Thompson challenges Lloyd’s reasons for moving anti-vaccination choice consequences proposal forward – public hearing, vote slated for August 2

After writing a preview of Monday’s Front Royal Town Council work session based on Jig ‘n’ Jive Dance Studio proprietor Annie Guttierrez’s analysis of minor changes to the Town’s Special Events Code, I thought I had the lead for the coming work session story figured out.

But that work session of July 12, took an unexpected turn 90 minutes in when a non-agenda item was raised during “Open Discussion” by Councilman Scott Lloyd. The “policy attorney” and “right-to-life” advocate, most prominently known nationally as former President Donald Trump’s Director of Refugee Resettlement during the child separation policy at the southern border, implored his colleagues to bring his pandemic-related, anti-vaccination choice consequences ordinance proposal to a vote despite admitting he knew he has no support for the initiative among them. Lloyd’s proposed ordinance would make it illegal for any business or “entity” in the Town of Front Royal to, not only fire but reposition or refuse to hire someone based on their refusal to be vaccinated against the COVID-19 Coronavirus pandemic. It is a pandemic as of July 13, attributed with killing over 4 million worldwide, 611,700 nationally, 11,450 in Virginia, and 61 in Warren County in the last year and a half.

That lack of support, even among Lloyd’s fellow conservative Republican Committee council members is based on the town legal staff’s opinion such an initiative has no legal basis in Virginia, particularly as a Dillon Rule state in which municipal governments have no authority greater than what is defined for them by the state government.

With his point raised, Councilwoman Letasha Thompson confronted Lloyd about his reasoning for requesting a public vote on an initiative Lloyd said he wouldn’t mind being the “lone vote” in support of. “I have a question – what is the goal? I’m starting to think there’s a goal here, and I think it’s a very personal goal I’m trying to understand,” she began. “What is your next step? Because you’re asking to bring something to a vote that you literally know you’re going to be the only one to vote on the ‘yes’ line. So, I’m thinking there’s something beyond town council that you’re going for. And that’s fine but you need to let the rest of us know,” Thompson told Lloyd, citing what she said were at least 10 previous times Lloyd had brought the matter to the council table.

Scott Lloyd left, denies any personal agenda beyond constituent representation in a drive to bring private-sector anti-vaccination ordinance proposal forward. Letasha Thompson, right, who confronted Lloyd about his motivations seems unimpressed by what she is hearing. Royal Examiner Photos by Roger Bianchini

“So, I’d like to understand, do you have some ambition outside of Front Royal and the town council – is that what we’re doing? Because … it’s a bunch of push for something that you know isn’t going anywhere. But there has to be some personal gain for you, and I’m trying to figure out …” at which point Lloyd interrupted to respond.

“You say it isn’t going anywhere – it has nothing to do with any personal ambitions beyond town council. I have four years on this and I don’t really plan out career moves or anything, especially this kind of thing, that far in advance,” Lloyd asserted. Rather, he claimed representation of a constituent base concerned about the issue of employer-mandated COVID-19 vaccinations he has heard from over the past month.

“And they’re saying things like ‘I want to be able to get pregnant in the future. And I have concerns about this vaccine. But I also don’t want to lose my job because I don’t want to lose my health insurance. – And I want to do something to help those people,” Lloyd stated beating the table rhythmically with that final sentence to make his point. However, he failed to elaborate how a public vote he anticipated at 5-1 against an initiative the town attorney has stated could not stand up legally, might help those constituents. Particularly with the likelihood of town taxpayers having to support a costly, time-consuming, and likely losing legal fight with the State, were his ordinance proposal to be approved.

But Lloyd continued to press for taking his no employment consequences business mandate to a council meeting public hearing and vote. Again beating the meeting table rhythmically, he stated, “I’m fine with having the argument and losing on the merits” (see subheader section below).

He added that he would continue to try to convince his council colleagues to alter their stance to his side on his proposal to forbid private-sector businesses and other entities in town from being able to mandate vaccines for employees, or even reassign unvaccinated employees among other governmental dictates on private-sector operations.

“What are you afraid of?” Lloyd challenged Thompson of proceeding to a vote.

“It’s literally not enforceable – it’s a waste of time at this juncture,” Thompson countered of a council majority’s apparent consensus that Town Attorney Doug Napier’s opinion is legally sound.

Lloyd challenged Napier’s research and opinion on his proposal, asking for specific, directly related case histories. And while Napier previously cited specified written legislation indicating the State does have the authority to mandate vaccinations in a public health crisis, thus in a Dillon Rule state like Virginia seeming to eliminate a municipality’s ability to do the opposite, Lloyd expanded his legal inquiry to include a state government challenge of the legality of any municipal ordinance proposal in the past.

A staredown between the two attorneys at the work session table, as Town Attorney Doug Napier, right, reacts to ‘policy attorney’ Lloyd’s requested expansion of legal research into broader areas like dog walking and walking on one’s hands municipal ordinance challenges, as Vice-Mayor Cockrell and Mayor Holloway try to make sense of the conversation.

“Is there any case regarding dog walking, hand-standing, anything, carnivals, curb and gutter, credit card fees – is there anything?” Lloyd pressed Napier for a case history example of a state challenge of municipal code authority.

“I haven’t looked at it like that,” Napier replied.

“I’d like you to look at it like that,” Lloyd told the town attorney.

At this point, Mayor Holloway entered the fray.

