Soros-funded DA faces trial for firing unvaccinated employee, Navy settles COVID vax mandate suit

Larry Krasner led a vanguard of self-proclaimed progressive prosecutors during the Trump administration, the subject of his own docuseries as well as bipartisan ire for a crime spike amid the Philadelphia district attorney's policies of declining to prosecute or deprioritizing certain crimes, including gun possession arrests and ending cash bail. 

It was part of a broader backlash against DAs funded by progressive megadonor George Soros, though unlike San Francisco's Chesa Boudin, Krasner couldn't face recall. A court blocked Krasner's impeachment trial from going forward after the Pennsylvania House held him in contempt for ignoring its subpoena request for an investigation of the crime spike.

With more than a year left in his second term, Krasner is now facing a literal trial for a different issue: the COVID-19 vaccine mandate he unilaterally imposed on his office.

The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday overturned a lower court's summary judgment in favor of Krasner and the city, saying Judge Paul Diamond "overlooked factual disputes that a jury must resolve" in Krasner's firing of assistant DA Rachel Spivack, an Orthodox Jew whose "religious beliefs preclude receiving any vaccine" and received an exemption during law school.

One dispute is whether Krasner showed religious hostility by testifying that he denied religious accommodations, exceeding the city's vaccine mandate, because "some people" are "flat-out unscientific and … not as concerned as they really should be for their fellow human beings."

The celebrity DA cited cases in which parents were incarcerated for denying medical care to their children based on their religious beliefs, testifying that "those children lost their lives because their parents were utterly unscientific in what they were doing."

"Unanswered factual questions pervade this inquiry," the three-judge panel said, and if "the mandate is not both neutral and generally applicable," a jury must determine if the vaccine mandate was "the least restrictive means of achieving [Krasner's] objective."

Its rebuke could be even more crushing to Krasner because of the optics: three women appointed by Democratic presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, two of them black.

"Due to the fact that this is an open matter, we have no comment at this time," Philadelphia DA's Office spokesperson Dustin Slaughter told Just the News, and didn't answer when asked whether it would seek review by the full 3rd Circuit.

The U.S. Navy avoided a trial last week in another COVID vaccine mandate lawsuit, settling with a class of thousands of service members – led by Navy SEALs and Navy Special Operators – with religious objections to COVID vaccines. 

They aren't getting compensation for past harms but "will now have an opportunity to have their records corrected and their careers protected," said their lawyers at First Liberty Institute and Hacker Stephens, which are getting $1.5 million in attorney's fees.

The next three promotion boards "must not consider any adverse information related solely to COVID-19 vaccine refusal" in accommodation request cases, the Navy agreed to post a statement affirming its "respect for religious service members," train commanders better in reviewing requests and revise a policy "changed during the mandate," the lawyers said.

The class includes those who chose to "voluntarily separate" after certification and had to rescind their religious accommodation request to do so, according to the settlement site.

The legal updates took place against the backdrop of most American adults now counting as "anti-vaxxers" under the Merriam-Webster dictionary definition, vaccine injury and Freedom of Information Act litigator Aaron Siri wrote in his newsletter.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention figures released July 26, from the National Immunization Survey, show that less than half of adults say they were vaccinated against influenza as of June 30 and less than a quarter each have received an up-to-date COVID vaccine and, for those 60 and up, an RSV vaccine as of July 20.

Though the city of Philadelphia is named as a co-defendant in Spivack's First Amendment and Pennsylvania Religious Freedom Restoration Act lawsuit, Krasner's behavior is the square focus of the 3rd Circuit ruling.

His office's original COVID vaccine mandate in August 2021 granted religious exemptions "absent undue hardship" following an "individualized assessment in each situation" in which the parties would "explore potential reasonable accommodations."

Scheduled to start the following month, Spivack "submitted a religious exemption request with a supporting letter from her rabbi." She was then told to fill out a form asking detailed questions about her vaccination history, prior religious exemptions, congregational membership and attendance, and "religious beliefs about diet and medical care."

Spivack responded that Orthodox Judaism doesn't have a central authority for deciding vaccine questions, that different rabbis "may come to different, but equally valid, rulings about a course of action," and that "she had not received any vaccines in the past ten years."

Krasner changed the policy in January 2022 before reading Spivack's application – testifying later that the city's policy is an "obstacle" to public health in his office – and "decided to categorically deny religious exemption requests" under his reading of the law, fear of the Omicron variant surge and "discomfort" with interrogating his employees' religious beliefs.

"No evidence shows that the January 2022 policy was committed to writing or disseminated to DAO staff," the court said, calling it a "striking oversight" in an office that "typically" communicates COVID policies in writing. 

Krasner's first assistant DA claimed "there was no change in the policy" and Krasner said he kept reviewing applications "out of respect for the time employees devoted to preparing them."

He denied Spivack's application, conveyed to her in a "prepared script" by Deputy Chief of Staff Cecilia Madden and a formal rejection letter that "bears the indicia of a form letter," the court said: It uses "gender-neutral pronouns" and entered her name "on a blank line." 

Ignoring her argument, the letter alludes to an argument often invoked by Christian objectors, that aborted fetal cells were used in the COVID vaccines' development. It said Spivack did "not present a credible claim that their opposition to the vaccine was based on their religious belief" and employees who oppose "how the vaccine was manufactured" can choose others.

Krasner testified the letter was drafted before he changed the policy and passed the buck to Madden for reviewing Spivack's application. Officials told her there were no "workarounds," including remote work, and she was fired April 8, 2022.

The lower court wrongly concluded "the mandate is neutral and generally applicable as a matter of law" without a jury determining whether Krasner's deposition "evinced anti-religious bias" and which policy he used to evaluate Spivack's exemption request, the 3rd Circuit said.

"Krasner’s comments merit particular scrutiny because he was the primary decisionmaker responsible for the vaccine mandate," the panel said. "Krasner had authority to set the terms of the mandate and to adjudicate exemption requests."

The judges faulted his "conflicting testimony" that first suggests "he maintained discretion to grant individual religious exemption requests" despite the January 2022 policy, and then that he made a "categorical" and "final decision" to not grant religious exemptions.