Pandemic restrictions on Florida-based cruise ships will remain in place after a federal appeals court temporarily blocked a previous ruling that sided with a Florida lawsuit challenging the regulations.
The one-paragraph decision by a three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals was filed at 11:50 p.m. Saturday, literally minutes before a Tampa judge’s previous ruling on the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) restrictions was set to take effect.
The 11th Circuit’s brief decision did not include any opinions from the judges, which the panel said would be released later, according to NBC News. The decision noted that one appeals judge dissented.
But the court’s temporary stay will keep the CDC’s restrictions in place while the CDC appeals the Tampa judge’s June decision by U.S. District Judge Steven Merryday.
The Florida lawsuit, championed by Governor Ron DeSantis, claims the CDC’s “multi-step process to allow cruising from Florida is overly burdensome, harming both a multibillion-dollar industry that provides some 159,000 jobs and revenue collected by the state.”
“The equities overwhelmingly favor allowing the cruise industry to enjoy its first summer season in two years while this Court sorts out the CDC’s contentions on appeal,” Florida’s lawyers argued, reports Penn Live.
Judge Merryday seemed to agree with Florida’s lawyers. In his decision, the judge wrote: “Florida persuasively claims that the conditional sailing order will shut down most cruises through the summer and perhaps much longer. Florida faces an increasingly threatening and imminent prospect that the cruise industry will depart the state.”
Readers may recall that last week,
Norwegian Cruise Line sued Scott Rivkees, the surgeon general of Florida, over the state’s ban against businesses asking for proof of vaccination against the coronavirus.
In its lawsuit, Norwegian notes that Rivkees is the state official in charge of enforcing the ban, and calls its move “a last resort” against the “misguided intrusion” of a state law that bars the use of vaccine passports in Florida, according to Digital Journal.
