Washington State head coach Rolovich FIRED for not being vaccinated by deadline

I think the state of Washington is being overly strict.

They should allow state employees the option to get vaccinated OR get tested weekly.

All the other states do that.

I have a feeling he's going to sue.

He hasn't said one word, nor issued a statement during this entire process leading up to his firing.

I think he has been advised by his attorney not to speak, so that nothing will come back to haunt him when he sues the state.

The Pope said yes to vaccines, so what’s the exemption?

Even the conservative Mennonite Church of Canada put out a statement Sept. 29 saying there is no religious argument for refusing to be vaccinated.

“For a religious exemption to be granted, rationale for exemption must be clearly indicated within our sacred texts or confessional statements. We wish to clarify that there is nothing in the Bible, in our historic confessions of faith, in our theology or in our ecclesiology that justifies granting a religious exemption from vaccinations against COVID-19,” the Mennonite Church stated.

Vaccines are not as politicized in Canada as they are, for example, in the U.S, where only 66% of Americans are vaccinated and the governor of Texas just banned vaccine mandates. In Canada, 81% of people over 12 are fully vaccinated and 87% of the population has at least one dose.

I was originally wondering why they made such a big deal about a college coach not getting vaccinated, until it came out that he is the highest paid state employee in Washington.

He even gets paid more than the governor!

Head coach without a brain.

Absolute idiot

Good.

Will they still pay out the remainder of his contract?

It runs through 2025, and it's worth millions.

Yesterday was the deadline for all Massachusetts state workers to get vaccinated or lose their jobs unless its for medical or religious purposes. Many state troopers are planning to quit.

How dumb do you have to be? Jesus. Maybe all those quit state troopers and cops will keep more black people alive.

Do they have the option for weekly testing, R10?

Dumb jocks everywhere...

It's not about religion or principles. What drives these tards is the belief that they are sticking it to those lefty liberals. If Biden and Pelosi announced today that they thought vaccines were awful these same people would be rushing out to get the shot. What a bunch of worthless and destructive losers.

He is the highest paid state employee and I’m sure his contract has a disrepute clause making this perfectly legal. It simply looks bad, especially for a state which like Washington in which more than 2/3rds of the population is vaccinated.

R9 "for cause" means no contract buyout.

The state of Washington has no testing in lieu of being vaccinated option for public workers at any level of educational institution. Illinois and Maine have similar orders. Other states with vaccination mandates offer at least once a week testing as an alternative.

Hahahahahahaha!

[quote] The state of Washington has no testing in lieu of being vaccinated option for public workers at any level of educational institution. Illinois and Maine have similar orders. Other states with vaccination mandates offer at least once a week testing as an alternative.

This right here could be grounds for Rolovich to successfully sue the state.

There's a reason most states have allowed the weekly testing option, and it's because forced vaccination with no other option might not be completely legal.

We'll see.

That's not unusual r5. In the MAJORITY of states the highest paid public employee is a college football coach. It's such a fuckin absurdity.

BYEEEEEE

Let's hope WSU and WA have better lawyers and a huge legal war chest for the incoming lawsuit. All you do is coach football for $3M annually. I would get vaccinated daily if I had his job.

Most of these guys are big pussys who are AFRAID of the vaccine. They won't admit that they're SCARED. Gone. Good.

I think the state would kick his ass in court. States have broad powers related to public health, and good reason to require vaccination in this case.

Is there a specific reason why Washington State won't allow weekly testing for state employees, as a secondary option?

Has this guy met ESPN reporter Allison Williams? Bye, Felicia

Courts have been upholding vaccine requirements so far when they have been tested.

[quote] Multiple assistant coaches and staff members who are not vaccinated were also fired Monday as vaccinated defensive coordinator Jake Dickert got tapped to become interim head coach

“Today was a good day” - Jake 🥂

I knew it! I have a feeling this case will set a precedent across the country.

[quote] Former Washington State football coach Nick Rolovich's attorney plans to take legal action against school

An attorney for former Washington State football coach Nick Rolovich announced on Wednesday that the coach plans to take legal action against the school.

