Stephen Waguespack's LABI Lobbied FOR Vaccine Mandates by Lobbying AGAINST Your Health Freedom
Before you vote for him, know Waguespack likely cost you your job if you refused covid vaccination.
Going into the 2023 statewide election, Health Freedom Louisiana wants to make sure voters are fully informed of those individuals who fought FOR the people of this state, and those who actively lobbied AGAINST the preservation of individual rights.
It is imperative that people know that if they lost their job because of an employee vaccine mandate in the last few years, they have Stephen Waguespack, in part, to blame.
Let me explain.
As we have stated over and over, the three main stumbling blocks to individual liberty in the fight against covid tyranny over the last several years are Governor John Bel Edwards, Speaker of the House Clay Schexnayder, and Senate President Page Cortez. Outside of public office, the next greatest offender would have to be the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry (LABI) and its president, Stephen Waguespack. LABI is a powerful lobby association, with incredible influence on the outcome of bills presented to the Louisiana Legislature. At almost every turn, LABI impeded efforts to secure freedom from medical mandates, ironically placing businesses at great peril of lawsuits for workman’s compensation and wrongful termination.
In October of 2020, the country was anxiously awaiting a vaccine that experts promised would “save” the world from COVID-19. Remember that? Having followed the various vaccine production processes, we were not as excited as the rest of the world. We also saw the writing on the wall. By October 2020, there had already been ominous comments from the likes of U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy referring to immunity passports. The idea of vaccine passports and employee mandates were not far fetched. Although history will reveal that many welcomed passports and mandates, HFL was intent on preserving individual liberty and bodily autonomy, especially in the workplace.
As the legislature was called into the Second Extraordinary Session in October of 2020, we placed our support behind legislation proposed by State Representative Danny McCormick. With incredible forethought, Rep. McCormick proposed legislation that would protect both businesses and employees from a COVID-19 vaccine mandate. HB49 by Rep McCormick, would have prevented the mandate of a non-FDA approved COVID-19 vaccine, and IF a COVID-19 vaccine WAS approved, it could only be required by employers if the following conditions were met:
(a) The vaccination was evaluated for any potential risk of harm to cause cancer, impair fertility, or mutate genes.
(b) The safety of the vaccination was evaluated for at least one year after it is administered through a clinical trial against a control group, the members of which receive either the vaccination or an inert placebo which is FDA-approved.
(c) Studies were conducted to identify any potential injury or disease that may be caused by the vaccination or any injury or disease the vaccination may cause when administered with other required or recommended vaccinations.
(d) The risk of permanent disability or death from receiving the vaccination is proven to be less than the infection rate associated with COVID-19.
(e) The manufacturer of the vaccination is liable for any claims of injury or death caused by the vaccination.
The proposed legislation also required:
Safety and efficacy data be made readily available and understandable for the public;
An exemption for medical, religious, or philosophical reasons;
Prohibition of discrimination and coercion against those who refused to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.
Waguespack’s organization, LABI, had an associate present at the committee hearing who submitted a red card in opposition to HB49.
HB49 received only TWO votes and failed in committee. Less than a year later, EVERY ONE of the stipulations of HB49 were violated, including a workplace mandate of a non-FDA approved vaccine that had no long-term safety studies.
If the Louisiana legislature had passed HB49 in 2020, the federal mandates Biden issued less than a year later would have had almost no impact on the state’s work environment as it provided the legal framework for the exemption allowed in the federal mandate, but considered arbitrary by most employers.
Without HB49, businesses across the state, and their employees, were plunged into a chaos that wreaked havoc on the economy and life in general.
In a statement released September 10, 2021, following the implementation of the federal mandate, Waguespack was forced to beg for crumbs when the opportunity to prevent this level of economic disruption had been offered and rejected a year prior.
Almost two years after the mandate was implemented, the healthcare industry still suffers from a workforce shortage. Wrongful termination lawsuits have already been filed by employees across the state and country whose religious exemptions were not accepted by their employers.
