Judge blocks Jackson, St. Louis counties’ attempt to fight ruling in COVID lawsuit

A Cole County judge on Wednesday rejected Jackson County’s attempt to reverse his ruling that threw out several state disease-control regulations, sending pandemic responses across Missouri into disarray.

Judge Daniel Green ruled the county, along with St. Louis County and three other local health departments, did not have the right to step into the case, which was originally a lawsuit filed by a St. Louis-area resident, a restaurant owner and a church against the state’s Department of Health and Senior Services.

Green’s original Nov. 22 ruling goes into effect Wednesday. He sided with the plaintiffs and tossed several state regulations that delegate power to local health departments to issue a wide range of orders. He called them unconstitutional and “naked lawmaking by bureaucrats.”

“All pending Motions to Intervene denied,” a court docket entry posted Wednesday said.

The decision not to allow the counties, which had not been parties to the original case, to intervene marked a victory for Attorney General Eric Schmitt. His office represented the health department in defending the regulations but refused DHSS director Donald Kauerauf’s request to appeal the ruling.

It leaves intact the ruling, which Schmitt has embarked on a campaign to enforce. A Republican running for U.S. Senate, the attorney general this month sent letters threatening legal action to health departments and school districts across the state, demanding they drop COVID mitigation measures.

Others have taken up his cause. They include parents angry over school COVID rules, a police officer who threatened a St. Louis-area school bus driver over a mask policy and Missouri State Treasurer Scott Fitzpatrick, who told school districts he would not approve bond sales to finance capital improvements if they did not comply with Schmitt’s demands.

It was not immediately clear whether the counties had any other legal recourse to challenge the ruling, which is expected to affect how health departments may respond to other diseases, such as tuberculosis and meningitis.

In response to Schmitt’s threats, several health departments across mostly-rural parts of Missouri have halted COVID response work, dropping contact tracing or requirements that those exposed to an infected person go into quarantine.

Several school districts, too, have dropped masking requirements for the next semester, though state law gives school boards the ability to implement their own rules.

Attorneys for Jackson and St. Louis counties argued it led to “chaos” across public health in Missouri.

“It bears noting that General Schmitt’s attack on local public health authorities and school districts, using this Court’s Judgment as his sword, has taken place against a backdrop of soaring numbers of COVID-19 cases and a surge in hospitalizations in Missouri,” they wrote in a Tuesday court filing.

“The stakes in this case are high.”

They were joined in their challenge of the ruling by health officials in Livingston, Cooper and Jefferson counties.

Stephen Jeffery, attorney for those three departments, wrote in a separate filing that Green’s November ruling was vague, creating “confusion and significant uncertainty concerning which local health orders and regulations are valid and which are not.”

Schmitt took the same position as the plaintiffs who sued DHSS in opposing the counties’ efforts to intervene, arguing that the counties stepped into the case too late and that only his office had the authority to decide whether or not to appeal.

“Political subdivisions and local health officials are not second-chair attorneys general,” state solicitor general Dean John Sauer wrote. “Only the Attorney General has the final authority to accept or reject the judgment here.”

The plaintiffs accused Jackson and St. Louis counties of promoting “doom and gloom” and called their warnings of disease spread “transparent puffery and hysteria.” They contended the counties only wanted to appeal the ruling after the county executives unsuccessfully attempted to get local legislatures to reinstate mask mandates earlier this year in the face of rising hospitalizations and the Omicron variant.