Ninth Circuit Affirms COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate: Curtis v. Inslee
Executive Summary
Case: Curtis v. Inslee, No. 24-1869 (9th Cir. Oct. 6, 2025)
Court: United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (appeal from Western District of Washington, Case No. 3:23-cv-05741-RJB)
Matter: Employment termination claims arising from Washington State's COVID-19 vaccination mandate for healthcare workers, asserting federal statutory, constitutional, and state law theories.
Plaintiffs:
Aila Curtis and more than 80 other former at-will employees of PeaceHealth, a nonprofit healthcare system in Washington State.
Defendants:
Jay Robert Inslee, former Governor of Washington; PeaceHealth, Inc.; Liz Dunne; and Doug Koekkoek.
Plaintiffs' Counsel:
David J. Schexnaydre (argued), Schexnaydre Law Firm LLC, Mandeville, Louisiana; Charice L. Holtsclaw, Bellingham, Washington.
Defendants' Counsel:
Ian D. Rogers (argued), Kai A. Smith, Zachary J. Pekelis, and Meha Goyal, Pacifica Law Group LLP, Seattle, Washington (for Governor Inslee); Whitney A. Brown (argued), Stoel Rives LLP, Anchorage, Alaska; Vanessa S. Power and Jenna M. Poligo, Stoel Rives LLP, Seattle, Washington (for PeaceHealth).
Ninth Circuit Panel: M. Margaret McKeown, Richard A. Paez, and Gabriel P. Sanchez, Circuit Judges. Opinion by Judge McKeown.
Key Findings
Outcome: Defense verdict affirmed on all federal claims; state law claims against Governor dismissed with prejudice; state law claims against PeaceHealth dismissed without prejudice
Statutory Claims: None of the federal statutes, treaties, regulations, or agreements cited by plaintiffs created rights enforceable under 42 U.S.C. § 1983
Substantive Due Process: Claim foreclosed by Jacobson v. Massachusetts and Health Freedom Defense Fund, Inc. v. Carvalho
Procedural Due Process: At-will employment is not a constitutionally protected property interest
Equal Protection: Washington's vaccine mandate survived rational basis review
Leave to Amend: Properly denied as amendment would be futile
Factual Background
On August 20, 2021, then-Governor Jay Inslee issued Proclamation 21-14, which required healthcare workers in Washington State to be vaccinated against COVID-19 by October 18, 2021, absent a qualifying exemption. Ten days later, PeaceHealth adopted its own vaccination mandate for employees, with a compliance deadline of October 15, 2021.
The plaintiffs, more than 80 at-will employees of PeaceHealth, refused to comply with the vaccination requirement and were subsequently terminated. They filed suit in the Western District of Washington against both PeaceHealth and Governor Inslee, asserting an extensive array of federal statutory claims, constitutional challenges under the Fourteenth Amendment, and Washington state law claims for breach of contract, employment tort, outrage, and invasion of privacy.
Central to the plaintiffs' theory was their characterization of the available COVID-19 vaccine as an "investigational drug" because it was authorized only for emergency use at the time the mandates were issued. The plaintiffs argued that various federal laws and international agreements protected their right to refuse such drugs without penalty. They also asserted that they were not adequately informed of their option to refuse the vaccine.
The district court, presided over by Judge Robert J. Bryan, dismissed all claims. The plaintiffs appealed to the Ninth Circuit, which heard oral argument in Seattle on July 9, 2025.
The Court's Analysis
Statutory and Non-Constitutional Claims. The court examined an eclectic collection of sources that the plaintiffs claimed conferred enforceable rights: the Emergency Use Authorization statute (21 U.S.C. § 360bbb-3), the Department of Defense funding statute (10 U.S.C. § 980), the PREP Act (42 U.S.C. § 247d-6), Article VII of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the human subjects research regulations (45 C.F.R. Part 46), the Belmont Report, the Federal Wide Assurance Agreement, the COVID-19 Vaccination Program Provider Agreement, and various Emergency Use Authorization letters.
