# Plain Language Summary: COVID Relief Funding and Vaccine Mandate Bill

This bill would prevent organizations that received federal money during the COVID-19 pandemic from requiring their employees to get vaccinated against COVID-19. If an organization that got pandemic relief funds tries to mandate vaccines for workers, they would have to return all the federal money they received to the government.

The bill applies to six major COVID relief packages passed between 2020 and 2021, including programs like the Paycheck Protection Program (which gave loans to small businesses), unemployment benefits, and direct aid to states and hospitals. This means hospitals, nursing homes, schools, businesses, nonprofits, and government agencies that received any of this pandemic funding would be prohibited from making COVID-19 vaccination a job requirement.

In practical terms, this could affect millions of workers and hundreds of thousands of organizations. A hospital that received federal pandemic funds couldn't require its nurses to be vaccinated. A school district that got relief money couldn't mandate vaccines for teachers. A small business that took a forgivable loan couldn't require vaccines for employees. The threat of having to repay all received funds would likely make organizations choose not to enforce vaccine requirements, since the financial penalty would be severe.

The bill doesn't prevent organizations from encouraging vaccination or providing information about it—it only bars them from making it mandatory. It also doesn't apply to organizations that didn't receive pandemic relief funds, so they could still set their own vaccine policies. The bill was introduced in January 2025 and is currently in committee.

To prohibit any entity that receives Federal funds from the COVID relief packages from mandating employees receive a COVID-19 vaccine, and for other purposes.

Biggs, Andy

<p>This bill prohibits any entity that receives specified COVID-19 relief funds from mandating that its employees receive COVID-19 vaccines. An entity that violates this prohibition must return the funding it received.</p>