Mayor Bill de Blasio sprang a COVID-19 vaccine mandate on all private businesses in New York City on Monday — drawing immediate rebuke from trade groups, New York office workers and some fellow elected officials who said the backbone of the Big Apple was “blindsided” by the stunning move.
De Blasio, whose mayoralty ends at the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve, labeled making vaccines compulsory for private businesses a “pre-emptive strike” against an expected surge in COVID infections this winter amid the emergence of the Omicron variant.
“We’re going to announce a first-in-the-nation measure,” de Blasio said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” pinning the move on getting “ahead of Omicron and all the other challenges we’re facing right now.” The city so far has just seven known cases of the new variant, according to state data released Saturday.
Adding to the shockwave, the policy is scheduled to go into effect in just 21 days, on Dec. 27. The announcement left New Yorkers and the city’s business community flabbergasted.
Kathryn Wylde, head of the business group Partnership for NYC, blasted the mayor’s announcement.
That just means more of those NY people will be moving this way.