“I can tell you I’m not going to have it on the agenda – I think it’s a waste of time,” Holloway told Lloyd, siding with Thompson on the “why are we doing this” aspect of a public vote.

Lloyd responded by challenging the mayor’s authority to limit his ability to force the issue to a meeting vote. “I was told that we changed our local ordinances because, in order to empower town councilmen to bring their own things on their agenda when the mayor doesn’t want it on the agenda. So, the code was designed for this specific circumstance,” Lloyd told the mayor. He then cited the support of a necessary second council member to bring the ordinance proposal forward over the mayor’s wishes. While not mentioned during the work session, staff later verified that support to move the matter forward came from Joseph McFadden.

Council reacts as the legal sparring between the town attorney and Councilman Lloyd progresses. Councilman McFadden, left foreground, was later identified as council member whose support of at least bringing the matter to a vote allowed Lloyd to successfully achieve that goal.

“By the way, we’ve got two people to get it on the agenda since last month and we’re still playing this game,” Lloyd said with rising frustration aimed the town attorney’s way.

“I’m not in control of the agenda – I don’t do anything with it,” Napier pointed out.

“But you know what the town code says regarding the agenda,” Lloyd parried, refusing to take his sights off the only other lawyer at the table. Napier reiterated that he does not influence meeting agenda construction. With voices beginning to rise, Mayor Holloway asked Lloyd “to tone it down” – Uh oh.

“You know what, excuse me, I’ve been really polite about this. I’ve put it in emails, I’ve made polite requests over this for now weeks. And I’m not getting straight answers to direct questions,” Lloyd replied to the mayor, suggesting staff stonewalling of his desire to take the matter to a public vote. After some silent reading, Napier read the relevant code on agendas to council, minus the absent Gary Gillespie.

Town Manager Hicks, right, sought clarity from council in moving toward public hearing and vote on Lloyd’s anti-vaccination mandate ordinance proposal with, thus far little council support or legal justification. The public hearing and vote will occur at a Special Meeting at Town Hall, 7 p.m., Monday, Aug. 2.

“The mayor or in his absence, the vice mayor, approves the final regular meeting and work session agendas before the publication and shall not remove any item on said agendas placed by at least two council members,” Napier read, leading to further back and forth.

The outcome is that Lloyd’s proposed town ordinance restrictions on businesses and other entities within the town limits being able to mandate employee vaccinations will be advertised for a public hearing and a vote slated at a special council meeting at Town Hall, 7 p.m. Monday, August 2. It was observed that the public would also have an opportunity to weigh in at the council’s regular meeting of June 26 at the Warren County Government Center. That opportunity would come during the Public Concerns portion of the meeting devoted to non-agenda items.

‘Fine with losing on the merits’

As to the merit of his offered example of a constituent fear of the COVID-19 vaccination based on the risk of female sterilization as a consequence of Coronavirus vaccinations, an online search revealed multiple news and medical reports attributing the concern to a “rebranding” of long-standing anti-vaccination “disinformation” claims with no verifiable scientific support base. Here is what the medical site “sciencebasedmedicine.org” posted June 7 on the matter:

“Before there were safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines authorized for use, such as the vaccines by Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson here in the US, as well as AstraZeneca in Europe and elsewhere, those of us who have been countering the antivaccine movement for many years now were warning about the sorts of disinformation that anti-vaxxers would spread about them. We were largely correct, too, but I can’t really say that it took any particular brilliance or foresight to have been so correct. We simply knew that there is no truly new trope, pseudoscience, or disinformation in the antivaccine narratives and conspiracy theories; so all we did was to predict the repurposing of tried-and-not-true anti-vax lies.”

Of the claim that “a top Pfizer researcher” was raising concerns about a vaccine/sterilization link, a December 2020 Associated Press (AP) investigative report ruled the claim “FALSE”. The AP story by Beatrice Dupuy based the false claim, at least in part, on social media circulation of a “Health and Money News” story titled “Head of Pfizer Research: Covid Vaccine is Female Sterilization” naming a “retired” British doctor named Michael Yeadon, who left Pfizer nine years earlier, as the source. While AP could not locate Yeadon for comment, multiple practicing medical sources contacted by the writer debunked the alleged science cited in the article as the basis for the sterilization concern.

The Snopes fact-checking site noted that in his retirement, Yeadon and a German physician Wolfgang Wodarg had sent a letter of concern to the European Medicines Agency (ESA) citing a potential blocking of a placenta-forming protein in mammals related to the Pfizer vaccine. However, Yeadon and Wodarg’s letter to ESA never claimed the vaccine actually caused infertility in humans as the circulated Health and Money News headline/story suggested.

Some of the many links to articles debunking a COVID vaccination connection to human infertility. Support for the idea, which Councilman Lloyd cited as an example of town citizen concern driving his ordinance proposal forward, was hard to come by.

In fact, an online search of “support for COVID-19 vaccination/sterility claims” led to pages of links to articles and medical sites debunking any claims that COVID vaccinations have been linked to female or male infertility.

See the above-referenced discussion in the Town video, beginning just past the 1-hour-30 minute mark, as well other council business discussed that evening. That other business included an updated version of a new Special Events Permitting Code; a Water and Sewer Line Replacement Program to help town utility customers finance the replacement of aging, corroding water and sewer lines; a proposed ordinance amendment on Blighted and Non-Conforming Structures; Dusk to Dawn lighting in town and impacts on neighbors; and the advisability or not, of encouraging short-term rentals in town, among other topics.