MT Enacts Nation’s First Vaccine Antidiscrimination Law
Montana made history by becoming the first state in the nation to enact a vaccine antidiscrimination law in August 2021. Representative Brad Tschida sat with with Leah Wilson, Executive Director and co-founder of Stand for Health Freedom to discuss the motivation and mindset behind passing the law.
Watching this steadfast lawmaker state matter-of-factly that antidiscrimination laws and health privacy are just common sense will recharge your advocacy. It will remind you there are lawmakers out there standing up for our Constitution and health rights.
Click below to watch this uplifting and inspirational discussion about the importance of protecting the privacy of vaccination decisions.
In discussing the mindset behind the law, Representative Tschida explains, “Our medical records are private. There is no reason the government should have access to them, and we shouldn’t be required to give them up.”
In the face of mandates and digital passport rollouts across the globe, it just makes sense for Americans to make medical and vaccine status a protected class to protect our fundamental rights. Americans are being segregated and subject to loss of freedoms based on their personal health decisions. “To create a two-class society based on the use of a pharmaceutical product is unethical and unnecessary.”
Representative Tschida talks about how the Montana government met this discrimination head on. It became the first state to make vaccination status a protected class and limit inquiries into immunization status. Montana’s law is protecting citizens and business-owners alike.
And the reaction? At the time of writing the law is facing one limited challenge in court: health professionals and some patients claim that portions of the law as applied to them are in violation of the ADA, and constitutional rights. However, the lawsuit does not call for the entire bill to be revoked, only that plaintiffs in the health field are exempt from some of its provisions. In this age of unprecedented litigation in the face of covid policies, the limited legal challenges thus far to this law reflect the will of the people to protect medical decision-making.
Representative Tschida reports, “The majority of people we hear from are saying ‘Thanks’ for protecting our informed choice.”
Interview Transcription
The entire interview between Leah Wilson and Representative Brad Tschida has been transcribed and is available below, with permission to quote and source material from, so long as an original attribution link to this article is used as a citation for the original interview.
Full Interview Transcript
Leah Wilson: Hello, Leah Wilson with Stand for Health Freedom. I am here today because we are at a point in time when it is necessary to make medical status and vaccine status a protected class, so that we can protect our God-given, fundamental freedoms at this point in time.
I have a special guest with me today who did exactly that for the State of Montana. So welcome, Representative Brad Tschida. Thank you so much for joining me to talk about Montana’s policy and why it is so needed.
Rep. Brad Tschida: Well, Leah, first of all, thank you for having me on, and it’s an honor to represent the majority of the legislators in the State of Montana who saw the need to stand up against the regimented government in position of overreach, in terms of masks and vaccines, and any other status that they’re trying to force onto people in the State of Montana and into the U.S.
I just have to be a voice for a number of very tremendous legislators, so I’m happy to be here.
Leah Wilson: Yes, thank you, Representative Tschida. Representative Tschida has been in Montana as a lawmaker since 2015. He is also the father of five, and supports common sense policies, such as the one that we’re here to talk about today.
So I’m going to go ahead and dive in, and ask you, well, as I understand it, Montana was the very first state to explicitly make vaccination status a protected class. And then also, you all went ahead and even limited the inquiry into immunization status, which, obviously, reinforces medical privacy which so many of us are willingly giving up almost two years now.
So what does the new Montana law do for your people, and why did you find it worthy of supporting?
[01:57]
Rep. Brad Tschida: Well, first of all, I have to give credit to the author of the bill, Representative Jennifer Carlson, who is not a medical professional, but probably knows as much about vaccines, vaccination and medical issues surrounding this, as any representative we have in the legislature, and there are a number of them that have medical background. So we are fortunate to have somebody with her experience and her background leading the charge on this.
The essential issue is that our medical records are private. There’s no reason the government should have access to them, and we shouldn’t be required to give them up. And we’ve been seeing throughout the country where employers are trying to impose mandates for employees to stay employed.
Even in the State of Montana, there are employers who are telling their employees, “You must become vaccinated.” There are some schools that are talking about doing that.
And whether I’m vaccinated or not is my business, and I don’t have to disclose that to anyone. And if somebody asks me what my status is, I’m going to say, “Due to HIPAA, I’m not going to divulge what that is one way or another,” and let them surmise whatever they want to as a conclusion.
But when Representative Carlson brought this bill forward, it was seen as a bill that just made sense to so many of us. There were some with Rs after their name who did not comply with what we decided to pass through as a good piece of legislation. But overall, we had a strong majority of the 67 Republican representatives who did support this anti-vaccine and anti-mask mandate piece of legislation.
