Attorney General reflects on one year of COVID-19

Over the past year, since the state of emergency was declared in response to the start of the COVID pandemic on March 12, 2020, Attorney General Herring has made it a top priority to keep Virginians, their families, loved ones, and communities safe and healthy during incredibly uncertain times. Attorney General Herring has been incredibly successful in defending Virginia’s COVID safety measures in court; he made sure that Virginians could vote safely and easily even during a pandemic, and he has taken many important steps to support Virginians.

“This past year has been unlike anything anyone has ever experienced in their lifetimes, and it has forced Virginians to live with uncertainty and fear,” said Attorney General Herring. “My Team and I have worked tirelessly to make sure Virginians, their families, and loved ones remained safe and healthy during this unprecedented public health crisis. From successfully defending the Commonwealth’s COVID mitigations efforts time and again in court, to making it a top priority to ensure that every Virginian feel safe and comfortable voting whether they chose to vote in person or absentee, to supporting Virginians in so many ways during a time of so much uncertainty and unrest, I have not stopped protecting those who call Virginia home and I remain as committed as ever to continuing that important work.”

Successfully Defending Virginia’s COVID Safety Measures
Attorney General Herring has been incredibly successful in defending Virginia’s COVID safety measures and has successfully won at least 25 times in court. These COVID mitigation measures and guidelines have been key over the past year in keeping Virginians, their families and loved ones, and communities safe and healthy during an unprecedented global public health crisis.

Due to the hard work of Attorney General Herring and his team, courts across the Commonwealth ruled time and again that maintaining life-saving measures like in-person gathering limits, temporary stay-at-home orders, school closures, and others were crucial to public health and safety.

A number of the legal challenges to Virginia’s COVID safety measures sought to stop the enforcement of the in-person gathering ban for certain businesses. In Hall v. Northam, for example, the plaintiffs asked the Court to allow for the immediate reopening of gyms, indoor sports facilities, and indoor exercise facilities. The judge, in this case, ruled in favor of Attorney General Herring and denied the request, saying: “I don’t believe that balance of equities tip in [plaintiffs’] favor largely because when you weigh the rights of one small business owner against the rights of the citizenry of the commonwealth, or even in smaller political subdivisions like the county of Culpeper, that you can’t say that his rights outweigh everyone else’s rights to remain free of any disease, illness or other.”

Additionally, Attorney General Herring successfully defended Virginia’s mask requirement twice against legal challenges. In both cases, the plaintiffs sought a preliminary injunction allowing them to opt-out of the Commonwealth’s mask requirement and in both cases, the injunction was denied.

Ensuring Safe and Easy Voting Access
Attorney General Herring made it a top priority last year to protect voting rights and protect Virginia voters from illegal harassment or intimidation at the polls. Because of all the work that Attorney General Herring and his team did in preparation for Election Day, including making it clear that absolutely no voter intimidation would be tolerated in Virginia and preparing and planning for any and all outcomes or potential legal challenges, the Commonwealth saw a remarkably smooth and uneventful Election day. In addition to the OAG attorneys who normally represent the Board of Elections and the Department of Elections, Attorney General Herring assembled a multidisciplinary team of attorneys from his Civil Litigation and Public Safety Divisions, Solicitor General’s Office, and other divisions across the OAG, who were on standby, ready to jump into action at a moment’s notice should the need have arisen. The OAG also had lawyers in every corner of the Commonwealth who were prepared to go into court to handle any potential legal challenges.

Virginia also saw historic turnout during last year’s election, especially in early and absentee voting. This increase in voter participation was really possible in part because of Attorney General Herring’s work to make voting as easy and safe as possible during this unprecedented election cycle by crafting agreements to waive the witness signature on absentee ballots, making it easier for disabled Virginians to vote safely at home, extending the voter registration deadline, and blocking the drastic operational changes at the USPS.

Last year’s election cycle brought numerous challenges that prompted Attorney General Herring and his team to develop solutions and put out guidance to make sure every Virginian had a safe, comfortable, easy voting experience, whether they chose to vote early absentee, early in person, or on Election Day.

Attorney General Herring and his team negotiated options to promote safe, secure voting for Virginians who could not or did not want to risk their health to vote in person including:
• An agreement that waived the witness requirement for absentee ballots for Virginians who feared for their safety voting in person
• An agreement that made it easier for Virginians with disabilities to participate in the election safely at home

Attorney General Herring also successfully blocked the Trump Administration’s drastic operational changes to the U.S. Postal Service, when a federal judge granted his motion for a preliminary injunction, explicitly saying in his order that, “at the heart of DeJoy’s and the Postal Service’s actions is voter disenfranchisement.”

Additionally, Attorney General Herring put a lot of emphasis on ensuring that Virginians felt comfortable and protected at polling places across the Commonwealth by:
• Issuing an advisory opinion outlining the protections in both state and federal law against voter intimidation and harassment in response to some reports of potential voter intimidation at a polling place in Fairfax the day after early voting began in Virginia
• Reiterating the voter intimidation protections and outlining the actual duties of poll watchers in Virginia, following President Trump’s alarming rhetoric at the first presidential debate where he urged his supports to “go into the polls and watch very carefully”
• Writing to key law enforcement and elections stakeholder organizations asking for their commitment to ensuring a safe, fair, free, and accurate election, and outlining protections in both state and federal law to prevent voter intimidation and harassment
• Producing a short training video that walks law enforcement and elections officials through his voter intimidation opinion and the various tools that they can use to address potentially unlawful conduct

Supporting Virginians During Uncertain Times

Moratorium on Utility Cutoffs – In response to Attorney General Herring’s emergency petition requesting a freeze in March, the SCC halted all utility disconnections for non-payment. Attorney General Herring successfully requested that the SCC extend their freeze on all disconnections again in April and again in June. In his June filing with the SCC, Attorney General Herring noted that Governor Northam had extended the state of emergency indefinitely and explained that “the existing moratorium should be extended to a point in the future after Virginia’s economy has had an opportunity to resume, allowing impacted citizens an opportunity to regain some financial footing.”

Protecting Virginia Consumers
During the COVID-19 emergency, the Virginia Attorney General’s Office has received more than 500 complaints and e-mails alleging possible price gouging activity and has sent more than 150 investigative letters to businesses. In January, Attorney General Herring announced that he had secured a settlement with Joule Wellness Pharmacy resolving allegations that the business charged unconscionable prices on rubbing alcohol. Investigation of these complaints has largely revealed that many price increases occurred further up the supply chain with manufacturers or distributors that were beyond the reach of the state’s price gouging laws, and this prompted Attorney General Herring to successfully seek amendments to the state’s price gouging law during the 2020 General Assembly special session.

Additionally, in April, Attorney General Herring led a national effort to address price gouging in the PPE supply chain, urging 3M as one of the largest manufacturers of PPE, particularly masks, to do more to address price gouging within its supply and distribution chains that were causing hospitals and healthcare providers to pay exorbitant prices for PPE.

Highlighting Tenant Protections
In July, Attorney General Herring outlined the various state and federal tenant protections currently in place to help Virginians stay in their homes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Attorney General Herring highlighted protections that were included in the federal Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act); state protections included in the 2020 Virginia Act of Assembly; powers the Supreme Court of Virginia has to declare a judicial emergency during which unlawful detainer cases can be stayed, continued, or have deadlines modified; and various legislative and executive actions that can be taken to protect tenants.