Eric Schmitt creating ‘chaos’: Jackson, St. Louis counties sue to overturn health ruling
Accusing Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt of creating “chaos” across the state with what they call a “campaign of litigation terror,” Jackson and St. Louis counties filed a legal action late Monday afternoon aimed at overturning a court order Schmitt has relied on to challenge local health regulations.
That court order by a Cole County judge last month invalidated numerous regulations of the state Department of Health and Senior Services. And it stripped local health departments of several legal powers to order measures to control the spread of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.
Jackson and St. Louis counties seek to appeal the ruling or ask for a new trial. If an appeal is granted, they ask that the ruling be stayed pending the outcome.
“Chaos now reigns in the State with respect to the administration of public health,” the counties say in a memorandum supporting their motion to intervene and stay enforcement of the Cole County judge’s ruling. “Few public health officials, local government leaders, and school boards have any idea what they are legally permitted to do or are legally prohibited from doing.”
The ruling stems from a lawsuit filed last January by a St. Louis-area resident, a church and a bar in Chesterfield that had opposed dining restrictions then in effect in St. Louis County.
They challenged local public health measures indirectly by questioning the lawfulness of certain state health regulations.
According to Jackson and St. Louis counties, Cole County Circuit Judge Daniel Green went beyond what he was asked to do when he issued his summary judgment.
Green said DHSS did not have the authority to “permit naked lawmaking by bureaucrats across Missouri.” Even though most mask mandates and capacity restrictions had been lifted at the time of his ruling, Green barred health departments from making any future rules, including quarantine requirements for school children.
“This case is about whether Missouri’s Department of Health and Senior Services can abolish representative government in the creation of public health laws, and whether it can authorize closure of a school or assembly based on the unfettered opinion of an unelected official,” Green wrote. “This Court finds it cannot.”
Schmitt represents state agencies in such court actions, but declined to appeal the ruling. A candidate to replace fellow Republican Roy Blunt in the U.S. Senate next year, Schmitt had sought to overturn mask mandates in Kansas City, St. Louis and elsewhere prior to the ruling.
Since then, he has been issuing threats of further legal action against local governments that have health restrictions in place or are considering reimposing them.
Public health institutions across the state have sought legal advice on whether they can continue to require infected patients to isolate at home or advise school districts on mask rules.
According to Jackson and St. Louis counties, the court ruling and Schmitt’s stance threaten to undermine public health departments’ efforts to control the spread of all infectious diseases, not just COVID-19.
“At the direction of General Schmitt, various counties across the State have now taken the position that public health authorities in the State have absolutely no power to order citizens who have tested positive for any communicable disease, whether that is COVID-19, tuberculosis, or any other of the myriad diseases, to quarantine or remain in isolation,” the counties says in their motion.
“In short, if the Court’s Judgment is not set aside, community spread of all communicable diseases will no doubt skyrocket in this State, while the mechanisms for combating any such spread will have been dismantled.”
The court order was to go into effect Dec. 22. But Schmitt has embarked on a campaign to enforce the ruling sooner, writing health departments and school districts across the state last week to demand they drop mask mandates, quarantine rules and other COVID mitigation orders.
The responses have varied widely. Several Kansas City-area school districts have said their mask and quarantine rules will stand, arguing the court decision did not touch schools’ legal authority to issue their own health rules. An attorney for the district in Lee’s Summit blasted Schmitt for issuing threats that the district said “not only lack legal effect — they are simply wrong.”
Other districts in the state have dropped their rules within days of receiving Schmitt’s letter. Several metro-area school boards were scheduled to discuss their COVID rules Monday night.
More than half a dozen local health departments in rural Missouri last week halted their COVID response efforts entirely. They said they would no longer investigate cases, order those infected or exposed to the virus to quarantine, or in some cases, report case numbers to the public.
The agencies called the suspensions a “huge concern” but said they had no other choice but to follow Schmitt’s “orders.” The agencies said they were awaiting additional direction from DHSS.
This story was originally published December 13, 2021 at 5:15 PM.
