URGENT: ACLJ Takes Emergency Action At The Supreme Court

Breaking today on Sekulow as the ACLJ takes emergency action at the Supreme Court. Keeping you informed and engaged. Now more than ever, this is Sekulow. We want to hear from you.

Share and post your comments or call 1-800-684-3110. And now your host, Jordan Sekulow. Welcome to Sekulow. If you saw my social media you may have seen this, but for most of you probably not, that on Saturday we filed emergency action before the US Supreme Court, Saturday evening, late into the evening. This is because on Friday evening the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals lifted the stay on the Biden Administration's vaccine mandate for businesses with 100 or more employees that was scheduled to go into effect January 4th. Now technically it still goes into effect as it stands at this moment on January 4th, but the enforcement would not begin until February 9th.

So it would give companies an additional 30 days or a little bit more than that to figure out how they were going to do this, watching people get tested who aren't vaccinated, putting that into a system, creating new databases. So what did we do? We represent the Heritage Foundation in this case. We filed emergency action at the Supreme Court on Saturday evening. So our team was working through the weekend through the late hours because this came out Friday evening to get this filed.

It's up on the screen right now if you're watching it. It's asked the court to do what two things. One is a stay, but second is and or to grant cert to hear the arguments in this case specifically on an expedited basis. So we're going to explain all this for you today, but this is again an emergency action. So far we have not heard anything out of the court yet. We just did. So we got this just a few minutes ago, but now that I've actually seen the copy.

So here's what the Supreme Court has now said. They said your application for stay has been submitted. So they acknowledge that they've received it. It will be reviewed once the hard copy is received. So I just sent a text out to our staff to make sure the hard copy, because it was over the weekend and the building's really closed.

So there's, but there's ways to submit it. And we're right across the street. Our office is right literally across the street from the Supreme Court of the United States.

We are their neighbor. So all we have to do is get Ben or Christie or someone to walk it over and file it. So I just sent a text just now to our team and let's verify that we have, will if we could, let's verify that we have in fact submitted the hard copy and that that will then trigger the process.

Is that unusual during this time where they've been operating sometimes remotely, sometimes in a person that they would rely on something like that? Or is that just the court buying more time? I think what's happened is this is this move very, you know, surprisingly quick out of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.

I think, I don't know if anybody was prepared. I mean, in that sense, I mean, we did, I mean, obviously we were in the five or six petitions that have been filed because they were filed within literally, you know, we filed those petitions within hours after the decision came out, within a day of when the decision came out. But this is, I'll go to Andy on this. We've done this before. Stays are, and we need to be clear on this.

We'll get into it more on the, we worked tirelessly and Abby Sutherland and Eric Zimmerman, Ed White, our team, Miles, Jordan, all of us did it. Andy, Harry was working on, I mean, we probably had what, eight lawyers, I guess, eight lawyers working on this over the weekend. But getting a stay is not an easy thing, Andy. It's not.

No, it's not. I think over the years, I think you've gotten maybe over 40 years, maybe you've gotten five or six stays and those have been mainly in First Amendment cases in which there is the First Amendment was implicated and things like that, but it's not an easy thing to get. And I think on a case like this, I think it's going to move very, very quickly. If they grant any kind of relief, it's going to move very, I think by the end of the year, this case will be over.

I think that is correct. And I also think that the Supreme Court will be under enormous pressure to move expeditiously. And I also think the American people will want the Supreme Court to come up with a decision soon.

The interesting thing is that they've not issued an administrative stay yet. So we'll talk about what all that means when we come back from the break. But folks, if you're on any of our social media platforms, share this with your friends. Yeah, absolutely.

Share it with your friends and family. Also, there's big news. Senator Joe Manchin did the right thing. He did what his constituents wanted, which is come out and said, no, I'm a no vote on Build Back Better, Build Back Bad, whatever you want to call it.

It's dead because of Senator Manchin. He deserves credit for that move because it's under tremendous pressure from the Democrat Party, as you've seen in the media as well. Which means we beat the IRS. We'll talk about that, too, as well, the broadcast today. So we're going to get to that as well. Support our work at ACLJ.org.

You can double the impact your donation. Again, working through the weekend to defend your rights. Again, at ACLJ.org, double the impact matching challenge through the month of December.

We'll be right back. At the American Center for Law and Justice, we're engaged in critical issues at home and abroad, whether it's defending religious freedom, protecting those who are persecuted for their faith, uncovering corruption in the Washington bureaucracy and fighting to protect life in the courts and in Congress. The ACLJ would not be able to do any of this without your support.

For that, we are grateful. Now there's an opportunity for you to help in a unique way. For a limited time, you can participate in the ACLJ's matching challenge. For every dollar you donate, it will be matched. A $10 gift becomes $20.

A $50 gift becomes $100. This is a critical time for the ACLJ. The work we do simply would not occur without your generous support.

Take part in our matching challenge today. You can make a difference in the work we do, protecting the constitutional and religious freedoms that are most important to you and your family. Give a gift today online at ACLJ.org. Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected is there any hope for that culture to survive. And that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn.

It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, the play on parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life.

Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift. Let's start with where this occurs. So back in November, November 29th, we file on behalf of the Heritage Foundation. We represent the Heritage Foundation in federal court. This case gets consolidated. So we file in D.C., but it gets consolidated to the Sixth Circuit. The Fifth Circuit has a stay that prevents this mandate from going into effect. That's what the Sixth Circuit then decided they would put out a decision on the stay. It was a three-judge panel.

