UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT

August Term 2022

(Argued: October 13, 2022 Decided: August 4, 2023)

Docket No. 22-249-cv

WE THE PATRIOTS USA, INC.; CT FREEDOM ALLIANCE, LLC; CONSTANTINA LORA; MIRIAM HIDALGO; ASMA ELIDRISSI, Plaintiffs-Appellants,

v. CONNECTICUT OFFICE OF EARLY CHILDHOOD DEVELOPMENT; CONNECTICUT STATE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION; CONNECTICUT DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC HEALTH; BETHEL BOARD OF EDUCATION; GLASTONBURY BOARD OF EDUCATION; STAMFORD BOARD OF EDUCATION, Defendants-Appellees.

ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF CONNECTICUT

Before: LEVAL, CHIN, and BIANCO, Circuit Judges.

Appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut (Arterton, J.) dismissing claims against defendants- appellees challenging Public Act 21-6, which revised the Connecticut General Statutes to, inter alia, repeal religious exemptions from state immunization requirements for schoolchildren, college and university students, and childcare participants. Plaintiffs-appellants are two organizations and three individuals who allege that the Act violates the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and other federal constitutional and statutory guarantees. The district court granted the motions of defendants-appellees -- three state agencies and three local boards of education -- to dismiss certain of plaintiffs-appellants' claims against the state agencies as barred by the Eleventh Amendment, to dismiss the organizational plaintiffs-appellants' claims for lack of standing, and to dismiss all counts of the complaint for failure to state a claim.

AFFIRMED IN PART AND VACATED AND REMANDED IN PART.

Judge Bianco concurs in part and dissents in part in a separate opinion.

NORMAN A. PATTIS (Cameron L. Atkinson, on the brief), New Haven, CT, for Plaintiffs-Appellants.

DARREN P. CUNNINGHAM, Assistant Attorney General (Timothy J. Holzman, Alayna M. Stone, on the brief), for William Tong, Attorney General of Connecticut, Hartford, CT, for Defendants- Appellees.

2 CHIN, Circuit Judge:

This case requires us to decide whether a State that has for many years exempted religious objectors from its vaccination requirements for students and participants in childcare programs violates the Free Exercise Clause and other federal constitutional and statutory guarantees by repealing that exemption to protect the public health and safety.

All States have such vaccination requirements. The vast majority of States offer religious exemptions from vaccination requirements. In 2021, Connecticut became the fifth State to cease allowing such religious exemptions, following in the footsteps of Mississippi, California, New York, and Maine. West Virginia has never exempted religious objectors. Plaintiffs-appellants are two membership organizations and three individuals ("plaintiffs") who allege that Public Act 21-6 (the "Act"), which revised the Connecticut General Statutes to, inter alia, repeal the religious exemptions, violates the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution; other guarantees under the Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments; and the In