Following discharges throughout the military, one judge and over 4,000 Navy sailors are fighting for their right to remain unvaccinated in a massive class action lawsuit.

From Military.com. Fresh off of a Supreme Court decision that saw his previous vaccine-refuser injunction narrowed, a federal judge in Texas issued a new order Monday that turns the case into a class-action lawsuit and halts the Navy from discharging vaccine-refusing sailors Navy-wide.

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In January, U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor told the Navy that it could not discipline or discharge 35 sailors – mostly Navy SEALs – who were suing over their religious exemption denials. That order was upheld by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. Yet the Supreme Court disagreed in part and ruled that, while the special operators couldn’t be discharged, the Navy was allowed to use their vaccination status to make operational and deployment decisions.

In Monday’s order, O’Connor granted the SEAL’s request to broaden the case out to a class action that includes “4,095 Navy service members who have filed religious accommodation requests,” the ruling said. That request was filed in January, according to court records….

O’Connor’s order also notes that, given the Supreme Court’s ruling, the Navy retains the power to consider sailors’ “vaccination status in making deployment, assignment, and other operational decisions….”

In arguing against the class certification, the government’s lawyers noted that “the Navy has a compelling interest in slowing the spread of COVID-19” and noted that this “policy choice resides with the Navy, not with its service members.”

The lawyers also rebutted claims that the rejections of the service member’s religious exemption requests were a foregone conclusion, as the SEALs alleged in various filings, by pointing out that they “provide no evidence that hundreds of military officials are acting together in bad faith to issue undifferentiated denials of each service member’s request….”

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(Excerpt from Military.com. Photo Credit: Thomas Park on Unsplash)