It came out on Friday evening, so just last week, but after we were on the air, it's Friday evening, and we filed by Saturday evening. We were filing at the U.S. Supreme Court, by the Sixth Circuit, on two different asks. One is an emergency stay, two is and or a granting cert. So granting certiorari to hear the case. People need to understand what the case is. We've challenged the mandate from the federal government aspect. We've always said the state governments have the authority to do this. It's within their state power. The federal government does not. But here's what's so interesting, and we represent the Heritage Foundation, which has been an early promoter or early supporter of vaccine options.

We have been as well, but we don't think the federal government can mandate this. Now, what's interesting about this, there's a couple of things interesting about procedurally. This took, I mean, I'm holding the brief in my hand, folks. This is a lot of work in a, I mean, you're talking about a tremendous amount of work in a number of hours.

To put an application, let me read exactly what it says. It's called a Heritage Foundation's Emergency Application for Stay of Agency Action, Pending Judicial Review and for an Administrative Stay and Petition for Writ of certiorari before Judgment. So it's a, we've got three asks in the pleading. What's important here is there's been about six of these filed now. There's, I think, 132 plaintiffs in these cases.

Six groups, since law firms have now filed, all of which, three of which I'm very good friends with. We thought it was, there was a decent chance we were going to get an administrative stay this weekend of the order. We did not. So we'll get into what that exactly means. But Harry, the legal issues here are significant and we just made it a legal argument. We're not getting into science.

We're not getting into medicine. It's the legal argument. It's the statutory authority arguments. It's the constitutional federalism principles that are at stake here.

I think that's precisely correct. So really two issues come to the fore. Number one, the Commerce Clause, and then number two, the constitutional grant to states of police power, which the Supreme Court has routinely supported. And so I think you can make very solid legal arguments that the emergency standard issued by OSHA exceeds the authority of the federal government because the commerce power, at least as defined by the Sebelius case, that is the Obamacare decision, basically upheld the Obamacare mandate, not on the basis of the Commerce Clause, but on the basis of Congress's power to tax.

That's number one. Then number two, if you go back to the Jacobson case, which was decided in around 1906, in that particular opinion, the Supreme Court upheld the right of states to engage in police power action designed to protect their citizens. The Biden administration has blown through all of these constitutional safeguards, largely for, this is my view, political purposes, but we have attacked this initiative largely on the basis of the Constitution itself. But there is an interesting thing here, an issue that has developed, Andy, and that is surprisingly George W. Bush appointee, Judge Gibbons, a very good judge in the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, ruled in favor of the mandate.

And that's got everybody kind of scratching their heads. There was a strong dissent in the case. And then two days before when there was an en banc request, it was denied, which included conservative judges.

Yeah, that's true. It seems that the conservative judges, yes, the Bush appointee judges are not falling in line with the conservative and federalism concepts that we hold and cherish to be so important to us. And I'm disappointed in seeing that, but I understand that that's how judges are. Once they get confirmed and appointed, they sometimes take positions- I don't want to- Andy, she's a conservative judge. I mean, you see, she's at a consistent conservative position. She just said they're not going to put their view in for the health and safety of OSHA.

It's just surprising that we've got conservative judges that are doing this. Now, I have said from the beginning that this is an uphill battle. In the next segment, we'll get into what that means. But people need to understand, our audience needs to understand, your team here at the ACLJ, our team worked tirelessly. I'm counting now. Here are the lawyers that were working on it.

Jordan, me, Andy, Harry, Abby, Ed White, Eric Zimmerman, and I'm probably leaving some people, Christy, yeah, Christy Sierhoff was on it, as well as, I'm trying to think, I leave, Laura Hernandez and Miles. So we had basically 10 lawyers on this all weekend. Now, actually, we got this done in 24 hours. So I'm holding in my hand again what we filed. We have filed with the Supreme Court of the United States to Brett Kavanaugh as the Associate Justice of the Supreme Court and the Circuit Justice for the Sixth Circuit, which means he's in charge of what happens in the Sixth Circuit. He could technically, he could technically, Jordan, grant the stay himself, or he could deny the stay himself, or he could refer it to the entire court for determination.

That's right. And so this is what's interesting here is you got to think about, you know, is Kavanaugh with this 24-hour delay that we've seen where usually you would get some kind of order initially on the stay. It could be something that only stays for a few days, like the administrative stay, which, you know, we've talked about, but that does this, is it more likely that he's getting feedback or he can refer this to the entire, all nine justices. So that's the question here is it's the briefing schedule. Now we were told by the court, they were waiting for the hard, they're waiting for the hard bound briefs, but that doesn't mean they do have the, what's been filed. So again, they bought a little bit more time there. I guess that they're saying they wouldn't put a decision out before then. They got that from the printers, which everybody, even if you filed on Saturday, these printers were not open till today. And so we're going through that right now. And so they'll have that delivered today, which means, again, that that will no longer be a bar to them issuing some kind of an opinion, but just to understand what the ACLJ team can turn around, what I'm holding my hands here, it's 22 pages filed before the court, but it's almost 40 pages that you had to file.

