Indiana University students sue school over vaccine mandate
Eight students at Indiana University are suing the school over their policy of mandatory vaccines.
The students allege that the university’s policy violates both their constitutional rights and the state’s new vaccine passport law.
On June 21, eight Indiana University students filed a federal lawsuit against their school, claiming that IU’s vaccine mandate violated their constitutional rights as well as Indiana’s vaccine passport law which has been in place since April.
When alleging the unconstitutionality of IU’s vaccine mandate, the students cite the right to bodily integrity under the 14th amendment, asserting that this right is being stripped from them when their public university forces them to get vaccinated.
Additionally, Indiana’s new vaccine passport law, HEA 1405, states that Indiana state and local units of government do not have the authority to mandate a vaccine passport, or proof of vaccination. The students declare that IU is violating this law and their right to medical-privacy.
The eight students also assert that their university will make sure they face “strong consequences” if they refuse to get vaccinated.
”The university is confident it will prevail in this case. Following the release of the Indiana attorney general’s opinion, our process was revised, with uploading proof of vaccination no longer required,” IU spokesman Chuck Carney told Fox News. “The attorney general’s opinion affirmed our right to require the vaccine.”
“I don’t think the lawsuit solves anything because IU already retracted the initial instructions after a ton of backlash,” explained IU student Nathan Mirsky. “I think the lawsuit is pointless and probably will fail in court. That said, I understand why they’re doing it.”
“Had IU not mandated the vaccine, I personally would not have taken it at this point in time,” Calista Stafford, another student at IU, told Campus Reform.
“Many people choose to follow their own scientific research and make an educated decision about their own health, but IU and many other universities have made this either impossible or socially unacceptable.”
Another IU student, Kaleb Wasmuth, had this to say:
“If we subscribe to an ideology that legal entities such as IU can essentially blackmail us into waiving our bodily rights in order to receive their services, then we might as well void our rights entirely and give way to the very thing the constitution was meant to protect us from - government overreach.”
Campus Reform has reached out to IU’s president for comment but we have yet to hear back.
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