[03:31]
So essentially, we’re the only state in the country, as I understand it, that does not allow employers, whether we’re talking about private or public employers, to demand any proof of vaccination nor require individuals to wear appliances or comply with the mandatory requirements for vaccinations, vaccines, and divulging of that information.
We could say in Montana that we are fiercely stubborn, which we are, but that’s many people from across many states. We simply saw the need to do this.
We’re getting hammered by people who say that we don’t care, and they’re [virtue signaling], telling us that we’re the cause of somebody else’s tragedy. If we change the word “vaccine” to “medicine” and somebody came up to me said, “In order for my medicine to work, you have to take your medicine as well,” then that to me makes absolutely no sense.
So we just supplant the word “vaccine” from “medicine,” and it says, “If their vaccine will only work if I have one,” then I’m sorry, but I’m not going to do that simply because somebody is telling me to take a questionable substance, inject it into my body, and perhaps not know, or unwittingly, do something that’s harmful to myself and wind up shortening my life expectancy or decreasing or reducing the quality of the life that I have.
So 702 is a great piece of legislation, and we’ve gotten an awful lot of feedback from people in the State of Montana who said, “Thank you for doing that.”
I talked to a gentleman yesterday who said, “Thank you for standing up the way you have for the people in the State of Montana.”
[05:11]
And the majority of people that we’re hearing from are individuals who say, “Thanks. We appreciate you giving us the ability to make a decision, to make a choice as far as our health is concerned.”
Leah Wilson: Yes, and have you already seen the law be protected for some of the people in Montana? Has it stopped employers from requiring certain things?
Rep. Brad Tschida: It absolutely has. We’re hearing from certain entities. For example, we also passed an accompanying piece of legislation that limited the liability of businesses, including medical practitioners when it came to the charge or the allegations somebody could make that a particular action on behalf of somebody, or inaction, might be a reason for somebody to sue a business because they haven’t been vaccinated.
And we just said, “Look, you can’t tell where you pick up a particular illness or malady.”
If you go to the farmer’s market, and then go to the grocery store, go to a vehicle dealership to have your oil changed, go to a movie, go out and have dinner, who do you pick out and say, “Well, they’re the ones that was responsible for me catching this particular malady,” whatever it is.
So we have passed a limit on the liability that businesses have and that schools have. So whether it’s a public or private entity, they have a limited amount of liability, and there’s no reason for people to feel scared or uncertain anymore about requiring people or not requiring people to be vaccinated or wear masks. We’re not going to allow people to just [unintelligible 00:06:51] on businesses.
[06:52]
We’ve already suffered, as the rest of the country has, other than, say, a state like South Dakota, that didn’t implement any kind of shutdowns, mask mandates, social distancing. They said use common sense. And that’s what we’re attempting to do. So we’re seeing businesses say, “No, we want to stay open. If you’re not feeling well, don’t come in. Stay home.”
Just do what we’ve always done. If somebody doesn’t feel good, stay home. Take the medications you’re supposed to, and ingest heavy quantities of Jewish Penicillin, otherwise known as chicken soup.
So just do the kinds of things that you need to that are common sense applications of good healthy practices—eat healthy, get plenty of rest, and make sure you maintain your hygiene.
We’ve seen businesses who have been very, very grateful that we have now allowed their business to be further impacted by the COVID insanity right now that we’re seeing throughout the country.
Leah Wilson: Yes, and you all even took a step further. I mean, I hear you talking a lot about the business protection with the employer/employee relationship, which is really what we’re hearing a huge outcry for across the U.S. But also, making this protection extend into receiving goods and services as a consumer, so that any services or places of public accommodation may not refuse/withhold goods to someone based on their vaccination status.
So that is another step that really is going to be a hallmark of this—the cusps that we’re on to say, “Okay, we need new protections that we had not needed in the past,” or at a point in time where people are being discriminated against, and our society is at risk for being segregated again for a new reason based on medical status.
[08:36]
And we want to say, at Stand for Health Freedom, that we do not stand for the segregation of our society for any reason, and to create a two-class system based on the use of pharmaceutical product is unethical and unnecessary.
Rep. Brad Tschida: Absolutely, and given the fact that we’re talking about experimental, emergency use authorization kinds of products, there’s no reason for people to be shoved into a caste system and delineate or differentiate between, “Have I been vaccinated? Have I not been vaccinated? Have I had one or two vaccines?” What has been the outcome of those kinds of things? Because we’re seeing across the country people who are experiencing health problems as a result of that.