This was all done in less than 24 hours on that for Heritage Foundation. With a three-part ask, an emergency application for a stay, an administrative stay, and a writ of petition, the alternative writ of petition for certiorari before judgment. So there were three what are called extraordinary requests for relief that we filed.

And listen, figuring out what rules to comply with. I spent a night, and I know others did too, looking at what rules could be applied when the decision came down Friday to make sure we could get before the court. But you know, Andy, we're now before the court, and in the next segment, we're going to talk about likely outcomes, but this was a monumental effort. It was a monumental effort. It was an effort that was put forward by a lot of lawyers working many hard hours, Jay, and as you and I worked Saturday night, looking at even commas and colons and periods, and whether or not we had the adequate sources cited in the case and in the brief. And those are important little things, but it makes a difference between a good brief and a mediocre brief, and I think we filed an outstanding product on behalf of our client in the Supreme Court of the United States. We'll just see what happens. Yeah, no, I think we served our Client Heritage Foundation very well, and our lawyers did a great job, and I would say thank you to all of them, and I know you are listening audience.

Those of you that are watching would say the same thing. Thank you. It was a monumental task. It's just phase one of this task. When we get to the next segment, we're going to talk about what phase two looks like. It could be very, I will preview the next segment in one little thing, Jordan, and that is this could move unbelievably quick, because the implication date, the date of its implementation is January 4th. They're letting the, they're not going to, penalties start till February 9th, but the scenarios of difficulty with complying with this are unbelievable.

That's right. I mean, so for instance, there's been people talking about, Topeka, where you are in the country, this idea that you could just go buy the $20 test at the store, at the Walgreens, or at your CVS, or at a grocery store. Sometimes you walk in and they've got plenty of them, and sometimes you walk in and they don't have any, and so what if you'd walk in on Sunday to do it for Monday, and remember, it's the employee has to, I think, provide the test. The employer could, but the employee, in this scenario, the burden is on the unvaccinated employee. And then there's plenty of burdens on the employer too. But then the employer's got to come in and you've got to designate someone as a test watcher.

So not just someone to take. So you're exposing them to potential virus. They have to sit there for 15 minutes of the workday. With this other place, you've got two employees sitting there for 15 minutes. There could be 20 employees taking it. Based off a test that they administer themselves, so you don't have any safeguards in place. For instance, what happens if one of those employees then tests, it comes back negative, but then they end up spreading it and there's cases in your place.

Is someone liable? Because we know these tests are pretty accurate, but they're not 100% accurate, and all of those questions come to play. This database that you would then create on your employees. You also would have to get all of your employees who were vaccinated, all of their cards, and at least have some kind of, I guess, copy.

You'd have to get copies of those, file those away. And that's a changing definition as well. Right now, that's two shots, but in a month that might be- It's going to be three.

Three. And so then you've got to go through all of your employees and say, okay, the ones who are vaccinated now, I got to go through that process again because of what they've mandated is what it means to be vaccinated. So you see the issues here. That's why you support our work at ACLJ.org.

This again, it's a federal power grab. Donate online today if you can. Be part of our matching challenge this month of December at ACLJ.org.

We'll be right back. Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected, is there any hope for that culture to survive. And that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn.

It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, playing Parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life. Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift. At the American Center for Law and Justice, we're engaged in critical issues at home and abroad. Whether it's defending religious freedom, protecting those who are persecuted for their faith, uncovering corruption in the Washington bureaucracy, and fighting to protect life in the courts and in Congress, the ACLJ would not be able to do any of this without your support.

For that, we are grateful. Now there's an opportunity for you to help in a unique way. For a limited time, you can participate in the ACLJ's Matching Challenge. For every dollar you donate, it will be matched. A $10 gift becomes $20.

A $50 gift becomes $100. This is a critical time for the ACLJ. The work we do simply would not occur without your generous support. Take part in our Matching Challenge today. You can make a difference in the work we do, protecting the constitutional and religious freedoms that are most important to you and your family. Give a gift today online at ACLJ.org.

Hi, welcome back to St. Kilo 2. I want to open up the phone lines to you as well. 1-800-684-3110. So if you've got questions about this, questions about how it could impact you, you could be a small business owner and still this. They talk about this for big companies, but they're talking about 100 or more employees and not in one location. Which in the United States is considered small business.

Right, right. But the way that they've done this is it's a large, these are for a large business mandate, but this would impact you if you've got 40 people somewhere, 40 people somewhere else, 20 people who never go into an office, but they would still count that. Now those people who never go into an office, you don't have to go to their house and test. They do accept those people out. They also have an exception for people who work outside. I don't really understand how that works because even people who work in construction, who work on the roads, they still clock in. They pick up vehicles.

They're in, they're also transporting in close places with each other because they're in trucks. So I'm not sure who that applies to, which again is another thing that OSHA is really not also ready to implement this into place. Okay, we just got, we got some breaking news here. We are docketed.

Our case number is 21A249. The government response is due December 30th. So they're giving them a week, 10 days to respond.

It's through Christmas. No stay yet. No stay yet. So wait to see.

So, well, by the day they witnessed the stay. Can we get, can I actually have the, we're talking live on air here. Can someone print for me the actual, from the Supreme Court website, the order, what they, what they just said? Okay. So we are docketed. Our case number is 21A249. Government's response is due December 30th. I wonder if, do they have a request for a response from us in that? Get me the order.

