KANSAS, March 10 - TOPEKA – (March 10, 2022) – Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt is calling on the Biden administration to immediately rescind its mask mandate for the federal Head Start program, arguing that the mandate subjects children and toddlers to arbitrary and inconsistent discipline at a time when similar mask policies are being discontinued in schools nationwide.

The mandate has not taken effect in Kansas because it is blocked by a federal court injunction in a case Schmidt filed. It is, however, in effect in about half the states.

Schmidt has now joined 22 other state attorneys general in sending a letter to the president and officials with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services which administers the Head Start program. The attorneys general cite opposition from the World Health Organization and the United Nations Children’s Fund to requiring children under age 5 years to wear a mask because of the potential impact on learning and psychosocial development.

“If it was misguided then, it is reprehensible now,” the attorneys general wrote. “Even States with some of the most restrictive COVID-19 policies – including California, New Jersey, and Oregon – are lifting indoor mask mandates for schools. And the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has walked back its masking guidance. If the mandate stays in place, it is likely that staff, children, and toddlers at Head Start programs will soon be among the only people in this country who are forced to wear masks.”

Schmidt has pushed back against the federal mandates since last fall when the Biden administration announced several vaccine and mask mandates as part of its one-size-fits-all approach to combating COVID-19. That included filing the lawsuit to block Biden’s mandate that Head Start workers and volunteers be vaccinated and children and toddlers wear masks. A federal judge in Louisiana has issued the preliminary injunction prohibiting implementation of the vaccine and mask mandate in Kansas Head Start programs. The case is still pending in the federal district court.

Schmidt has brought legal challenges to three other Biden mandates. The OSHA mandate for private employers was blocked by the U.S. Supreme Court, the federal contractor mandate that affects defense contractors and research universities is blocked by a federal appeals court, and the challenge to the vaccine mandate for healthcare workers remains in litigation in the federal courts after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to temporarily block its implementation.

A copy of the letter to the Biden administration regarding Head Start can be found at https://bit.ly/3hSzdnP.