Mask mandate in schools; Mootness; Denial of a preliminary injunction; Free-exercise claim; Equal protection claim; Substantive due process claim; Michigan Department of Health & Human Services (MDHHS)

[This appeal was from the WD-MI.] The court voted for rehearing en banc and vacated the prior decision and judgment (see e-Journal # 76075 in the 8/26/21 edition), in which the court had held that plaintiffs’ challenges to the MDHHS’s Orders requiring school children to wear masks to prevent the spread of COVID-19 were not moot just because they had been rescinded. Applying rational basis review, it had also held that they were “rationally related to a legitimate government interest”—controlling the spread of COVID-19 in Michigan. The mandate was stayed and the case was restored to the court’s docket as a pending appeal.