Arkansas lawmakers left the state’s mask mandate ban in place and passed legislation that barred the state from resuming federally funded supplemental unemployment payments after a judge previously ordered the state to continue.
GOP Governor Asa Hutchinson called a special session to consider removing the ban on mask mandates in schools. The state has seen a 517 percent increase in the number of virus cases for people under the age of 18 between April and July, according to the top state health official.
“Local school districts should make the call and they should have more options to make sure that their school is a safe environment during a very challenging time for education,” Hutchinson said Tuesday.
The House and Senate gave approval for the only other item on the session’s agenda on Friday, legislation to bar the state from resuming supplemental unemployment insurance payments to 69,000 people in the state.
For more reporting from the Associated Press, see below.
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The majority-Republican Legislature adjourned the special session that GOP Gov. Asa Hutchinson had called to consider rolling back the ban for some schools. Hutchinson signed the ban in April but said the change was needed to protect children under 12 who can’t get vaccinated as the state’s virus cases and hospitalizations skyrocket.
A House panel on Thursday rejected two measures to allow some school districts to issue mask requirements.
There had been growing calls to lift the ban before school starts statewide later this month. The ban is already being challenged in two lawsuits, including one from an east Arkansas school district where more than 800 students and staff have quarantined because of a COVID-19 outbreak.
Pediatricians and health officials have said that masks in schools are needed to protect children, as the delta variant and Arkansas’ low vaccination rate fuels the state’s spiraling cases.
But Hutchinson faced heavy opposition from fellow Republicans, who had been inundated with calls and messages from opponents of masks in schools.
He said this week he regretted signing the mask mandate ban, telling reporters that “in hindsight, I wish that had not become law.” Hutchinson noted he did so when the state’s cases were much lower and that the Legislature could have easily overridden him had he vetoed the measure.
A state judge last week ordered Arkansas to resume unemployment payment, ruling that Hutchinson didn’t appear to have the authority on his own to cut off the payments. Hutchinson was among more than two dozen GOP governors who ended their states’ participation in the federally funded payments, which were scheduled to run through early September.
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