I need the order because that's going to tell me what they have. And it's kind of moving as we anticipated. They gave, they gave the government a little bit more time to respond than, than I would have thought, but they have not at this point issued a stay. No stay has been issued, but now 10 days has been given to the government to file a response to the heritage provisions found, foundations application for relief from the Supreme Court of the United States.

That's moving very quickly. I think something is going to happen before the first of the year. Well, I mean, it's briefed by the 30th. It depends if they give us a reply. Normally they may not hear. They may say, you get your, you know, normally it's a reply, but let's go ahead and take a call. And then I've got an economic question for Harry.

And Harry, let me tell you what I'm thinking. When we put this in our brief, there is an employee shortage right now. There is a supply chain problem. What does this do economically when you add all, and you've got a surging number of COVID cases.

What does it do economically to the country when all this goes on? But let's go ahead and take that phone call first. Rina calling from California online one. Hey, Rina, welcome to Sekulow. You're on the air. Thank you so much.

No words can describe how thankful we are to the Lord for all of you. So Jay, I want to know this, the Congress just ruled that we, that that, um, they cannot mandate the vaccine for businesses. So, so how is it that you have to now all of a sudden run to the Supreme Court and do this?

Can you help us understand that? That was a Senate resolution opposing, uh, opposing the mandate. It does not stop the mandate. And if, remember anything that went through that, if it, let's say the House did also adopt that, which they wouldn't under Pelosi, but let's say, you know, the change happens in the next election cycle. You get one of these. Well, Biden can veto it.

It's just like any other. So he, so there's not really, there's the, the thing is you can get legislative, you can get them out on the record on it, that they don't believe that the federal government, which they're part of too, has the power to do this and should not be doing this. And you had two Democrat senators, it was Joe Manchin and Jon Tester out of Montana. And I think this goes to an interesting point.

Tester is, is pretty much a party line guy. But he's worried about the economic impact. He's also looking at a place like, uh, uh, where he represents like in Montana, where the mat, where even the big employers, I mean, there's a lot of space in Montana and the idea that you're going to put the same kind of, uh, uh, requirements on companies in Montana that you would put on, uh, companies that are operating in New York city is, is, does it make a lot of sense? And also look at how companies are self governing there.

You always do that in law. You look at the, what's a reasonable company doing? And the big companies where these outbreaks are happening are sitting people home. So they don't need a mandate to do it because they don't want their employees dead.

So they need, uh, and they don't need, they don't need all their employees out of, you know, sick where they can't operate. So they, they do, they, they take the measures. We took measures here.

Uh, there was, uh, uh, you know, filtration system. They're doing it without being mandated by the government. People are acting in a responsible way at both the mega corporation level. And I think of the small business level as best they can. No, I mean, we put in a, a, a expensive high-end filtration system because we're production studios and additional offices. And it's, it's space where we put all these air filters.

And I mean, I mean, they're, they're running right here right now. Nobody mandated that we did it. We just did it because it was smart, but there is real economic consequence here, Harry, to all of this, right?

Absolutely. So it increases the level of economic uncertainty going forward. Uh, employers will doubtlessly lose some employees with respect to the full implementation of this mandate. Uh, number two, it will likely expand what is called the underground economy.

In other words, it might be legal activity, but it will be off the books. Um, it may or may not influence the rise in independent, uh, uh, contractors, uh, who actually deliver services, uh, to employers. Uh, but I also think at the end of the day, this particular approach by the federal government, uh, ignores the possibility, uh, that natural immunity will be a helpful going forward. Uh, apparently something like a hundred million Americans have had COVID and have recovered. Uh, and so certainly those individuals that have natural immunity and let's say they've had one injection of the vaccine, uh, then the question becomes whether they would be considered fully vaccinated, even if at the end of the day, they may be seen as less of a threat, um, to their fellow workers. So there are lots of uncertainties out there.

Let me give you another one. So not that there's enough work to do before the, um, as we get to the end of the year, I just got notification that the United Nations Human Rights Council is calling for briefs on the topic of whether Israel is committing apartheid. So I, we've already put a team together to respond to respond to that. So that brief will be worked on as well.

So whether it's the Supreme Court of the United States, or if it's at the UN, uh, we're engaged in this and next year, we're going to even engage in that in a higher level. So we'll talk more about that in the days ahead, but, uh, obviously do we just get the order? That's all it's okay. We got it.

So let me, you go ahead and talk to her. Let me see what it says. Uh, yeah, I mean, so what we're seeing, this order is basically, it's exactly what we said. Just all it says so far is a request by the, the justice department, uh, response by 4 p.m. on Thursday, December 30th. There's nothing in there about a stay yet.

That doesn't mean that won't come. Would that usually come in the same order or could that be what they usually administrative stays usually granted at the time of submission. So if they say nothing's at denial, do they have to come out and deny it? Nope. They could just let it sit and that's a denial. Yeah. Right now that law comes into effect January 4th.

So I mean, this is the interesting part. Now, the briefing has to be in by the 30th, which means I think that they are on that likely path to make some decision on this before January 4th. And they also, January 4th is when you're supposed to start complying. Yeah. You don't, you're not going to get fined by the government until, uh, early, uh, until February 9th. We got a busy half hour coming up.

Yes. Uh, so give us a call about this too. Um, because certainly this puts employers in a different position than they were Friday at 5 PM.

