Both Gov. Kathy Hochul and Mayor Bill de Blasio face court dates for their vaccine mandates in New York City and across the Empire State.

In two separate hearings the courts granted temporary restraining orders to the mandate until a broader case can be brought forward. Hearings on the religious exemptions that was not included in the mandate come in the next two weeks.

In the state’s mandate case Federal Judge David Hurd granted the order on Tuesday in response to a suit filed by healthcare workers, who are opposed to the vaccine because they “employ aborted fetus cell lines in their testing, development, or production.”

“We left off that in our regulations intentionally … we’ll be defending this in court. To the extent that there’s leadership of different religious organizations that have spoken, and they have, I’m not aware of a sanctioned religious exemption from any organized religion. In fact, they’re encouraging the opposite,” Hochul said Wednesday. 

“There’ll be some individuals who will try to defy this, they’ll be court decisions that we’ll appeal. We’re going to continue appealing those and trying to win on the merits in the case,” Hochul added.

In New York City’s case Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Laurence L. Love issued his order barring City Hall from ordering city staffers to get the shot by Sept. 27th or risk termination. This suit was filed by municipal unions against de Blasio’s directive. 

The mayor told reporters, ““It’s a very temporary action to get to the court date where the actual case will be heard. We’re very very confident in our legal position.”