Parents’ bid to block Youngkin school mask policy dismissed, but temporary hold granted to school districts still stands
Tierney Sneed, CNN
The Virginia Supreme Court dismissed a lawsuit filed last month by parents in Chesapeake, Virginia, who alleged that Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s mask executive order ran afoul of the state constitution.
The court said that the challengers had failed to show that the dispute met the procedural threshold that would warrant the direct intervention by the state Supreme Court that the parents were seeking. In a footnote, the court said that it was offering “no opinion on the legality” of the Youngkin executive order “or any other issue pertaining to petitioners’ claims.”
Youngkin’s executive order, which he issued the day he took office in mid-January, allowed for parents and guardians to “elect for their children not to be subject to any mask mandate in effect at the child’s school or educational program.”
The case before the state Supreme Court was separate from a lawsuit brought by seven Virginia school districts that are also challenging the executive order. In that case, the school districts secured a temporary restraining order last week, with Judge Louise M. DiMatteo writing Friday that the governor could not override the decisions of local school boards delegated to them by state law.
This story is breaking and will be updated.
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