They are now in a different position and what they have to prepare for and give us a call at 1-800-684-3110 and how it may impact you as an employee. 1-800-684-3110 to talk to us on air, support the work of the ACLJ generating all of this in less than 24 hours on a weekend. That's what our team does. I'm not bragging about it, but it's the work that you support.

That's why you support us financially. If you can do so, you double the impact of your donation this month of December at ACLJ.org. Donate today. That's ACLJ.org.

Be back second half hour coming up. At the American Center for Law and Justice, we're engaged in critical issues at home and abroad. For a limited time, you can participate in the ACLJ's Matching Challenge. For every dollar you donate, it will be matched. A $10 gift becomes $20.

A $50 gift becomes $100. You can make a difference in the work we do, protecting the constitutional and religious freedoms that are most important to you and your family. Give a gift today online at ACLJ.org. Keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever, this is Sekulow. And now your host, Jordan Sekulow.

There's a lot to talk about. There's a lot of political implications to all of this. Now, first, of course, we filed an emergency application to the Supreme Court this weekend. So if you're just joining us, just to reset it for you, Friday night, the Sixth Circuit comes out and they lift the stay on the vaccine mandate for employers with over 100 or more employees. That goes into effect January 4th.

The penalties begin February 9th. And so they lift the stay. And so that came out Friday. It was a three-judge panel.

Then we represent the Heritage Foundation. We take it to the Supreme Court asking for two different kinds of a stay, but also for the court to grant cert. They've just now issued an order asking for the Department of Justice to provide briefing by 4 p.m. Eastern Time on December 30th. So exactly 10 days from right now. They have not yet issued anything on a stay for that time period in between. Now, technically, between now and December 30th, it's not into effect yet. So I don't know if they need an administrative stay for that period of time technically, but usually it would... Yeah. I mean, technically, you're right.

I mean, but normally, because you wouldn't want this thing... This is a major case, you would issue the stay pending a disposition. So even if it's expedited brief, they're giving them here 10 days to respond.

Okay. They give them 10 days to respond. They respond on December 30th. Which is not a fast turnaround for the court. First turnaround is we've done them in three days.

I mean, so this is 10 days. And then normally we have a reply chance. But also what's interesting here, Andy, is this does not... Brett Kavanaugh, Justice Kavanaugh, has not... He should be calling by his first name.

He's 23 years old. This should not be sent... Normally they would... You don't have to. It would be referred to the entire court. Does not appear that's happened either. So no stay, no referral yet.

No. I'm rather surprised that there hasn't been an administrative stay issued by the circuit Justice Brett Kavanaugh and a referral to the full court. But instead, there was a briefing schedule set for December 30th. And I actually thought that's a rather long time, Jay. I have seen them giving them three to five days. But they're giving them a whole 10 days, which is a long time in which to reply to what we have petitioned the court to do. But it's not just us.

There's five other, I think five other cases as well that are up there. But it's gonna be the same response to each entity. But what's interesting here is this is gonna move in rapid fire. This is gonna be very, very quick.

You're gonna see... I think before January 4th, Harry, we're gonna get an opinion. It looks that way anyway. I think that's very, very likely. And I think the key question at the moment is whether that opinion is simply a disposition by Justice Kavanaugh alone or whether or not the entire court takes this up.

Yeah. Hard to believe they wouldn't at least... Well, I don't wanna speculate because you just don't know. So what we do know is that the Department of Justice has to respond in 10 days to these applications for the emergency stay to the... Also on the merits to actually grant cert in this case. Again, you're not gonna have a disposition of this, it doesn't look like, until at least after the Christmas holidays, maybe before New Year's. And then it's supposed to... You're supposed to be in compliance on January 4th, they just aren't going to fine you until February 9th. No, but the law comes into effect on January 4th. Right. So when you talk about the normal holidays in the United States, and that employers have been reliant on this stay from the circuit courts.

Yes. And the fact that OSHA has said they're really not doing anything until February, but then how are they going to do it? And what is an outside employee versus an indoor employee? And then again, they have to educate the public on it, which I think they've always done a bad job of during this whole crisis, is that it doesn't mean you have to have 100 employees in one location, it means total. So literally you could have 95 people work from home, you wouldn't have to test them, but five people go to an office, this still applies to those five people the way this law is written.

I mean, it's the overbreadth, bizarre... You're exposing employees to testing and the employee that's monitoring is exposed to virus. And I mean... There's all sorts of things that you have to do. You have to have all these tests. I'll wait. Yeah.

You'd have to have a new room in your building that's going to be a testing room and a new database because you also have a database of all of your vaccinated employees. So any employees who felt like that was a personal decision, it won't be February 4th. As of right now, unless a stay is issued. Be right back on Secular. At the American Center for Law and Justice, we're engaged in critical issues at home and abroad, whether it's defending religious freedom, protecting those who are persecuted for their faith. I'm covering corruption in the Washington bureaucracy and fighting to protect life in the courts and in Congress. The ACLJ would not be able to do any of this without your support.

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Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift. All right, welcome back to Sekulow. We are taking your phone calls too. If you've got questions about this 1-800-684-3110, I would understand why you have questions about this as an employee. Listen, your employer as of right now on January 4th is going to say, give me that VAX card. I've got to at least I guess take some kind of electronic copy. I've got to create a database of this and you're going to be subject. You can't hide that from your employer. Decide that you don't want to share that information and they're going to have to create a database.