Rolovich was fired for cause on Monday after a religious accommodation request wasn’t granted for his decision to not take the COVID-19 vaccine. The firing occurred because of a state deadline that essentially declared that all state employees needed to be vaccinated by Oct. 18.

In the release, Rolovich’s lawyer, Brian Fahling, calls the termination “unjust and unlawful.” In the release, Fahling accuses Washington State athletic director Pat Chun of “discriminatory and vindictive behavior [that] has caused immeasurable harm to Coach Rolovich and his family.” Chun declined comment.

The release doesn’t specify what specific damages Rolovich will be seeking nor what exactly the legal case will entail.

Rolovich had three years and approximately $9 million remaining on his contract when Washington State terminated him. He was fired for cause, along with four on-field assistant coaches, which means that the university does not plan to pay Rolovich any of the money remaining on his contract. (He’d have been owed $3.6 million if fired without cause.)

The statement mentions Rolovich’s “sincerely held religious beliefs” and claims Washington State, without offering specifics, “indicated” that if Rolovich had been granted a religious exemption that “no accommodation would have been made.”

It also says, without offering specifics, that Chun "had already determined that Coach Rolovich would be fired" since "at least early April."

“Chun’s animus towards Coach Rolovich’s sincerely held religious beliefs, and Chun’s dishonesty at the expense of Coach Rolovich during the past year is damning and will be thoroughly detailed in litigation,” according to Fahling.

The news release signals the start of the litigation portion of Rolovich’s dismissal. And it targets both the university and Chun, claiming that Chun arranged a “‘secret’ donor trip” that “he had Rolovich attend” during the height of the pandemic in July 2020. It says the trip shows the “university’s deceitfulness about being unable to accommodate Coach Rolovich even if his religious exemption request had been granted.”

“It is a tragic and damning commentary on our culture, and more specifically, on Chun, that Coach Rolovich has been derided, demonized, and ultimately fired from his job, merely for being devout in his Catholic faith,” the release said.

[quote]Many state troopers are planning to quit.

Buh-bye!

He's a devout catholic? So why doesn't he listen to the pope? Francis had said get vaccinated. If he is using catholicism as basis for an exemption, then I don't see how you can go against the pope?

Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

[quote] Many state troopers are planning to quit.

Yeah right. I’ll believe it when I see it.

(To be clear, that’s not directed at you, r10, as I fully believe you have a source. I don’t believe THEM.)

[quote] An attorney for former Washington State football coach Nick Rolovich announced on Wednesday that the coach plans to take legal action against the school.

Now THERE’S a shocking development.

Nobody could’ve seen that coming.

The weekly testing option is bullshit.

And yep, he's going to sue. I hope he loses and they make him pay WSU's fees.

[quote] ultimately fired from his job, merely for being devout in his Catholic faith,” the release said.

Is he fucking stupid? I already ruled on this. Dumb twat.

There's no faith based reason for this. He's not devout, it's the opposite - a reckless disregard for other humans. Don't think Jesus is going to be shaking this guy's hand anytime soon.

Good. Fuck this cunt.

His lawyer must not be aware that the Supreme Court has already rejected certiorari for three separate "religious" exemptions to vaccination mandates, including Maine's just yesterday.

I still think that the religious exemption will hold, as long as Washington State doesn't allow weekly Covid testing.

There has to be some other option for the unvaccinated.

It's the reason why grocery stores and doctor's offices aren't requiring vaccinations, the way that bars and restaurants do.

I guess he thinks (like Trump) the rules from the Supreme Court don't apply to him, that the Catholic church needs another Nazi pope who is hateful, and he doesn't have to give a shit about other people because he's special.

[quote]There has to be some other option for the unvaccinated.

There is. They can stay home and not interact with polite society.

Where did you go to law school R39? You may personally feel it unfair, but that’s not a legal argument for a religious exemption, particularly when the religious authorities in question don’t require it.

He just wants attention and wants to be looked at as a martyr 🙄

[quote]They should allow state employees the option to get vaccinated OR get tested weekly.

What good does testing do on the seventh day after you've possibly been infected for a week and spreading it for four or five days already?