There’s an article I read yesterday that said that—I wish could remember the author of it or the authority of it, but it was done recently in the U.S., and they indicated that young males are six times more likely to be impacted by receiving an injection than they are suffering from COVID itself. And they were talking about, specifically, heart issues.
So we’re talking about problems that a healthy person is going to potentially experience as a result of being injected with whatever is in this so-called vaccine, and I’m not one who wants to take any chances.
I haven’t led a perfectly pure life in terms of the decisions that I’ve made for my overall health, but those decisions are mine. If I choose to smoke, if I choose to drink, whatever the case is, that that is on me, and I understand the underlying health consequences.
[10:18]
But the bill you’re referring to was House Bill 257, which was introduced by Jedediah Hinkle, who was a former state senator, who took a brief hiatus, and then came back into the House of Representatives. It says essentially that no business can withhold goods or services from somebody based on a demonstrated or non-demonstrated vaccination status.
And it was, again, just good, common sense legislation that the legislators in the State of Montana and the conservative side said, “Yes, we think it’s a great deal.”
We got zero support from those on the other side of the aisle, and we expected that. We expected that they would say, “No, you have to be like a bunch of sheep or a bunch of cattle and prodded and do the things that the government is telling us to do.”
We understand that there are certain things that the government is going to ask us to do. If they’ve been tried, and if they’ve been demonstrated to be positive and successful and effective, then yes, then we have the opportunity to choose to accept the vaccine or accept some kind of injection.
For example, the [sponsor of] 702, Jennifer Carlson, is not anti-vax, neither am I. We just think that if we have vaccines that are proven to be effective, then let’s go and use them. And I have some very, very dear friends who had a daughter who is the same age as my number three child. She would have been 36 years old, and she passed away three months of age. The closest they could come to determining the cause of death was something in one of the vaccinations that she received as a child. They don’t know that for sure, but they spent so much time and money trying to figure out, and that was the conclusion they came to.
[11:58]
And I spoke to a gentleman in [unintelligible 00:11:59] who has an eight and a half year old son who is autistic, and he believes that it was due to a vaccine that the child received.
So we understand that there are some pitfalls, we understand that there are some potential health hazards, but let’s make sure if we’re going to be giving things to people that we know what the inherent risks are, and that we’re not using the human being, the human population, the sacred soul of people as a guinea pig for these kinds of experimental vaccines.
Leah Wilson: That’s exactly right—the sacred soul of people. And the federal law even acknowledges that vaccinations are unavoidably unsafe. So any time we hear the media, or a public health official, or a neighbor say safe and effective, safe and effective, and want to shut down any and all dialogue, we have to remember that these products are unavoidably unsafe just by their very nature.
And so allowing the individual and the parent to do their own risk benefit analysis, like you said. If you want to smoke or drink, great. You get to do your own risk benefit analysis which you decide your value of life, do you know what I mean? Maybe smoking brings you more joy than not.
And so that’s your own decision, whereas the use of any medical treatment also has to be the person’s decision. As you mentioned, the experiment, some people might thing, “Well, the experiment is over.” And we heard the White House say, “Okay, well, the experiment is over now. It’s no longer EUA. It’s time for you to all stop watching and waiting.”
[13:30]
But we also know that that very same Pfizer product is still in trial until May of 2023.
And so we’re looking at more than a year-long remaining in the trial, plus the long-term effects will be unknown for the next 20 years. And so it will remain an experiment regardless of an FDA designation.
So we want to make it very clear that under the Constitution and under laws like you have passed in Montana, those are our protections against the Biden-type mandates, saying that the 80-million who are eligible for the vaccine must get the vaccine against our will.
So I just want to thank you once again so much for talking with us today, and for championing common sense policies like these, that put health decisions in the hands of the individual, and make sure that we retain our freedom in this great nation.
Rep. Brad Tschida: Again, I appreciate you giving me the opportunity to be here and represent those who really, the mainstays and the integral proponents of these pieces of legislation. I was one part of the entire process, and gladly was part of that. But we have so many outstanding conservative representatives and senators to thank that I wouldn’t be able to do justice to them, but they know who they are, and they know they have my gratitude, and I’m sure that they have the gratitude of the people of the State of Montana as well.
[14:56]
Leah Wilson: Yes, and I want to tell all of our viewers today to make sure that you look for policies like this in your own state during your legislative sessions that are coming up, and that you support those however you can. Start talking to your senators and your representatives about your desire to see protections for workers and for the public when it comes to the receipt of goods and services.
Thank you so much for joining us, and we’ll see you soon.
Rep. Brad Tschida: God bless you. Thanks, Leah.