And right now, vaccinated means two shots, but that feels like, as we all see in the news, some kind of changing potentially where that might not occur. And remember, your anger should not be on your employer in this. Remember, most of these big employers, like the Heritage Foundation is one example, the conservative world of groups doing it because they've got hundreds of employees. But also, big business is also saying, we don't want to do this. I mean, and states are also filed.

So I'm looking through the list right now. I think the first one docketed was, it's the state of Missouri. And so Missouri's put it in place to say our businesses can't do this, shouldn't have to be responsible for the entire state.

Are you the Supreme Court website? But yeah. And so this again puts people in a very unique and tough position because massive fines, if they take no action, begin occurring February 9th potentially. I mean, the fines could close your business if you don't quickly get into compliance and figure out what that means. Again, there's a lot of troubling parts of this.

So if you've got questions about it, I understand and give us a call, 1-800-684-3110. We can explain where the legal process is going, but also what happens if they don't take the action to prevent this and allow the government to issue. Now, it's still being done in an emergency fashion. This is not a way in on whether they could mandate this forever. But what we see with people like Fauci and COVID is, you know, he said this weekend, he doesn't see ever airline travel without mask. So they're already looking post emergency. And I do think, again, they're letting it go into effect in January, but they're really not enforcing it till February.

We could be in a very different position than where we are right now with COVID. So again, to me, it puts a lot of burden on businesses. I mean, big corporations. Think about if you've got a thousand employees like these banks do all across the country, places like that. But even your bank, you know, your local bank connected to like Wells Fargo or whatever, they've got to do it there too. So they've got to go through this process there, even if they only got 20 employees, because they are part of a company that has thousands of employees, even if the only 20 are going into that one.

So they're really operating like a very small business. This is all the issues here. So if you have questions about it, give us a call at 1-800-684-3110. I'm looking at the court's docket sheet right now up on the Supreme Court website, and we're docketed as case number 21A.

A is for application 249. It looks like there's about eight of these filed. They're all getting the same order, which is a response to the application requested by Justice Kavanaugh due by 4 p.m. on Thursday, December 30th, 2021. So it's 10 days basically from now the response is due.

What's not in there is two things that jump out to me, Andy. One is there's not an administrative stay has not been issued of the order. So the Sixth Circuit order is still binding, which means employers have to get ready. And there's been no referral to the court. It looks like Justice Kavanaugh is going to keep this in the bosom of Justice Kavanaugh, at least until December 30th, because he has decided not to refer to the court for action. And as a circuit justice for the Sixth Circuit, he has the right to do that.

But I still think that we're going to have some definitive ruling. Excuse me? How do you not, though?

I was just thinking about this, Andy. How do you not have- 250 is in, 251 is in, at least a lot of- Since we filed, three others have filed. How do you not refer this to the court? Well, you know, it's amazing that he didn't.

I mean, it's just, you know, he doesn't have to. It's not required under the rules of the Supreme Court. But I would have thought that he would have referred it to the full court instead.

He set a briefing deadline for the government to respond by December the 30th. And I think the court is going to do something or either he is going to do something before this law takes effect. I am pretty well convinced of that. Well, I think he can either, he can on his own deny it. I mean, they have denied some of these applications before, but Harry, he could deny it. Yes, he could.

We could grant it. And certainly from a historical perspective, I'm confused as to why he would want to take this responsibility only upon himself. But again, I don't know him personally.

Here's what I'm talking out loud here, but I've been doing this for four decades. Here's what he could do. I mean, this is Kavanaugh. He's going to get it briefed before him, and then he will decide whether a stay gets issued. At that point, since the law, like you said, Jordan's not in effect, he issues- I'm not saying this is what will happen.

He could issue the stay at that point as the case is referred then to the entire Supreme Court to see if there's enough votes for certiorari. So there's a lot can happen to these, the next, well, maybe not so much is going to happen in the next 10 days unless some order came out later granting an administrative stay. We have to be ready for replies though. I think we got to get ready. But it looks like it'll be 10 days from now. So at the end of the year, so right December 30th, because then the replies potentially- Maybe he may ask for a reply.

He hasn't yet, which is interesting. So there's a lot of ways it could go. So obviously the big takeaway here is we're ready. American Center for Law and Justice is ready. Our team is ready. Your support makes a huge difference at ACLJ.org.

Yeah, that's right. And we do have people calling in. We'll get those calls ready to go, 1-800-684-3110. There are a couple more phone lines open for you if you got questions about this.

I want to shift a little bit while we've got those calls coming in, and we'll take more of your questions to Build Back Better. Again, this was a big win for conservatives, but also the idea of explaining this because it took a Democrat senator to kill this ultimately. And it has been, for all intents and purposes, Build Back Better, which included the Green New Deal, IRS expansion, $80 billion and 87,000 new agents going after you. That has been for now killed legislatively by Senator Manchin of West Virginia. So far the lone Democrat to come out, but I think he's taken flack for some of these more junior Democrats who would have a tough time facing reelection if they voted yes on this, but were facing that kind of pressure for the party. He's not as reliant on the party pressure.

He's more of his own entity in West Virginia. And he heard from his constituents. They didn't want him to vote for this. They didn't like it. He said he couldn't explain it to them. The Biden administration was not explaining it very well.