The court found that none of these sources created specific and definite rights enforceable under Section 1983. Regarding the EUA statute, the court noted that Congress has limited enforcement of the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to public actions, thereby "shut[ting] the door to private enforcement." The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights was ratified by the United States with an express understanding that it was not self-executing and thus did not create obligations enforceable in federal courts. The Belmont Report, the court observed, "is neither a statute nor a regulation" and "contains no hint of a legal right or remedy enforceable in U.S. courts."
Substantive Due Process. The plaintiffs framed their claim as a right "to refuse an investigational drug without penalty or pressure." The court held this claim was foreclosed by the Supreme Court's decision in Jacobson v. Massachusetts (1905), which upheld penalties for refusing vaccination where justified by public health concerns, and by the Ninth Circuit's recent en banc decision in Health Freedom Defense Fund, Inc. v. Carvalho (2025).
The court applied rational basis review, noting that fundamental rights are "highly circumscribed" and courts are "reluctant to expand the concept of substantive due process." Under Jacobson, penalties justified by public health concerns are legitimate where they bear a "real or substantial relation to the protection of public health." The court found the mandate easily satisfied this deferential standard, particularly given the Supreme Court's recognition in Biden v. Missouri (2022) that vaccine mandates for healthcare workers serve the compelling interest of reducing transmission to patients.
The court acknowledged the plaintiffs' assertion that the available vaccine was only EUA-authorized and not FDA-approved at the relevant time, but found this distinction immaterial. The plaintiffs themselves conceded that the EUA-authorized and FDA-approved vaccines had the same "medical formulation" and could be "used interchangeably." Under these circumstances, the court concluded there was "no material distinction between the refusal of a vaccine and Employees' refusal of administration of an investigational drug that is clinically identical to a vaccine."
Procedural Due Process. The court rejected the procedural due process claim on multiple grounds. Most fundamentally, at-will employment with PeaceHealth was not a constitutionally protected property interest. The court further noted that the Proclamation provided notice of the vaccination requirements and consequences, and required that healthcare workers be given opportunities for individualized assessment of religious and medical exemptions.
Characterizing the plaintiffs' argument as "a bid to alter the state's policies, rather than its procedures," the court observed that "[t]he Governor was under no obligation to hold a town hall for Employees to make known their various complaints regarding the Proclamation."
Equal Protection. The plaintiffs asserted discrimination against a non-suspect class of "healthcare workers choosing the option to refuse." The court found this framing problematic because the Proclamation "applied evenhandedly" to all healthcare workers, with exemptions for religious and medical reasons. Under rational basis review, the mandate survived because a state decisionmaker "could rationally have decided" that requiring vaccination of healthcare workers would further the legitimate and indeed "compelling" interest of stemming the spread of COVID-19.
State Law Claims. The court affirmed dismissal of all state law claims against Governor Inslee. The breach of contract claim failed because the Governor was not a party to the Provider Agreement. The employment tort claim failed because plaintiffs did not allege the Governor acted as their employer. The outrage claim failed because a vaccination requirement—a "common feature of the provision of healthcare in America"—could not plausibly constitute conduct "utterly intolerable in a civilized community."
As for the state law claims against PeaceHealth, the court upheld the district court's exercise of discretion to decline supplemental jurisdiction after dismissing all federal claims, leaving those issues for Washington state courts to adjudicate.
Significance
Curtis v. Inslee represents a comprehensive rejection of the legal theories advanced by employees terminated for refusing COVID-19 vaccination. The decision joins a growing body of federal appellate authority—including the Fifth Circuit's decision in Pearson v. Shriners Hospitals (2025) and the Tenth Circuit's decision in Sweeney v. University of Colorado Hospital Authority (2025)—uniformly rejecting these claims.
For employers, the decision reinforces that vaccination policies implemented for legitimate health and safety reasons will be evaluated under highly deferential rational basis review, absent claims of religious or other protected-class discrimination. For plaintiffs' counsel, the decision suggests that constitutional challenges to facially neutral vaccination mandates face substantial hurdles, while claims focused on discriminatory application of exemption processes—as in the Ninth Circuit's earlier decision in Bacon v. Woodward (2024)—may present a more viable path.
The court's refusal to grant leave to amend, finding that any amendment would be futile, underscores the difficulty of pleading around the fundamental obstacles these claims face.