Greg Abbott Defies Joe Biden and Throws Southwest Airlines a Lifeline

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has made another move against nonsensical COVID policies. Yesterday, he signed an executive order banning vaccine mandates by any entity in the state. This from redstate.com.

This would hit corporations that have begun to follow federal guidelines to mandate vaccines for all their employees. And though an official rule from OSHA has yet to materialize as threatened, Abbott’s move is in direct defiance of Joe Biden.

This comes in the midst of a meltdown happening at Southwest Airlines over a coming vaccine mandate in November.

Reports continue to indicate that employees of the Texas-based air carrier are using sick days in anticipation of being fired for not conforming to the mandate. That has left thousands of flights canceled over the last several days, and while Southwest Airlines has blamed weather and ATC issues, those “issues” have not affected any other airline. Clearly, the issue is internal.

Given that, perhaps this move by Abbott is actually a lifeline worked out via back channels,

Southwest Airlines, which has already faced a lawsuit over the mandate, can now claim their hands are tied and lift the requirements. That gets air and maintenance crews back to work—while allowing the airline to somewhat save face for its terrible decision to follow Joe Biden’s lead.

We’ll have to wait and see how this shakes out.

Southwest Airlines could decide to simply ignore the directive or to fight it in court, at which point their position would be clearly staked and the fight would escalate. They’d certainly pay a large consumer and employee price for such a move, but if they want to be that stupid, it’s their company. I doubt they go that route, though.

Governor Abbott’s order is already eliciting gnashing of teeth from the left, and that’s as good a sign as any that it was the right move.

God speed to the powers of right and true.