A new state law that severely limits school mask mandates has been blocked. That means, for at least Monday, students in districts that have required masks will come to school with their faces still covered.
A federal judge filed an injunction Sunday — not even 48 hours after Gov. Bill Lee signed a sweeping COVID restrictions bill into law.
More: Gov. Lee signs COVID bill, despite potential conflicts with federal law
The new law updated mask mandate rules for Tennessee schools, setting dramatically higher conditions for districts to require face coverings among students and staff. Immediately after the bill’s signing, families from Knox, Williamson and Shelby counties filed a lawsuit asking to halt the law to protect the health of their disabled or medically vulnerable children. They cited a potential violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act, or ADA.
The suit is on behalf of eight anonymous public school students, who range from 7 to 14 years old and have conditions such as diabetes, asthma and a chronic form of esophagitis or disorders like autism and Down syndrome. The suit lists both Gov. Bill Lee and the state’s education commissioner, Penny Schwinn, as defendants.
More: Read the entire lawsuit from the families
The eleventh-hour injunction on Sunday gives the families what they want in the interim. U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw ordered that, for now, schools should continue operating the way they did before the bill was signed into law on Friday.
More: Read the entire injunction from Judge Crenshaw
On Sunday afternoon, Metro Nashville Public Schools sent an automated message to parents stating that the injunction “means masks will continue to be required until further notice from the court.”
“Our strong desire is to get to a point where masks are no longer necessary, and our classroom environment looks like it did back before the start of the pandemic,” writes the district’s superintendent, Dr. Adrienne Battle. “Unfortunately, there is still COVID transmission throughout our community, and we are still seeing dozens of cases a week of students testing positive for the virus. Additionally, the CDC still recommends that K-12 schools adopt universal masking rules to reduce transmission in buildings, and while students ages 5-11 have begun receiving their COVID-19 vaccine if their parents want them to, it takes five weeks from the first dose for a person to be considered fully vaccinated.”
A status hearing for the lawsuit is scheduled for Monday at 1 p.m.
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