik, a Tucson city councilman, argued that since the city-wide mandate complied with directives from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there could be “nothing illegal about our local ordinance,” insisting that the requirement “is in the best interest of public health.”
People of goodwill can disagree about the safety, efficacy and religious implications of a new vaccine for the coronavirus.
But, everyone should agree on this point:
No government can force anyone who has reached legal adulthood to be vaccinated for the coronavirus. Equally, no government can vaccinate minors for the coronavirus against the will of their parents or guardians.
Please SIGN this urgent petition which urges policymakers at every level of government to reject calls for mandatory coronavirus vaccination.
Fear of a disease - which we know very little about, relative to other similar diseases - must not lead to knee-jerk reactions regarding public health, nor can it justify supporting the hidden agenda of governmental as well as non-governmental bodies that have apparent conflicts of interest in plans to restrict personal freedoms.
The so-called "public health experts" have gotten it wrong many times during the current crisis. We should not, therefore, allow their opinions to rush decision-makers into policies regarding vaccination.
And, while some people, like Bill Gates, may have a lot of money, his opinion and that of his NGO (the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation) - namely, that life will not return to normal till people are widely vaccinated - should not be permitted to influence policy decisions on a coronavirus vaccination program.
Finally, we must also not allow the rush by pharmaceutical companies to produce a new coronavirus vaccine to, itself, become an imperative for vaccination.
Unwitting citizens must not be used as guinea pigs for New World Order ideologues, or Big Pharma, in pursuit of a vaccine (and, profits) which may not even protect against future mutated strains of the coronavirus.
And it goes without saying that the production of vaccines using aborted babies for cell replication is a total non-starter, as the technique is gravely immoral.
However, if after sufficient study of the issue, a person who has reached the age of majority wishes to be vaccinated with a morally produced vaccine, along with his children, that is his business.
But we cannot and will not permit the government to make that decision for us.
Thank you for SIGNING and SHARING this petition, urging policymakers at all levels of government to reject mandatory coronavirus vaccination.
FOR MORE INFORMATION:
Bill Gates: Life won’t go back to ‘normal’ until population 'widely vaccinated' - https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/bill-gates-life-wont-go-back-to-normal-until-population-widely-vaccinated
COVID-19 scare leads to more digital surveillance, talk of mandatory vaccine 'tattoos' for kids' - https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/covid-19-scare-leads-to-more-digital-surveillance-talk-of-mandatory-vaccine-tattoos-for-kids
Trudeau says no return to ‘normal’ without vaccine: 'Could take 12 to 18 months' - https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/trudeau-says-no-return-to-normal-without-vaccine-could-take-12-to-18-months
Trudeau mulls making coronavirus vaccine mandatory for Canadians - https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/trudeau-mulls-making-coronavirus-vaccine-mandatory-for-canadians
US bishop vows to ‘refuse’ COVID-19 vaccine if made from ‘aborted fetal tissue' - https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/us-bishop-vows-to-refuse-covid-19-vaccine-if-made-from-aborted-fetal-tissue
** While LifeSite opposes immorally-produced vaccines using aborted fetal cell lines, we do not have a position on any particular coronavirus vaccines produced without such moral problems. We realize many have general concerns about vaccines, but also recognize that millions of lives have been saved due to vaccines.
*** Photo Credit: Shutterstock.com
Meanwhile, church leaders in Arizona remain divided on the implementation of vaccine mandates.
On August 24, Bishop Edward Weisenburger of Tucson issued a statement instructing all priests of his diocese “not to cooperate with any individuals seeking our endorsement of an exemption from vaccine or facemask mandates based specifically upon our Catholic faith.”
The prelate claimed that “[a]ll current anti-Covid-19 vaccines may be received by the faithful without moral compromise,” based on his reading of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith’s (CDF) 2020 “Note on the Morality of Using Some Anti-COVID-19 Vaccines.”
While noting that the letter clearly acknowledges the legitimacy of refusing to accept COVID jabs based on the moral repugnance of the abortion-derived cell lines used in their development and testing, Weisenburger yet insisted that “there may well be a legitimate and compelling moral obligation for one to accept a vaccination … such as in a pandemic.”
The bishop added that the CDF’s emphasis on protecting the vulnerable shows that “we have a clear moral obligation to abide by mask mandates and social distancing” in addition to taking the shot for “the moral good of the community.”
Just a few days later, however, Weisenburger’s brother bishop Thomas Olmsted, Bishop of Phoenix, released his own statement August 27 in which he defended the right of Catholics to refuse COVID-19 shots, declaring that the faithful can choose to forego the jabs “in good conscience.”
Olmsted likewise wrote that those who receive the jabs “can do so in good conscience,” following “prayerful consideration” of their personal circumstances.
The bishop maintained that it is “not for us to make medical decisions for others but rather to support the right of faithful Catholics to come to a personal decision with the help of a well-formed conscience.” Therefore, Olmsted urged employers to make provisions for individuals to object to vaccine mandates on the basis of religious and moral conviction.
LifeSiteNews has produced an extensive COVID-19 vaccines resources page. View it here.