“It’s a question of if anybody should be able to make you inject something into your body without your own will,” the Republican from Laurens said.ĭemocrats put up more than a dozen amendments during the day that were all rejected. Stewart Jones argued that the proposal protected personal freedom. Fewer than a dozen states have in place similar laws to what the South Carolina House ended up passing Thursday.īefore agreeing to strip out the ban on private businesses allowing vaccines, the bill’s primary supporter Rep. Only two states - Montana and Tennessee - have passed similar bans for private businesses. “Nobody knows what it is - that’s not a good way to govern,” said Rep.
The amendment that altered the bill came when there was only six minutes of debate available on the proposal. Democrats spent hours championing businesses and the right of employers to determine requirements for their workers only to watch the debate change in an instant.ĭemocrats suggested Republicans were trying to provide cover for their most conservative members in party primaries by putting on a debate. Republicans typically allow businesses in the state to have free rein and numerous groups, including the South Carolina Chamber of Commerce, asked lawmakers to oppose the bill. The suddenly watered-down bill was a dizzying, but maybe not surprising end to a whirlwind 48 hours where the proposal went from a subcommittee to the House floor. It also makes businesses pay unemployment benefits to a worker fired for not being vaccinated.
The proposal requires employers to honor religious or medical exemptions and said a medical exemption can include a prior positive COVID-19 test, pregnancy or presence of coronavirus antibodies. Senators have already gone home and appear unlikely to take the matter up before the regular 2022 session begins on Jan. The bill passed 67-31 on Thursday and only needed a routine third reading Friday before being sent to the Senate. Then, just before members were set to vote, Republican leadership stripped that ban from the bill, leaving it only banning COVID-19 vaccine mandates for state and local government employees, contractors and public school students. For five hours Thursday, the South Carolina House debated the proposal to prevent private companies in South Carolina from firing employees who refuse to get a COVID-19 vaccine.
0 kommentar(er)
