California Law to Punish Doctors Who Dissent from Coronavirus Party Line Repealed
On October 1 of last year, I wrote about California Governor Gavin Newsom having signed into law the previous day AB 2098, legislation I described as telling “the state’s medical boards to punish doctors who challenge the coronavirus orthodoxy.”
Here is an update.
On September 30 of this year, exactly a year after signing AB 2098 into law, Newsome signed into law new legislation (SB 815) that includes among its provisions the repeal of AB 2098.
George Washington University Law School Professor Jonathan Turley provided in a Saturday article details regarding the repeal of AB 2098, which Turley refers to as “California’s unconstitutional Covid gag law for physicians and other medical professionals.” The repeal, Turley suggested, is motivated by the prospect of judicial determination striking down the speech restricting law. Turley also addressed in his article how repeal was accomplished surreptitiously, with no peep heard about the repeal from Newsom who had signed the original bill into law, state legislators who had sponsored it, or the California Medical Association that had pushed for its enactment. You can read Turley’s report here.