Mo attorney general, 76 parents file suit against 36 school districts to halt mask mandates

JEFFERSON CITY – On Friday, Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, along with 76 parents as plaintiffs in certain cases, filed separate lawsuits against 36 school districts across the state to halt those districts from illegally enforcing mask mandates.

Districts sued Friday are Francis Howell, Park Hill, Columbia, Fort Zumwalt, Lee’s Summit, Holden, Affton, Liberty, Jefferson City, St. Charles, Kansas City, Waynesville, Hazelwood, Raytown, Kingsville, Rockwood, Hickman Mills, Ladue, Center, Dunklin R-V, Independence, Lindbergh, Grandview, Fox C-6, North Kansas City, Ferguson-Florissant, Maplewood, Clayton, St. Louis City, Parkway, Brentwood, Valley Park, Pattonville, Webster Groves, Warrensburg, and Mehlville.

Last month, following a recent Cole County ruling, the Attorney General’s Office opened up an inbox for parents to report non-compliant districts. The Office has since received over 11,000 email submissions to that inbox, and has sent a number of school districts to non-compliant school districts. Some have dropped their mask mandates, but others have continued to defy the law.

“Mask mandates in schools are illegal, they simply don’t work, and they contribute to alarming and negative psychological impacts on our children. My Office has been on the frontlines of the fight to end the forced masking of children all day in school, and today we took concrete legal action toward that end,” said Attorney General Schmitt. “Parents and families, not bureaucrats, should have the power to decide what’s best for their children. With this litigation, we’re seeking to return that power back to parents and families, where it belongs.”

Some fast facts about the cases and mask mandates in general:

School districts do not have the authority to impose public health orders like mask mandates. Entities like school districts must be authorized specifically by the Missouri state legislature to enact public health orders like mask mandates, an authority that has not been extended to school districts by the legislature. Further, the recent Cole County ruling, which held that the double-delegation of authority from the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services (DHSS) to local public health authorities was unconstitutional, further reinforces and affirms that school districts must be specifically authorized by the legislature to enact orders like mask mandates, which they have not been. Therefore, school districts enforcing mask mandates are doing so illegally.

Mask mandates are ineffective, and COVID-19 presents an exceedingly low risk to children. Prevailing research shows that cloth masks are ineffective at stopping the spread, and, according to a CNN correspondent, are “little more than facial decorations.”

An analysis done by the Attorney General’s Office using DHSS COVID-19 data in Missouri’s school districts from December 29, 2021 to January 11, 2022 shows that mask mandates are ineffective in schools, and that non-masked districts fared the same or better than masked districts. In that time period, of schools with similar population, Parkway (masked) had four percent of its student body test positive, while Wentzville (unmasked) had 2.6 percent of its student body test positive. Lindbergh (masked) had 3.37 percent of its student body test positive, while Northwest R-1 (unmasked) had 3.05 percent of their student body test positive.

Fortunately, COVID-19 presents very little risk to children and adolescents. As David Wallace-Wells sums up in New York Intelligencer from July, 2021, “Over the course of the pandemic, 49,000 Americans under the age of 18 have died of all causes, according to the CDC. Only 331 of those deaths have been from COVID — less than half as many as have died of pneumonia. In 2019, more than 2,000 American kids and teenagers died in car crashes; each year, according to some estimates, about a thousand die from drowning.” That analysis is likely further reinforced by the reduced severity of the Omicron variant. A New York Times article that analyzed hospitalizations in California notes that “compared with Delta, Omicron cut the risk of hospitalization in half,” and “cut hospital stays by more than three days, a reduction of 70 percent.” Further, the article notes “not a single patient went on a ventilator” during the time of the study. Lastly, the risk of “long COVID” in children is lower than previously thought.

Mask mandates harm important development, and pandemic restrictions have led to increased psychological problems for America’s children and teens. Experiencing and understanding facial cues from teachers and caretakers, as well as peers, are critical to the development of young children.

As Dr. Vinay Prasad notes in a September, 2021 Atlantic article, “The potential educational harms of mandatory-masking policies are much more firmly established, at least at this point, than their possible benefits in stopping the spread of COVID-19 in schools,” and “Early childhood is a crucial period when humans develop cultural, language, and social skills, including the ability to detect emotion on other people’s faces. Social interactions with friends, parents, and caregivers are integral to fostering children’s growth and well-being.” Test scores have declined since the start of the pandemic, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Suicide attempts by teens, especially teenage girls, has risen sharply since the start of the pandemic. Specifically, “There was a 22.3 percent spike in ER trips for potential suicides by children aged 12 to 17 in summer 2020 compared to 2019, and that trend continued into the 2020-21 academic year as visits were up by 39.1 percent during 2021 winter compared to 2020 winter,” according to an NBC News article that compiled CDC data.

Schools are reporting more aggressive behavior from students. The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism stated that young adults are at increased peril for alcohol abuse and alcohol related deaths.

The Missouri Attorney General’s Office is working with several private attorneys who are offering pro-bono legal services to parents to ensure they have a voice in this critical litigation, including Stanley B. Cox, Jennifer M. Cross, and Mark C. Milton.

The petitions filed today can be found here: