Supreme Court Announces Decision on Mask Mandates on Flights

OPINION | This article contains the author's opinion.

Unfortunately, the U.S. Supreme Court has rejected a request to block a federal mask mandate for air travel.

The high court has shot down a request filed on behalf of a 4-year-old autistic boy, who is medically incapable of wearing masks for extended periods.

The justices denied the request without comment or noted dissent.

This decision upholds an executive order signed by Joe Biden that forces Americans on airplanes and other public transportation to wear face masks.

Justice Neil Gorsuch, who handles emergency applications arising in several Western states, received the filing and referred the matter to the full court. Gorsuch was nominated to the court in 2017 by President Donald Trump.

More from The Hill:

Under an executive order signed by President Biden, the Transportation Security Administration requires passengers on airplanes and other public transportation to wear masks to reduce the spread of the coronavirus, which has killed more than 850,000 in the U.S.

Joining the father-son challengers was another man, Lucas Wall, who has sought to raise money and publicity from his legal efforts targeting the federal transportation mask mandate. Chief Justice John Roberts last month unilaterally rejected a separate challenge filed by the group.

The court’s move comes less than a week after the justices issued a split decision on another set of Biden administration pandemic mitigation measures. Last Thursday, the court voted 6-3 to block a vaccine-or-test mandate for large employers but voted 5-4 to maintain a vaccine mandate for health providers at federally funded facilities.

Justice Gorsuch himself has refused to wear a mask during in-person proceedings. When the justices returned to the courtroom last fall to hear arguments in person, Sotomayor was the only one to wear a mask.

This decision by Gorsuch has sent Sotomayor off the rails. Now she is boycotting in-person attendance.

Instead, she is attending oral arguments remotely from her chambers. Sotomayor said she feel unsafe sitting next to unmasked people. Chief Justice John Roberts asked members of the court to accommodate Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s concern about Covid-19 by wearing a mask.

Despite the fact that some members of the court have refused to wear masks themselves, they will not extend this freedom to the American public who wish to use public transportation like airlines without wearing a mask.

Sotomayor has been notably out-of-touch with the American people. She was caught spreading massive lies and misinformation about Covid-19 during recent hearings over Joe Biden’s federal vaccine mandate on Americans.

In a desperate attempt to defend Biden’s drug mandate, she falsely claimed that the omicron variant is more “deadly” than the delta variant. This is inaccurate according to CDC data.

Sotomayor also claimed the nation has “over 100,000 children, which we’ve never had before, in serious condition, many on ventilators.”

Again, this is absurdly delusional rhetoric. In reality, there are between 3,000 and 4,000 children in hospitals from coronavirus, according to The Washington Post.

This statement has been the subject of numerous fact-checks, which have resulted in “false” ratings.

Sotomayor is participating remotely from her chambers as she clearly suffers from a completely false understanding of the actual data concerning coronavirus and its variants. She is guilty of using scare tactics as well as false and hyperbolic language to push Biden’s left-wing agenda.