You just see their interviews. No one could explain it very well, but the heat he's taken. Listen to Ilhan Omar. So how the progressives are treating Senator Manchin for making up his own decisions. He's a U.S. Senator. He's one of 100. He's not reliant on what the Progressive Caucus in the U.S. House wants to do, and that's certainly not who he represents in the state of West Virginia.

Take a listen to Bite 12. We all knew that Senator Manchin couldn't be trusted. You know, the excuses that he just made I think are a complete bullsh**. It is really disheartening to hear him say that he has been trying to get there for the people of West Virginia because that's a complete lie. No, what he was doing was going to West Virginia and hearing from people saying, we don't want this, and he said he was not given anything to sell to the people there, not anything to say this is what it's going to do for your state in a positive way. Because the Green New Deal, that's massive industries in the state, and again, people just didn't want this.

So I think, again, he's taking the flak for probably a handful of senators who agree with him that they didn't want this politically. But you look at all these mandates, I think that when you look at the politics of all this, this is really hurting the Democrat Party. Because however the Supreme Court decides on this mandate, it's because of them that there's a mandate itself. Remember, it's because of Joe Biden. It's not because of the court.

It's not because of what your state did. It's because of what's happening in the executive branch. But that's going to, I think, completely be reflected on the House and Senate Democrats who are up for reelection, which means you could have big surprise victories by Republicans in states and districts, so at the Senate level and at the House level, that usually would not be even tracked, and might not even be tracked because it'd be too many, and they'd just start mass losses. Because not only has this President, he wasn't able to pass his big piece of legislation, so he wasn't able to deliver for Democrats or progressives. And what it's been kind of clear is that they can't do it even when they had the majority, even when they got both the House and the Senate, slim in the Senate, but still can't get it over the line. That means you've got an administration with the House, which means their members of Congress weren't willing to die on the Hill, ultimately, for their pieces of legislation. And that's a direct signal of kind of, it implicates the entire administration, but the entire Democrat party.

I think all of these issues do. We come back for the break, start taking your phone calls. If you've got questions about the mandate, questions about Build Back Better, now dead, bought because of Senator Manchin, we'll take your calls 1-800-684-3110.

That's 1-800-684-3110. If you want to talk to us on the air, let me encourage you to support the work of the ACLJ. We're going to be ready on this case. We represent Heritage Foundation, but by doing that, it's all those businesses out there and all those employees out there like you. Again, support our work. You can double the impact your donation by donating this month in December online at ACLJ.org. That's ACLJ.org.

We'll be right back on Secular. Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected is there any hope for that culture to survive. And that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn.

It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, Planned Parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life. Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift. At the American Center for Law and Justice, we're engaged in critical issues at home and abroad. Whether it's defending religious freedom, protecting those who are persecuted for their faith, uncovering corruption in the Washington bureaucracy, and fighting to protect life in the courts and in Congress, the ACLJ would not be able to do any of this without your support.

For that, we are grateful. Now there's an opportunity for you to help in a unique way. For a limited time, you can participate in the ACLJ's Matching Challenge. For every dollar you donate, it will be matched. A $10 gift becomes $20.

A $50 gift becomes $100. This is a critical time for the ACLJ. The work we do simply would not occur without your generous support. Take part in our Matching Challenge today. You can make a difference in the work we do, protecting the constitutional and religious freedoms that are most important to you and your family. Give a gift today online at ACLJ.org.

All right, welcome back to Cenk Hill. We're going to start taking your phone calls now. 1-800-684-3110.

That's 1-800-684-3110. Bill calling from Wyoming on Line 3. It's an interesting part of this question because who should decide if this does go into effect on February 4th? Who do they go after? Who are they going to be the first people to go after? Hey, Bill, welcome to Sekulow. You're on the air.

All right, thanks for taking my call. And I hope I'm asking this question right. But from what you're talking about on this mandate, doesn't that mean that this can create a list of names for people to be put on a list or filed somewhere in Washington that they can actually monitor people? Well, I mean, they're going to... Look, they're requiring the employer to maintain a list and the government's going to have access to that list because if you had a situation, people say, well, you know, my employer is going to not... I know they're not going to do this. The fines are putting you out of business.

I mean, you're talking breathtaking. Yeah, we started like... $7,000... $2,000 or $3,000 per incident per person, up to $70,000 per incident. So, yeah, there's going to be lists created. What happens with the... You know, look, we got to be clear on something, though. This is not a vaccine mandate, okay? It is either a... If you're vaccinated, you don't have to be tested. If you're not vaccinated, you get tested once a week and wear a mask.

And that's where this becomes a little bit more of a tug of the nature. You do have to provide your documentation though. You've got to provide documentation. It puts the employer in a terrible spot. They've got to create a database, just like you said, Bill.

That the government could review. They will have to create a database of the employees that are vaccinated and the employees who aren't. The employees that are, if that definition changes, you've got to go back through that again.

If it requires a booster shot to technically be vaccinated. The employees that aren't, they have to be tested weekly. They bring a test in, they have to buy themselves. I guess you said what day that'll be.

Someone has to sit with them for that 15 minutes, watch them take the test, then record the results of the test. And that's a weekly basis that creates a database. So you will know if you're in any kind of employment situation right now where it's been up to the employees to self-govern, that will be done starting January 4th with penalties beginning February 9th.

