On Monday, Governor Doug Ducey, in a series of tweets, announced his intention to issue an executive order preventing the state’s universities from requiring students to be vaccinated for COVID-19. The governor’s announcement followed a message from Arizona State University reminding students that they would either have to be vaccinated before returning to in-person learning, or undergo seemingly non-stop testing (twice a week), daily health checks, and be forced to wear a mask on a nearly full-time basis.
This is bad policy, with no basis in public health. Even the Biden Administration has been more reasonable 1/ https://t.co/PPYYIt2cVK pic.twitter.com/mkbXsMj15a
— Doug Ducey (@dougducey) June 15, 2021
Rep. Jake Hoffman reacted quickly to the University’s message, calling it a “gross abuse of student’s individual liberty and medical freedom,” and “a gross abuse of taxpayer dollars.”
“This is an unacceptable overreach by an Arizona governmental entity,” continued Hoffman. “If Arizona State University and the Board of Regents (like Regent Karin Robson who’s just announced her run for governor in 2022) chooses to hold the line on this outrageous overreach, there will have to be a serious and heavy handed response from the legislature. You do not get to receive hundreds of millions in taxpayer funding, while blatantly trampling the rights of those taxpayers.”
The Governor’s position represents a major shift, as he and his closest allies in the Legislature, like Sen. TJ Shope, previously thwarted an effort spearheaded by Rep. Bret Roberts to prevent a vaccine passport requirement, eventually killing that effort. Shope, perhaps ASU’s most loyal legislator, surprised Capitol observers on Monday when he flip-flopped to match the Governor, saying that he too was opposed to this near-mandate by the university.
“Well, they shouldn’t be able to discriminate against people because they’re not willing to give up their private medical history,’’ he said.
— Bret Roberts (@BretRbrts) May 21, 2021
In comparison, Grand Canyon University recently announced that there would be no vaccine requirements for its faculty, staff, or students for the fall semester
“Why go to ASU at all?” asked one parent who contacted ADI, “GCU is a better education at a better price, they don’t torture you into getting vaccinated, and their basketball team actually gets invited to the NCAA Tourney!”