Rep. Deanne Mazzochi (R-Elmhurst) | Courtesy photo
Rep. Deanne Mazzochi (R-Elmhurst) | Courtesy photo
State Rep. Deanne Mazzochi (R-Westmont) recently spoke on the House floor to voice her opposition to an amendment to the Health Care Right of Conscience Act. Senate Bill 1169 would prevent the law from being used as a loophole for people who refuse to comply with COVID mandates.
“Government is supposed to persuade, not force,” Mazzochi said from the House floor. “Government is supposed to respect and protect our civil liberties, not disregard them. And that is because we are citizens, not subjects. If we are going to say there are healthcare services that are so important that we need to mandate them, spit it out. Say it plainly and enact it into law using the regular legislative process and then every single one of us can be accountable to the people in our districts for the vote that we took.”
Mazzochi said she worries how much damage such mandates will do to policy like the separation of powers.
“Let an executive order or executive threat be the equivalent of the legislative process. And then, take away the very remedy that the little guy, the powerless, the poor, the people have against government administrative and corporate overreach when it comes to medical rights of conscience,” she said. “Let’s also be clear that in this state this is an unprecedented effort to backdoor a vaccine mandate without any lines of accountability, including at the legislature and without any escape valve for religious liberty.”
Mazzochi said she’s never seen anything quite like it.
“Every other vaccine mandate that we have in the state of Illinois is specific limited and was passed by the legislature after years of scientific proof of beneficial outcome and they all still allow for religious exemption or proof of immunity to satisfy the statute,” she said. “You haven’t even offered a reasonableness or scientific efficacy standard for what you are doing here. If you were being scientific you’d be testing everyone, for example congregate-care facilities, because according to the Sept. 16, 2021 New England Journal of Medicine, vaccinated workers with breakthrough infections, even though they may have had mild symptoms, they had high viral loads and prolonged viral shedding for up to 32 days after diagnosis.”
The amendment passed the House and Senate and was signed into law by Gov. Pritzker on Nov. 8
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