Putting a Stop to It
Putting a Stop to It
For some Illinois agencies, the free exercise of religion was a problem to solve
Were Illinois state agencies trying to stop religious & other objections of conscience to the Governor's covid mandates in schools?
It certainly looks that way.
Emails obtained from the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) and Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) suggest staff were aware that parents and school staff could legally request religious exemptions to testing, vaccination, and masking requirements — and looked for ways to suppress or deny such requests.
Email 1: August 2, 2021
The first email is from Judy Kauerauf, Communicable Disease Section Chief at IDPH, sent two days before Governor Pritzker issued his [unlawful] school mask mandate.
In anticipation of the order, Kauerauf asks two IDPH colleagues to join a webinar for local health departments (LHDs) focused on handling “when parents defy isolation/quarantine orders, as well as the newer issue of religious exemptions, masking, testing, and quarantine.”
Jeffrey Aranowski, ISBE Chief of Staff, is copied and includes not only ISBE and IDPH staff on his reply, but also Beth Heller, Senior Director of External Affairs for SHIELD Illinois, which had been awarded a significant contract to provide covid testing in K12 schools.
Kauerauf was also planning to discuss how to handle any religious exemptions to masking, testing, & quarantines - all of which Illinois law permitted.
Why was IDPH trying to give LHDs “strategies” for handling parent objections to isolation/quarantine orders when the Illinois Communicable Diseases code clearly lays out the process? Because parents were becoming aware that only the health departments, not their schools, have legal authority to issue isolation & quarantines orders to an individual or group of individuals. If parents began demanding those orders - rather than saying “okay” on the school’s directive - it would create a heavy workload for the LHDs.
Kauerauf knew LHDs didn’t have the administrative and legal staff to handle hundreds of orders, let alone the potential objections to such orders (which is why school nurses were unlawfully leveraged to do the health department’s job).
Having followed IDPH’s various “guidance documents” and FAQs closely, I don’t recall ever seeing mention of religious exemptions, or other objections of conscience. I’m not sure what the state told LHDs in that webinar.1 Based on my own frustrating experience with making a religious objection to masking for my daughter, it seems public schools were following someone’s marching orders.
Email 2: September 14, 2021
A second email from September 2021 suggests Executive Branch staff continued working hard to suppress objections of conscience & religious conviction.2
In a thread of messages discussing about-to-be-filed, illegal emergency rules, ISBE’s Jeffrey Aranowski again discusses “such objections”. He implies the agency has provided tips for handling those - including barring them outright - but admits the Illinois Healthcare Right of Conscience Act (HCRCA) is a barrier. “[Given] the language of the Act,” Aranowski says, “we believe HCRCA objections are likely valid.”
Indeed, they were.
The Illinois Joint Committee on Administrative Rules (JCAR) apparently thought so too, because Aranowski notes, “We know the HCRCA issue is out there and we know that JCAR members have been asking about it. For these reasons, ignoring the issue in this rule does not seem a viable option.”
Yet, the final version of the emergency rules, guidance documents, etc., made no mention of HCRCA or religious objections.
The rest of Aranowski’s email shows that ISBE, IDPH, & Governor’s Office were struggling with how to tie the emergency rules to statutory authority. No surprise there. These agencies were evidently given the order to to do whatever it takes to make the mandates look lawful. This was not run-of-the-mill emergency rulemaking — it was de facto legislation from executive branch agencies.
Who Cares?
Why should Illinois parents care about these emails now?
For starters, covid testing in schools is still being pushed for the coming school year. Only the most foolish superintendents & school boards will be participating in the SHIELD Illinois racket, which is sure to lead to some form of ostensibly mandatory masking unless parents wise up to how the state has used their children as public health pawns.
Also remember that an illogical amendment to the Illinois Healthcare Right of Conscience Act was introduced in October 20201 - and later passed by a narrow margin - rendering covid-19 exempt from exemptions under the Act. The emails surrounding parents’ religious objections cast that move in a new light. While it never made sense to say, “HCRCA applies to everything except covid,” it makes a whole lotta “cents” (and dollars) that IDPH, IBSE, and the Governor’s Office wanted to protect SHIELD Illinois’ testing contracts with schools.
But most of all, these emails matter because the First Amendment matters. Prohibiting the free exercise of religion is unconstitutional. Any agency who worked to suppress it should be sued - and any employee who was a party to it fired.
UPDATE: This content has been features in Greg Bishop’s Center Square article “Some worry a repeat of COVID-mandate ‘chaos’ could start Illinois’ school year”.
I’ve confirmed a webinar occurred, but haven’t been able to obtain a recording,
Agency counsel likely intended to redact the entire email, but missed the second part.