Additionally, as employees correlate emerging health concerns with the experimental medical intervention their employer demanded they undergo to retain their job, and as realization hits that they cannot sue the manufacturer of the drugs, the only recourse is to sue the employer that created the unsafe work environment. Being an at-will-employee state will not save employers from lawsuits - they are required to provide a safe work environment. Case in point, as reported by The Defender, an Ohio nurse just filed suit against her employer, Ohio’s Hospice, for her disability resulting from a covid vaccine that was required for employment.
This is precisely what HFL warned the legislature of. Prohibiting mandates protects the employee AND the employer.
More lawsuits for vaccine injury resulting from a vaccine required for work are just a matter of time.
Waguespack’s opposition to an employee exemption has placed businesses across the state in the path of this litigation nightmare.
But wait! There’s more.
In 2022, LABI, with Waguespack at the helm, proved they had learned NOTHING from the federal mandate when LABI opposed more vital pieces of legislation intended to protect businesses, individual bodily autonomy, and your health freedom, including:
HB407 to prevent the addition of an EUA drug to the list of vaccines required for school attendance. Later that same year, Edwards began the process of adding an EUA drug to the list of vaccines required for school attendance.
HB427 to prevent vaccines from being administered on school property. Later that year, a child was administered a covid vaccine on school property without parental consent. The school is currently being sued by the parents.
HB531 that provides a civil remedy to students denied school entry for vaccination status. We get messages often regarding school denying entry because of the child’s vaccination status, a vioaltion of state law.
HB535 that would prohibit insurance discrimination based on vaccination status. Insurance companies are STILL discriminating against the unvaccinated with insurance policies, including requiring additional fees for those who refuse vaccination.
HB594 that protects an individual’s right to bodily autonomy and prohibits discrimination based on vaccination status.
a constitutional amendment (HB596) intended to recognize an individual’s right to bodily autonomy. A constitutional amendment recognizes limitations of GOVERNMENT, not businesses, and LABI still opposed the bill.
HB735, which later became HB1022 - HFL’s favorite bill in 2022 - a bill to prevent the mandate of a liability-free medical intervention. This bill was intended to protect businesses but especially employees from unsafe work environments where Emergency Use Authorized drugs and medical interventions are mandated. All EUA interventions are LIABILITY-FREE, meaning the manufacturer and administering physician cannot be sued for injury or death that occurs as a result of their use. Consumers, employees, students, etc should never be required to receive a liability-free medical intervention.
Undoubtedly, the most significant loss in 2022 was HB1022 by Rep Beryl Amedee. LABI’s uneducated opposition to HB1022 once again left employers and employees vulnerable to mandates of liability-free medical interventions, including masks. Once again, LABI with Waguespack at the helm, endeavored to kill HB1022, ignoring the protections it would provide businesses, as well as, their employees.
We are EXTREMELY concerned that a gubernatorial candidate like Waguespack would hold views that do not include the preservation of an individual’s right to make their own health decisions without coercive measures applied by employers OR the government. That these coercions included experimental, LIABILITY-FREE medical interventions increases our concern a thousand fold. We have lived through the most turbulent and disruptive events of the modern era, including tyrannical threats to the most basic of human rights: the right to determine what we inject into, or put on, our bodies without coercion or threat to our personal freedom.
While Waguespack resigned from LABI to run for governor in March, prior to the 2023 legislative session, LABI continued to oppose bills intended to protect Louisianans from government overreach, specifically HB182. Authored by Rep. Kathy Edmonston, HB182 would prevent schools from requiring covid vaccination as a requirement for school attendance. Questions directed to LABI’s lobbyist during the bills’ presentations during the House Education Committee can be viewed HERE. You can see that legislators are frustrated by LABI’s opposition to bills that involve matters of education.
Health freedom should be of the utmost concern to every Louisiana voter. Louisianans have suffered under tyrannical leadership for the last three plus years as John Bel Edwards coward behind a useless mask and pandered to the pharmaceutical industry. We quite literally cannot afford to elect another governor who has no respect for individual liberty and has no understanding of the harms of medical mandates in the workplace, in education, and in society in general. We cannot afford to elect Stephen Waguespack.
Forwarded to moon, Carol Ross, Walton & johnson etc.