UPDATE: On Friday, Gov. Pritzker announced he will seek an expedited appeal of the decision described below to the Illinois Supreme Court.
By: Mark Glennon*
An Illinois appellate court late Thursday night dismissed an appeal made by the Pritzker Administration, thereby leaving in place the February 4 lower court order that effectively ended Illinois’ statewide school mask mandate as of that date.
The new order issued by Illinois’ Fourth District Appellate Court ruled the appeal moot, meaning the particular controversy at issue no longer exists. The court noted that the emergency rules issued by state agencies that were needed to effectuate the mask mandate expired on February 13, 2022. “None of the rules found by the circuit court to be null and void are currently in effect,” said the court.
“Further,” the court wrote, “given the changing nature of the COVID-19 pandemic—which affects the State defendants’ response to the pandemic—and JCAR’s decision on February 15, 2022, it is not clear these same rules would likely be reinstated.” (The JCAR decision is described here.)
The new order means the masking decision is left up to the schools themselves, as it has been since February 4. Over 500 of the state’s 852 school districts have already dropped student masking requirements.
It will be interesting to see if Gov. J.B. Pritzker persists with the claim he made Wednesday that his statewide school mandate remained the law despite the lower court’s ruling to the contrary. We criticized that claim harshly here on Thursday. As we pointed out, the lower court’s February 4 ruling against the mandate is law, and remains such unless and until it is overturned on appeal. Now, that appeal has been dismissed, so the February 4 ruling stays in place.
Conceivably, the Pritzker Administration could also appeal the new appellate decision to the Illinois Supreme Court or try to fix the defects that voided the mandate through legislative and administrative action. Neither option, however, seems feasible or necessary given the rapid pace at which COVID is receding, growing sentiment against school mask mandates and, as the appellate court noted, doubts about reinstating the key agency rules.
*Mark Glennon is founder of Wirepoints
Further reading from Wirepoints and others on this subject:
- Gov. JB Pritzker’s false and irresponsible claim that we ‘still have mask requirement in the State of Illinois for schools’ – Wirepoints
- The Mask Is Off: Illinois Has No Science Behind Its School Masking Mandate – Wirepoints
- How the CDC Abandoned Science – Tablet
- The Case Against Masks at Schools – The Atlantic
- Masking: A Careful Review of the Evidence – AIER
- More than 150 Comparative Studies and Articles on Mask Ineffectiveness and Harms – Brownstone Institute
- Did Mask Mandates Work? The Data Is In … And the Answer Is ‘No’ – Bloomberg
- Growing calls to take masks off children in school – NPR
- Politics Getting Bad For Those Using Children As Human Covid Shields – Wirepoints
- That Study of Face Masks Does Not Show What the CDC Claims – Reason
- Why Americans Can’t Trust the CDC’s COVID-19 Advice – Reason
Some Illinois lawmakers continue to deny that covid aid and other federal stimulus bailed the state out of its fiscal mess. But a look at past and projected revenues from COGFA shows just how much the bailouts blew out the state’s revenues. And now that they’re over, how much harder it will be for Illinois revenues to grow.
Election integrity – both real and perceived – is essential to government’s legitimacy and stability. Illinois, like the rest of the nation, better fix its problems now.
Ted joined Dan and Amy to talk about Chicago’s latest bond offering, why Chicago’s dismal home value growth is due to poor policies, the next $70 million to be spent on migrants, the 9% salary hikes demanded by the CTU, and why Illinois lawmakers voting to stop Chicago’s selective enrollment schools from being closed is hypocritical.
Weekly crime statistics from the Chicago Police Department: Report through 4/21/2024.
Illinois just suffered the lowest presidential primary turnout since 1960, according to the Illinois State Board of Elections. Blame voter apathy on a lack of competitive elections. On gerrymandering. On the concern people have, thinking their votes don’t matter. It’s likely a little bit of each.
it’s important for the fully vaccinated to build antibodies
Question is, does the Ill SC take the case or tell him to pound sand?
My kid’s school board voted to go optional tonight.
Thanks DeVore!
This fat punk is eating crow now,oh wait,i forgot,JB will eat anything
Does the court have the power to order fat boy to appear and be held in contempt of the order? Wouldn’t that be a treat.
This is a blessing in disguise for Gov. Toilets. He has got to know that getting the mask mandate reinstated would be a long, uphill battle, and an extremely unpopular one if he got it done. Now he can shrug his shoulders to the teachers’ unions and say he gave it his best shot, but it’s out of his hands. Never mind that it lawfully was never in his hands in the first place.