No companies can survive. And that's how these penalties are created by OSHA. And when OSHA does things that are good for employees to protect them in the workplace, the fines are crippling for a reason.

We were talking about this before, like asbestos and things like that. There's reasons why OSHA exists for the American employee. They're supposed to be protecting the employees. But what this is actually doing is freaking out employees because they're going to have to be submitting a lot of more personal data to the company, which usually only if you got insurance through your company, your insurance company handles that kind of very, again, confidential health information about you. You don't have to tell your employer all about your health issues.

Here's the problem with all of this. We don't have a real, and I don't want to get into the medicine of it because I was very clear. I was vaccinated. I've had my boosters and I believe in that science.

Everybody makes their own decision, but I've been very clear. However, it's being reported right now, right this minute, Andy, that National Institute of Health is saying that we could be seeing a million cases per day in the next several weeks, a million cases a day. And we don't know if the vaccination is going or not. We don't know what the impact is. We know there's breakthrough cases, but the breakthrough cases if you're vaccinated are much less severe.

But here's what we don't know. If you get a million cases, let me finish my statement. If you get a million cases a day, if that number is right, putting the vaccine and stuff aside, do you know what that does to the economy? No wonder the market is reacting like this. A million cases a day, Harry, would be on the economic impact of this. And that's where the Chinese government should have been held responsible for this.

Absolutely. And so this whole atmosphere is somewhat confused because according to some reports that I've seen, 97% of the current COVID cases in the United States are tied to Delta. What is unknown is the long-term impact of Omicron, which now accounts for perhaps 3% of the cases.

There is some anecdotal evidence suggesting that Omicron is less severe than Delta. I'm going to say they're all bad. Let's just say that none of them are good.

You don't want any of them. You don't want COVID, whatever version it is. I'm asking if a million people a day are actually, if these numbers are right, what does this do to the economy? Well, it certainly could lead to some form of economic collapse.

Yeah, that's what I'm worried about. And perhaps more importantly, people might anticipate an economic collapse, which then becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Well, and then the inflation continues to rise on everything because you're freaking out about toilet paper. Again, you're freaking out about, I mean, just to go to the most basic level about the basic needs that you need.

And so you start hoarding those items because you're being told every day by the media. And so that's why I think the government here needs to cut through whatever the politics of this. Let's get to the reality.

And I think that's one of the problems is by continuing to have these figures like Fauci become divisive, how about we hear some new people who say, okay, what do we really need to expect? Because or else it's going to be out of Biden's control. But, you know, Richard on YouTube wrote in, I mean, agreeing that why isn't the President focusing his energy on holding the Chinese Communist Party accountable for their cover up of the virus?

Here's why. His entire family's on the payroll of the Chinese Communist Party. They became multi-hundred plus millionaires, his brother, his son, him, everybody associated with Joe Biden.

They ain't going after them because his son right now selling $80,000 to $500,000 paintings to Chinese investors. Yeah. So here's the problem. This is what I was going to, Andy. The impact of this thing, there's no doubt it's already been very significant.

A lot of people have lost loved ones, including me, including my own family. Here's the problem. If these numbers they're throwing out are right, okay, none of this is going to make any difference. Okay.

So we got to get, like Jordan said, we got to get some real answers. Put the, we took all the politics. We didn't put any politics in our brief. It's strictly a legal argument.

Got all the politics out. Some of the briefs that were filed are pretty polemic. Ours is not.

It's just, it's the legal stuff. But none of this is going to matter if that figure of a million is right. A million people getting sick a day, if that sickness then includes serious illness. I mean, it's devastating and the Chinese government gets away with it with nothing. I think Jordan articulated that the Biden's are living off the fat of the land in China, selling pictures, having business relations and so forth. And we have never once held the Wuhan Institute and the Biden administration and the Chinese Communist Party with whom they have connections responsible for this because President Trump exposed them. He said that what it was was the China virus. It is the China virus because President Trump said it. It was immediately pooh-poohed and discredited by the Biden administration. But this has been visited upon us by the Chinese and by the Wuhan.

And I think it was an intentional letting loose of the virus. But to get to the main point, the stock market is reacting. The economy is reacting. It's reacting now. It's reacting badly. The stock market has fallen. The stocks are taking a volatility that I've not seen in a long time, up 400 one day, down 300 the next day. This is a devastating blow to the economy of the United States.

And it's a reason we have no leadership in the White House. All right, folks, again, you can support the work of the ACLJ at ACLJ.org. We're going to be all over this. Again, finally, all working through the weekend, late into the hours to get this filing into the Supreme Court.

It's there. Department of Justice has to respond in 10 days. There might not be any other action in between now in those 10 days, and then it all ramps up again. But we're going to get ready because it can move quick.

But there could be some. So they could issue a different order on this day and things like that. So follow us this week again on our broadcast, but also at ACLJ.org. You can double the impact of your donation at ACLJ.org today. So support our work if you can financially. It is a great time as we fight back against this administration's power grabs. ACLJ.org.

We'll talk to you tomorrow. At the American Center for Law and Justice, we're engaged in critical issues at home and abroad. For a limited time, you can participate in the ACLJ's Matching Challenge. For every dollar you donate, it will be matched. A $10 gift becomes $20. A $50 gift becomes $100. You can make a difference in the work we do, protecting the constitutional and religious freedoms that are most important to you and your family. Give a gift today online at ACLJ.org.