[quote] Don't think Jesus is going to be shaking this guy's hand anytime soon.

Well, let’s hope he meets him soon, whether or not they shake hands.

[quote] Now-fired WSU coach Nick Rolovich asked if Bill Gates was involved in COVID-19 vaccine

Washington State went to great lengths to educate now-fired football coach Nick Rolovich about the COVID-19 vaccine.

Rolovich was fired earlier this month for not complying with the state's mandate that all employees be vaccinated against COVID-19. Rolovich had applied for a religious exemption to the mandate but his exemption was denied.

According to a lengthy ESPN story, Washington State took multiple steps to dissuade Rolovich of his anti-vaccination views once it learned the coach was not going to get the COVID-19 vaccine earlier in the year. The athletic department even brought in a top immunologist from the school to help explain vaccines to Rolovich. And one of the questions Rolovich asked Dr. Guy Palmer was if the founder of Microsoft was involved in the vaccine. He's not, in case you were still unsure like Rolovich.

From ESPN:

[quote] Over about an hour, Rolovich drove a conversation that focused on topics that were consistent with what Palmer said has been shared by the "anti-vax crowd on social media" over the past several years.

[quote] "Kind of typical ones: Is Bill Gates involved with the vaccines? Does [Gates] hold a patent on the vaccines?" Palmer recalled to ESPN. "He asked whether SV40 is in the vaccines and whether that could be a dangerous thing. And the answer to that is no."

Palmer also noted to ESPN that Rolovich didn't bring up any religious concerns regarding the vaccine. Since Rolovich was fired with cause for not complying with the vaccine mandate, he isn't entitled to any part of his contract buyout.

Rolovich's attorney said in the story that Rolovich, a Catholic, isn't the type of person to discuss his religious views. Those views are now a central part of pending litigation against Washington State. Rolovich announced a week ago that he was planning a lawsuit against WSU because of his dismissal.

Rolovich has repeatedly refused to provide any public insight into his decision not to get vaccinated and his anti-vaccination status is at odds with the Catholic church. The church has gone to great lengths to persuade people to get vaccinated.

Rolovich's attorney Brian Fahling said that Washington State athletic director Pat Chun and the school had held animus toward Rolovich because of his Catholicism. Chun is Catholic himself and was not involved in Rolovich's religious exemption denial.

Fahling's statement revealed that Rolovich's exemption was denied in the first step of the two-step process. That first step was a blind review. Whoever denied Rolovich's exemption did not know who was applying for that exemption.

Rolovich was in his second season at Washington State and was fired after Washington State posted a 4-3 record through the first seven games of 2021. His career record at Washington State finished at 5-6 and he was 28-27 at Hawaii.

Washington State is a college that was in the news for a frat's deadly hazing.

Like they’re the only ones.

If Washington State accepts even one government contract they are mandated to require vaccination for any employee who isn’t granted a medical or religious exemption. Contractors are allowed to determine who qualifies for those exemptions and I would think any reasonable standard would be legal. (For instance, has the person been exempted from other vaccine requirements on the basis of religious beliefs previously.)

Why does the word religious have to be included in the phrase "sincerely held religious beliefs"? Isn't "sincerely held beliefs" sufficient? Belief in a supernatural being doesn't have any bearing whatsoever on this or anything else for that matter.

Now he's appealing his termination, in addition to the lawsuit. I hope he wins.

[quote] Ex-Washington State football coach Nick Rolovich files appeal over firing

Former Washington State coach Nick Rolovich, who was fired on Oct. 18 for failing to comply with the state’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate, accused athletics director Pat Chun of violating his First Amendment rights and interfering in the university’s process to consider religious exemptions in a 34-page appeal made public by Rolovich’s attorney on Thursday.

The appeal is considered the next necessary step in a formal process before a wrongful termination lawsuit is filed. Rolovich and four assistant coaches were fired with cause for not complying with the mandate, meaning they were not paid the balance of their contracts. Rolovich was in the second year of a deal that paid him an average of $3.2 million annually.