CTUs negotiated covid protections with CPS requires masking through August. Does any other school district have a similar negotiated covid protections with teachers unions? I assume court dismissing JBs mask mandate would NOT negate CTU negotiated covid contract? Or in other words CPS kids and parent are screwed til August, thanks JB!!!
Devore filed paperwork to bring the CPS chief into court I believe on 2/25 to explain why kids in CPS are still masked. Devore said that union bargaining agreement argument is without merit and IIRC Devore said he will be asking the court to sanction CPS for making such a frivolous argument without any basis in law.
Seems if CPS is stuck with CTUs negotiated covid mask requirements through August, thanks to jb signing bill giving CTU ability to negotiate over anything while the rest of state is mask-less, then this is case #1 for republican gov candidates to go after Amendment 1.
The teachers themselves will prove it is without merit when they themselves stop masking up, which many will do. We negotiated for you to wear masks like you wanted, now wear them or the deal is broken. The kids are not part of your agreement, just the union, now wear your mask.
If the unions get that constitutional amendment approved, NOBODY would ever have the authority to undo what’s in the collective bargaining agreement. I hope voters remember than in November.
It only holds up if teachers refuse to unmask themselves, I would think. If a teacher goes to work now with no mask, they are basically saying, “we don’t need the covid protections”. Look ma, no mask. The union is now in a position to mandate that all union member teachers be masked in front of their unmasked classes.
The language of the temporary restraining order “in no way restrains school districts from acting independently from the executive orders or the IDPH in creating provisions addressing COVID-19,” according to the appellate court’s ruling, referring to the Illinois Department of Public Health. “Thus, it does not appear the school districts are temporarily restrained from acting by the court’s TRO.”
Unfortunately it sounds as though CPS and other districts can still implement mandates as they see fit.
CPS can implement mandates for provisions such as social distancing, remote learning, cancelled school events, etc. But the order was explicit: they cannot contact trace, quarantine, force testing or require masks. The order was explicitly clear about that – IDPH is the exclusive authority for those particular measures. IDPH cannot delegate these particular quanatine or modified quarantine measures to school districts. CPS’s frivolous argument is that the union contract forces kids to wear masks for safety reasons. Devore has said that argument has no legal authority and is frivolous – and if you read the TRO closely, it says that… Read more »
“The order was explicitly clear about that – IDPH is the exclusive authority for those particular measures. IDPH cannot delegate these particular quanatine or modified quarantine measures to school districts.” From the appellate court ruling. “We note the language of the TRO in no way restrains school districts from acting independently from the executive orders or the IDPH in creating provisions addressing COVID-19. Thus, it does not appear the school districts are temporarily restrained from acting by the court’s TRO.” The appellate court seams to disagree with you. This language will provide more than enough cover for CPS to do… Read more »
And if the CTU somehow wins its negotiated right to wear masks, and CPS continues to enforce a mask mandate on students, CPS will lose another 10-20K students next year to private schools. It’s like watching the movie Dumb and Dumber
hot off the CTU taxpayer funder shakedown express—Thanks JB!!!
https://www.ctulocal1.org/posts/despite-appellate-court-ruling-our-safety-agreement-with-cps-is-binding/
this ones good too, about all the other bills CTU is pushing thru legislature–Thanks JB!! The voter/ taxpayers are just an irrelevant joke.
https://www.ctulocal1.org/posts/2022-legislative-update/
Pigster believes he is above the law, he’s a democrap.
This decision was a disappointment and a cop out. In her dissent, Justice Holder White said: I find that issue is not moot where defendants asserted the Governor implemented masking, exclusion, and testing through the executive orders pursuant to his authority under the Illinois Emergency Management Act (20 ILCS 3305/7 (West 2020)), and plaintiffs challenge that authority. Thus, I would find this issue is not moot. As it stands, the majority’s decision leaves open the question of whether the circuit court properly enjoined the enforcement of the executive orders. She is absolutely correct. The Court could have used this opportunity… Read more »
In my view, that scathing, sweeping opinion you would have liked should have been issued long ago based on fundamental Constitutional rights and affirmed by the Illinois Supreme Court. Had this court based its ruling on that, however, it would likely have been overturned by the more political top court. I think the mootness rationale was very sound. I don’t think the dissent is important because (and I admit this is unclear so other lawyers’ opinions are welcome) it seems to address only the temporary restraining order, which is a somewhat separate issue applicable only to the named plaintiffs. The… Read more »
The mootness issue is sound but it’s the easy way out without making a ruling. It’s making a decision without making a decision.
