{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://frankel.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=3362", "Reps. Frankel, Wasserman Schultz, Crist, Deutch, Gallego, Garcia, Johnson, Kirkpatrick, Soto, Veasey Introduce Legislation to Defend Businesses, Local Governments that Implement Commonsense COVID-19 Safety Measures", "2021-11-05", "2021", "2021-11", "Democrat", "House", "FL", "Lois Frankel", "F000462", "frankel.house.gov", "frankel", "https://frankel.house.gov/news/documentquery.aspx?DocumentTypeID=27", "scraper", "Washington, DC \u2013 Today, Representatives Lois Frankel (FL-21), Debbie Wasserman Schultz (FL-23), Charlie Crist (FL-13), Ted Deutch (FL-22), Ruben Gallego (AZ-07), Sylvia Garcia (TX-29), Hank Johnson (GA-04), Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ-01), Darren Soto (FL-09), and Marc Veasey (TX-33) introduced the Let Our Cities And Local businesses Help Employees Achieve Long-Term Health Act (LOCAL HEALTH) Act. This bill would protect the ability of local governments, agencies, and private businesses to implement common sense public health and safety measures recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) aimed at curbing the spread of COVID-19. This includes requirements such as social distancing, masks, vaccination, and testing.\n\n\u201cWe should not just stand by and let Governors put politics over the health and safety of our communities by restricting critical tools like vaccines and masks,\u201d said Rep. Frankel. \u201cLocal governments, agencies, and private businesses in our communities that want to follow CDC guidelines should be supported not punished. This bill would protect them from dangerous state overreach that we\u2019ve been seeing across the country, including in my home state of Florida.\u201d\n\n\u201cBusiness owners and school leaders need the flexibility to adopt smart, CDC-backed pandemic measures to keep children, customers and all our residents safe,\u201d said Rep. Wasserman Schultz. \u201cWhen authoritarian governors bully mom-and-pop shops and educators into risking people\u2019s health or hurting their bottom lines, we need added protections. Congresswoman Frankel\u2019s bill does that, and Florida needs it. Our governor handcuffs and threatens businesses and local communities just for adopting common-sense safety measures for face coverings, vaccines and social distancing. People and businesses deserve security and flexibility, and know-nothing, overreaching governors need to stop jeopardizing our public health.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s simple. If a business wants to say no shirt, no shoes, no vax, no service \u2013 they should be able to. If a parent or local school board wants to follow expert advice to keep children safe, healthy, and in school \u2013 they should be able to,\u201d said Rep. Crist. \u201cNo Governor should defund our public schools just because parents and school boards are doing what they can to keep schools open and safe. Why does Governor DeSantis think he knows better than Florida parents and the school boards they elect? It\u2019s about respect. I\u2019m proud to support legislation that keeps local decision-making where it belongs: locally. We\u2019re here to give school boards, parents, and business owners back their power that Governor DeSantis is taking away.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe all want to experience life as normal. Ensuring communities are able implement the public health measures they need to keep people safe, without threats of retaliation from their state governments, is how we move toward that,\u201d said Rep. Deutch. \u201cSchool districts, cities, and businesses in my district and across Florida have faced millions of dollars in bogus fines for implementing mask and vaccine mandates to keep children, residents, employees, and customers safe from COVID-19. Enough is enough. Thank you to my friend and colleague, Representative Lois Frankel, for her work on this important bill.\u201d\n\n\u201cArizona is still very much in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, so we need to make sure that schools, businesses, and local governments feel empowered to protect themselves, their employees, and their constituents,\u201d said Rep. Gallego. \u201cGovernor Ducey\u2019s record of political grandstanding against public health guidance only hurts Arizonans\u2019 health and economic wellbeing. Arizonans can\u2019t afford for our state to keep playing politics with a pandemic. That\u2019s why I\u2019m proud to be a leader on the LOCAL HEALTH Act to give school districts, local governments, and businesses the protection they need to keep people healthy and help end this pandemic.\u201d\n\n\"We have the tools we need to end the Coronavirus pandemic, but many politicians in GOP-controlled state governments are putting the public's health at risk for political gain and tying business owners\u2019 hands through overbearing restrictions on common-sense safety measures such as mask mandates,\u201d said. Rep. Garcia. \u201cThe LOCAL Health Act gives businesses the freedom they need to provide their employers and customers with a safe environment that will help America to get back to work.\"\n\n\u201cI support Rep. Frankel\u2019s LOCAL Health Act because people, especially essential frontline workers, need protection from politicians who put politics ahead of public health,\u201d said Rep. Johnson. \u201cVulnerable people should not be put at risk because state officials ban employers from implementing Centers For Disease Control and Prevention recommendations. People have a right to be safe in their workspaces and in public settings, and this commonsense legislation will help accomplish that objective. Politicians should be the first to help stop the spread of COVID-19, which has killed more than 750,000 Americans. We must pursue policies that protect as many people as possible.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe only way we are going to recover from this pandemic is by implementing smart and science-driven mitigation efforts, which is exactly what so many of our local communities have had to step up and do,\" said.\" Rep. Kirkpatrick. \"With Arizona top of mind, this legislation is especially personal and important, and I am proud to support a bill that affirms the right of public and private employers to be leaders on COVID-19 mitigation efforts.\u201d\n\n\u201cTime and time again, we have seen that masks, vaccines, and social distancing save lives,\u201d said Rep. Soto. \u201cIt is dangerous for the governor to threaten businesses and continue to put politics over the safety of Floridians. The LOCAL HEALTH Act will prevent his policies from getting in the way and allow businesses to make choices that consider public health safety measures.\u201d\n\n\"We must defend the rights of local businesses to protect employees, especially in states that are basing public safety on politics rather than science,\u201d said Rep Veasey. \u201cThat is why I am proud to co-lead Rep. Frankel\u2019s legislation, which will allow employers to enact commonsense safety measures to curb the spread of COVID-19 in the workplace and get our economy back on the right track.\"\n\nThe LOCAL HEALTH Act would supersede any state law that limits local governments, agencies, and private businesses from implementing safety precautions. The bill makes it clear that employers may take measures to protect employees and patrons from COVID-19 including through vaccine and masking requirements.\n\nFull text of the legislation can be found here.\n\n###", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T20:30:49Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://frankel.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=3362"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.2174788862466812, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}