In the appeal, Rolovich claimed that Chun was “openly hostile” toward the coach’s beliefs in several meetings about the vaccine beginning in May, a few months before Gov. Jay Inslee issued the mandate for state employees.

In one of those meetings, Rolovich claims Chun offered to have him meet with a mental health professional and “offered his wife as someone the Coach could talk to because she had been in a couple different religions he referred to as ‘cults.’ ” He also claims that Chun encouraged him to resign on Aug. 19 and called him a “con-man.”

In the appeal, Rolovich paints the picture of a standoff between himself and Washington State officials who repeatedly questioned him about why he would not get vaccinated. Only toward the end of the process did Rolovich, who is Catholic, reveal the basis for his objection to the COVID-19 vaccine.

“Coach Rolovich didn’t feel comfortable talking about his faith,” the appeal states. “His faith is a very personal matter to him and he was uncomfortable talking about his religious beliefs with his supervisor. Coach Rolovich was also uncomfortable because he did not know how Washington State University would react to him sharing his religious opposition to medical research based on aborted fetal tissue, given that WSU professors have in the past publicly defended such research.”

As several news sources have explained, lab-grown fetal cell lines that are genetically related to cells collected from an aborted fetus decades ago have been used to test the safety and effectiveness of several common medicines and vaccines, including the mRNA vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna. Those vaccines do not contain aborted fetal cells. The Vatican said it is “morally acceptable” for Catholics to take the COVID-19 vaccine, and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has said the vaccine’s connection to abortion is “very remote.”

Most of Rolovich’s appeal, however, focuses on Washington State’s human resources process. He said he completed his religious exemption application on Sept. 28 and alleges (the supporting documentation wasn’t included) that the university’s Human Resources Services had notified Chun roughly a week later that Rolovich was entitled to a religious exemption and had proposed a list of accommodations and conditions that would allow him to continue working if the exemption were granted.

The appeal claims that the Washington State athletic department responded on Oct. 13 with two documents (copies of which weren’t included), one of which stated that the athletic department could not make the necessary accommodations for Rolovich to do his job safely (including masking, social distancing, etc.) and the other casting doubt on the sincerity of Rolovich’s objections because of previous statements he had made about not being vaccinated.

“The University concluded that Coach Rolovich was entitled to the exemption because his religious beliefs are sincere,” the appeal states. “But then, a week later, the University abandoned its process requiring 'blind' determination and instead allowed Mr. Chun to intervene, improperly permitting him to provide input that questioned Coach Rolovich’s sincerity, thereby poisoning its original determination that the exemption had been approved.”

Rolovich’s attorney went on to detail how he would have been able to perform the duties of his job, including extensive travel and recruiting, with accommodations and argued that Rolovich did not pose any added health risk to others due to his unvaccinated status.

“A denial of an accommodation by Mr. Chun does not constitute ‘just cause’ under the terms of his contract,” the appeal states. “There is no force majeure clause in Coach Rolovich’s contract with WSU, nor is there any provision that contemplates a scenario where he could be terminated because he refused to violate his conscience, bodily integrity, or religious faith by refusing to take a vaccine."

Rolovich's lawyer is a stupid asshole, just like Rolovich. Rolovich will not get his job back and since he was fired for cause he will not get paid the rest of his contractual salary.

We'll see, R53.

You have no idea how this case will end up. So STFU until then.

[quote] So STFU

Which university is STFU? Is it in Seattle?

Salary $3.2M

He's either paid by someone or been promised a large settlement to give up that kind of salary to make a stand for his freedoms.

Thanks for making us look like a bunch of rednecks, you asshole stale junked out jock. For that amount of money to be so uneducated, is beyond belief.

Are you from Spokane, R57?

Now he's saying it was an "abortion issue." What???

[quote] Attorney for ex-Washington State coach Nick Rolovich writes appeal to school in advance of lawsuit

An attorney for fired Washington State coach Nick Rolovich has written the school a 34-page appeal of the coach’s dismissal for not getting the COVID-19 vaccine.