As for the dissent, it is not authoritative, and IANAL, but she said Plaintiffs challenged JB’s authority to implement these measures by his Executive Order – the exact issue the TRO addressed. By saying it’s all moot – the court didn’t even address whether Judge Grischow’s opinion was correct or not. They just ignored the issue altogether. So Judge Grischow’s TRO order stands unchallenged now and JB can still run around claiming it’s not legal and errant.
Pritzker needs to come clean and apologize to the court and the people of Illinois for his reckless politics with masks. Anything less shows Pritzker is unfit to lead.
He has proven he craves power … absolute power.
Not the individual you want in power.
The legislature should have ended his emergency powers months if not a year ago.
Remember this chaos in November.
I agree, especially the last line, not only as to the Governor’s race, but the constitutional amendment.
Until I see cows flying, I won’t start combing the internet for a story on the apology.
The Joint Committee on Rules’ excuse for not reinstating Pritzker’s mask mandate was that the Appeal Court hadn’t yet ruled. Now it has, concluding that Pritzker’s appeal of another judge’s ruling was a moot point because the mandate in question expired on 2/13. Further, the court wrote that their uncertainty that JCAR would approve the mandate if asked also influenced their decision. Implying, of course, that JCAR could approve a mask mandate of some sort to replace the one that expired on 2/13, if it wanted to. I wonder if Pritzker goes back to JCAR, putting legislators in the position… Read more »
It is not at all clear to me that the JCAR ruling was that important to the court’s decision. Yes, they cited the JCAR ruling and it bolstered the appellate court’s decision. But even without the JCAR ruling, it seems to me that the the court said the whole process by which the two agencies amended their rules violated the statutory due process required by IL law. In other words, if JCAR had said OK, I suspect the court would have said the case is not moot but then invalidated the new rules just as the trial court did.
It seems that if Pritzker goes back to JCAR with a new mandate, changed in some way from the one that expired on the 13th, that JCAR is no longer going to be able to avoid considering it by hiding behind the circuit court’s ruling which Pritzker appealed. I think that JCAR will have to rule on the “replacement” mandate. This leaves the original plaintiffs in the position of having to request a new TRO in response to the new mandate, should JCAR approve it. Particularly when the Appeals Court was, as is pointed out in Justice White’s dissent, careful… Read more »
Hopefully JB sticks his fat finger in the air, realizes which way the political wind is blowing, and moves on. It would be playing right into Republicans hands to implement a new statewide school mask mandate while virtually every other state (except NY and CA) are in the process of lifting theirs, especially now after two weeks, there hasn’t been any increase in cases in those schools that have been mask free since 2/4.
I had the same thought, it’s a circular argument, the issue is moot because JCAR suspended the rule, but JCAR suspended the rule because the court issued the TRO, waiting for the outcome of the appeal, but the appellate court didn’t decide any issues, so the basis for JCAR suspending the rule is also moot, which leaves us back to where we were, with JB Pritzker saying “This is one errant ruling from one judge, in one county, and it doesn’t keep us safe blah blah blah”
Nice work following up on these, Mark.
Will be used at my kid’s Special school board meeting this evening.
If he is smart, he plays this like so:
1) He tells the Karens he tried, but those wicked courts! We need more progressives to ‘keep us safe’! Throws up his hands in exasperation!
2) And then secretly rejoices, as the pesky issue is removed from his fat, sweaty hands.It’s not his fault! 😉
JB is insufferable – an arrogant fool who is unfit to be Governor. HEY JB, ever hear of the concept called “the Rule of Law”? Shame on JB and his toadies and continuing shame on the do nothing ILL legislature.
Hey JB, I guess the good guys win this time. Okay parents, now that you’re aware of what is happening in our schools, don’t stop! Let’s return to teaching Science, Math, Technology and English.
Pugsley will have a red faced, sweaty, fat kid temper tantrum — and demand that his flying monkey lawyers file every possible appeal.
Hmm, now which red-faced, sweaty, fat guy with flying monkey lawers to file every possible appeal are you talking about here? I can think of two guys immediately but from different political parties. One here seems to be heaped with praise and the other derided on this website. ’tis a puzzlement.
I’m trying to remember the last time I read something from someone on this website that “heaped praises” on Donald Trump.
Which, even if that were true, would have nothing to do with Pritzker’s many faults and failures.
The fact that Trump is often a bloviating juvenile gasbag doesn’t mitigate Pritzker acting in the same way.
I agree with your point of view, but Msksks’s characterization seem a bit funny to me since I could easly see that same characerization being for another guy probably more to his liking.
JB! — Why So Edgy Today? — Did You Miss Having Your Third Breakfast?
kinda like when he was 12 years old and mommy wouldnt let him eat the entire package of oreo cookies!??