A federal judge ruled against mask and vaccine mandates for Texas' Head Start programs, a move lauded by Gov. Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton.
Lubbock Independent School District and the state of Texas filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration on Dec. 10 to temporarily block the federal mandates for the Head Start program from taking effect across the country. The judge, however, only allowed the order to apply to Texas, KLBK Lubbock reported.
"The Court concludes that the circumstances do not justify or require a nationwide injunction … The great majority of evidence before the Court is limited to harm caused to Head Start programs in Texas," Judge James "Wesley" Hendrix said in his ruling Friday, according to the local news outlet.
The court also said that it "concludes that there is a substantial likelihood that the mandates do not fit within the Head Start Act’s authorizing text, that HHS failed to follow the APA in promulgating the mandates and that the mandates are arbitrary and capricious," and stated that it "preliminarily enjoins their enforcement in Texas."
Friday's ruling is only preliminary and the lawsuit will now go to federal court, according to KLBK.
The new rules issued last month in Head Start programs required children over 2-years-old to wear masks. Staff, contractors and volunteers in the program were required by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to be vaccinated by the end of January.
Head Start is a program that helps infants, toddlers and pre-school children in low-income families prepare for school.
Abbott took to Twitter to hail the ruling, saying that Texas "just beat Biden again."
BREAKING: Texas just beat Biden again.
— Greg Abbott (@GregAbbott_TX) January 1, 2022
Another of Biden’s vaccine & mask mandates was just halted by a federal judge in Texas.
The Court writes: “It is undisputed that an agency cannot act without Congressional authorization.”
That would apply to all of Biden’s orders. pic.twitter.com/dqmDLGxR9j
And Paxton told Fox News that the judge's ruling "is a win for the children of Texas for sure, given that parents should be making these decisions, not the Biden administration."
"We didn't think that was right," Paxton said, referring to the rules put in place by the Biden administration. "We thought that was a parental choice, not a Joe Biden choice, so we sued them, arguing that he didn't have the authority – statutory or constitutional – to do this."