Texas Gov. Greg Abbott pushes to protect businesses from COVID-19 lawsuits
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott pushed to shield businesses from COVID-19 related lawsuits during a Monday visit to North Richland Hills.
Abbott held a small business roundtable at Bison Coolers, a maker of heavy duty coolers, where he was joined by state Sen. Kelly Hancock and Rep. Jeff Leach, authors of proposals aimed at providing pandemic-time civil liability protections to businesses, places of worship, nonprofits, health care providers, first responders and schools that operate “in good faith” to follow protections.
“Texas businesses and their employees that have opened and operated in good faith should not have their livelihoods destroyed by frivolous lawsuits,” Abbott said.
The Senate version of the bill is scheduled for a hearing Tuesday in the Business and Commerce Committee.
“What we’re wanting to do is make sure we don’t infringe on those that have a proper case, but at the same time protect businesses, especially the small businesses that dominate the state of Texas and help our economy grow,” Hancock, R-North Richland Hill said, noting that businesses’ earnings should go to supporting operations not attorneys.
But opponents of the bill worry about its effect on consumers.
AARP Texas is concerned about the bill weakening the ability of nursing home residents and their families to file pandemic-related lawsuits.
“Nursing homes and assisted living facilities … when the pandemic started were closed off to family members and other caregivers,” said Tina Tran, state director for AARP Texas. “So nursing home residents were isolated during this time and often were not able to advocate for themselves. Our concern is this bill really raises the bar so high that it is untenable for a nursing home resident or their representative to hold nursing homes and assisted living facilities to the standard of care they deserve during this time.”
Hancock said he’s working with bill opponents on the the nuances of the bill and recently met with AARP Texas.
Rick Levy, president of Texas AFL-CIO, a labor group made up of union members, said he feels state Abbott’s focus on civil liability protections is misplaced.
Levy is glad bill authors are trying to narrow the effect to businesses that aren’t operating in good faith to follow safety measures, but said lawmakers should be spending more time addressing workplace safety. He described an “established pattern” of working people’s needs not being addressed, whether it is essential workers not prioritized for vaccines or the lack of personal protective equipment for them.
“It seems to me that we should place much more of the emphasis on making sure that people don’t get sick and die, rather than protecting businesses when they fail to take those precautions,” Levy said.
Levy would like more traction on measures that would presume essential workers contracted COVID-19 on the job when filing for workers compensation. Abbott shied away from the idea during his Thursday news conference, noting that it’s hard to pin-point where someone contracted the virus.
“It could be to a restaurant, it could be a store, a grocery store. It could be with family members who were exposed to COVID,” Abbott said. “So where exactly did they get COVID? And it’s almost impossible to trace it back to that point in time.”
