Lift Municipal Vax Mandate And Reinstate Workers, Bayside Pol Demands

BAYSIDE, QUEENS — New Yorkers livid over Mayor Eric Adams' executive order lifting the vaccine mandate for professional city athletes and performers but not municipal workers, gathered in Queens this week at a news conference organized by Bayside's City Council Member.

"You guys showed up each and every day for work when it was at its worst and how were you rewarded? You were rewarded with a pink slip," said Council Member Vickie Paladino Tuesday, speaking to an audience of mostly frontline workers, many of whom are among the 1,430 people who lost their jobs after choosing to not get vaccinated.

At the news conference, Paladino, who herself was granted a vaccine exemption by the city, called on the mayor to reinstate unvaccinated city workers and compensate them for missed wages.

She was joined by by anti-vaccine-mandate advocacy groups, like Bravest for Choice and Teachers for Choice, who represent the FDNY and city educators, respectively, as well as members of the police department and Department of Corrections.

"We are the men and women that gave blood, sweat and tears to support the city during its darkest hour," said one former firefighter who was let go over his choice to not get vaccinated.

Other politicians, like Brooklyn City Council Member Inna Vernikov — who alongside Paladino is one of five Republican's in the city's local legislative body — joined the conference, too, noting the discrepancy in lifting the vaccine mandate for only some NYC workers.

"It's not science to peel off the mandate from an athlete but not from a teacher," she said.

The mayor's executive vaccine order has been criticized by members of his party as well, including City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams.

"This exemption sends the wrong message that higher-paid workers and celebrities are being valued as more important than our devoted civil servants, which I reject," the speaker said in a statement.

Asked the speaker's comment Tuesday, the mayor said: "She has a right to her opinion, and I have the right to carry out what's best for the city of New York."

Adams has continued to tout his selective executive order as a boon to New York City's post-pandemic economic rebound, which he's championed while in office.

"We're talking about a small number of people," Adams said of those affected by the executive order, "that are having a major impact on our economy."

For as long as Adams has painted himself as the face of New York's economic recovery, though, Paladino has been at the helm of the city's anti-vaccine-mandate movement.

The leader, who ran on an anti-vaccine mandate platform, has long protested the city's vaccine requirements, falsely claiming the mandates are a HIPAA violation, a law that only applies in health care settings. She later pledged that she wouldn't require her staff to show proof of COVID-19 vaccination, in defiance of a City Hall requirement.

Earlier this year, Paladino compared the COVID-19 vaccine mandate to policies of Nazi Germany (comments for which she has since apologized).