Rolovich was fired with cause on Oct. 18 after his religious exemption application to not receive the vaccine was denied. All state of Washington employees were required to be fully vaccinated by that date according to a mandate by Gov. Jay Inslee. Employees were able to apply for exemptions to the mandate and those were reviewed on a case-by-case basis.

Yahoo Sports Attorney for ex-Washington State coach Nick Rolovich writes appeal to school in advance of lawsuit Nick Bromberg Nick Bromberg Thu, November 4, 2021, 9:26 AM

An attorney for fired Washington State coach Nick Rolovich has written the school a 34-page appeal of the coach’s dismissal for not getting the COVID-19 vaccine.

Rolovich was fired with cause on Oct. 18 after his religious exemption application to not receive the vaccine was denied. All state of Washington employees were required to be fully vaccinated by that date according to a mandate by Gov. Jay Inslee. Employees were able to apply for exemptions to the mandate and those were reviewed on a case-by-case basis.

After Rolovich was fired, his attorney Brian Fahling threatened legal action against the school. Since he was fired with cause, Washington State doesn’t have to pay Rolovich’s contract buyout. In the appeal letter, Fahling writes to Washington State and athletic director Pat Chun that “this is your opportunity to take a step back, re-examine your illegal and unconstitutional conduct, and adopt a different posture toward Coach Rolovich before you and the University are forced to defend your conduct in the context of a federal court civil rights action.”

Had Washington State fired Rolovich and four unvaccinated assistants without cause it would be contractually obligated to pay their buyouts. Rolovich's buyout would be north of $3 million and a pending lawsuit is a way to attempt to recoup some of that sum.

The letter gives a little more insight into Rolovich’s reasoning for declining a COVID-19 vaccine. Rolovich, a Catholic, had repeatedly refused to explain why he was against getting the vaccine while he was employed and, through his attorney, cited his faith as a reason for not getting the vaccine after he was fired.

On page 3, the letter states that Rolovich has a “religious opposition to medical research based on aborted fetal tissue.” Like many other vaccines and pharmaceuticals widely available in the United States, the Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson and Johnson vaccines were derived from cell lines descended from cells taken from abortions decades ago and do not contain any fetal tissue.

The development of the vaccines is not an issue for the Catholic church, an entity that has been on the frontlines of encouraging people to get vaccinated. The church has previously said that “it is morally acceptable to receive COVID-19 vaccines that have used cell lines from aborted fetuses in their research and production processes.”

Days before Washington's mandate took effect, nearly 90% of Washington State University system employees had gotten at least one dose of the vaccine and fewer than 25% of over 400 religious exemption applications by WSU employees had been granted.

Rolovich’s attorney says his client’s First and 14th Amendment rights were violated when he was fired with cause at Washington State. The letter accuses Chun of having a months-long bias against Rolovich because of the coach’s refusal to get vaccinated and claims that Chun inappropriately interfered in Washington State’s religious exemption approval process.

WSU’s review process had two steps. The first was a blind review of an employee’s application for exemption. If that application was approved it was then sent to the employee’s supervisors. The supervisors — in this case, Chun — were then given the ability to determine if the employee can continue in his job while being unvaccinated.

Fahling’s initial statement said that Chun had “indicated” that if Rolovich’s exemption had been approved then no accommodations would have been made for him to keep his job. In this letter, Fahling says that Rolovich’s application had tentatively been granted on the basis of a sincerely held religious belief based on a number of accommodations “including mask wearing, social distancing, and testing requirements.”

The letter then states the athletic department said that it was unable to agree to the accommodations for Rolovich to keep his job and outlined parts of a memo that the department sent to human resources. In that memo, the athletic department said that it had “lost significant donor commitments” because of Rolovich’s vaccination status and that Rolovich’s vaccination status had damaged the school’s reputation.

I can't get vaccinated because of my sincerely held catholic faith.

Catholic church: it is morally acceptable to get the covid vaccine. In fact we strongly encourage it.

So what is his fucking case?

The abortion argument is pure desperation and he will lose. My guess is he has had other vaccines that would have raised the “abortion” issue—he seems like a Trump-lover more than a full-throated anti-vaxxer.