So you got fired from your job for refusing to get vaccinated or wear a mask.
By Howard Fischer | Capitol Media Services
Healthcare cure concept with a hand in blue medical gloves holding Coronavirus, Covid 19 virus, vaccine vial
Healthcare cure concept with a hand in blue medical gloves holding Coronavirus, Covid 19 virus, vaccine vial
So you got fired from your job for refusing to get vaccinated or wear a mask.
You also may have forfeited any right to collecting unemployment benefits.
That’s the conclusion of David Selden, a veteran labor law attorney. And he said it’s not just because Arizona is an “at-will” employment state where companies can fire workers for no reason at all.
But the Department of Economic Security, the agency that administers the benefits, said it may not be that cut and dried.
That issue has taken on increasing importance in the wake of an opinion issued last month by Attorney General Mark Brnovich. He concluded that private employers are free to require their workers to be vaccinated against Covid.
The only requirement is that company must make “reasonable accommodations” for those who cannot get vaccinated for medical or disability reasons, or have a “sincerely held religious belief.”
Selden said that pretty much anyone else who is let go — or quits — over issues like vaccination or masks has been terminated for refusing to comply with a condition of employment.
A federal pandemic relief program that provided extra financial aid to jobless workers ended Monday, hitting more than 45,000 unemployed Arizonans who had already seen the state pull away another source of federal aid in July.
