‘Checkmate’: U.S. Supreme Court Delivers Huge Win for Religious Exemptions

by Suzanne Burdick, Ph.D, December 8, 2025

Miller, Joseph, et al., v. McDonald, Comm’r, et al.

(ORDER LIST: 607 U.S.) MONDAY, DECEMBER 8, 2025

CERTIORARI — SUMMARY DISPOSITION

25-133 MILLER, JOSEPH, ET AL. V. McDONALD, COMM’R, ET AL. The petition for a writ of certiorari is granted. The judgment is vacated, and the case is remanded to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit for further consideration in light of Mahmoud v. Taylor, 606 U. S. 522 (2025).

The U.S. Supreme Court today reversed a lower court decision against a group of Amish parents and school leaders who challenged the state of New York’s vaccine mandates for schools, ruling that the appeals court must reconsider the case.

Today’s ruling is a win for health and religious freedom advocates — one that could have implications for other states that don’t allow religious exemptions from school vaccine mandates, attorneys said.

Attorney Sujata Gibson told The Defender today’s Supreme Court decision is “checkmate” for states that refuse to accept religious exemptions. “It means we’re almost certainly getting the religious exemption back, not only in New York, but across the country,” Gibson said.

Today’s decision stems from a lawsuit filed on June 2, 2023, against the New York State Department of Health and New York State Education Department, alleging they violated the U.S. Constitution by preventing the plaintiffs from exercising their religion.

Attorney Aaron Siri filed the suit on June 2, 2023, seeking injunctive relief.

On July 31, lawyers, including Siri, asked the Supreme Court to hear the case, Miller v. McDonald, after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit dismissed the suit in March.

Not only did the Supreme Court today announce that it would hear the case — which is rare, Gibson said — but it handed down its decision on the spot via a “summary deposition” in which it vacated the 2nd Circuit’s judgment.

“The case is remanded to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit for further consideration in light of Mahmoud v. Taylor,” the summary deposition stated.

“This is huge,” Gibson said, because Mahmoud v. Taylor — a Supreme Court decision released in June — negated the 2nd Circuit’s legal arguments for denying the Miller plaintiffs the right to a religious exemption.

“All of the reasons, basically, that the 2nd Circuit cited to say they weren’t giving relief were overturned in Mahmud v. Taylor,” Gibson explained.

“I don’t see any way that the 2nd Circuit could uphold its dismissal,” in light of the Supreme Court’s instructions, she said. “By vacating the dismissal, the Supreme Court signaled that Mahmoud applies to vaccine cases. Mahmoud provides incredibly broad protection to parental religious rights infringed by school policies.”

The 2nd Circuit will likely have to issue a decision that restores religious exemptions in New York, Gibson said.

Today’s Supreme Court decision will also likely affect other states that deny religious exemptions, said Children’s Health Defense (CHD) General Counsel Kim Mack Rosenberg. She told The Defender:

“While the Supreme Court’s decision in Miller v. McDonald directly relates to the religious exemption to vaccine mandates in New York state, it will have broader implications in other states that have stripped citizens of religious exemptions.

“As Supreme Court precedent, Mahmoud v. Taylor applies in all those states, not only New York, and should be considered by any court taking up these questions.”

Supreme Court paves way for constitutional protection of religious exemptions

Gibson broke down how and why the Supreme Court’s decision dramatically changes the legal landscape for religious exemptions to school-based vaccine mandates. She said:

“For decades, the problem with religious protection has been a case called Smith, where the Supreme Court said that you don’t actually get First Amendment protection for the exercise of religion until you can prove that the law that’s burdening your religion is either not neutral or not generally applicable.”

Since vaccine mandates apply to everyone and aren’t issued against a specific religion, it’s been challenging for those seeking religious exemptions to obtain protection. Lawyers have had to argue that there are certain exceptions to that rule, Gibson said.

One exception that the Supreme Court noted in its Smith decision involved Wisconsin v. Yoder, in which Amish families didn’t send their kids to high school because it violated their religious beliefs. “Even though the high school requirement is also neutral and generally applicable, the parents were still able to get strict scrutiny of that and get constitutional protection,” Gibson said.

Siri cited the Wisconsin v. Yoder case as justification for the 2nd Circuit to grant the New York Amish parents and school leaders relief from the state’s vaccine mandate for school entry.

The 2nd Circuit disagreed, arguing that the Yoder exception applied only to the exact situation detailed in that case.

However, this summer, the Supreme Court ruled in Mahmoud v. Taylor that the Yoder exception applies more broadly.

For instance, the Mahmoud v. Taylor case was about how public schools must offer opt-outs for parents who object to LGBTQ-themed elementary school books due to their religious beliefs.

The Yoder exception “basically applies any time parents have a religious objection to a school policy, even if that school policy is neutral and generally applicable,” she said.

That means the Yoder case can be used as a potent legal argument in vaccination contexts. “That’s what the Supreme Court did today by vacating (nullifying) the 2nd Circuit’s decision in Miller and ruling that the 2nd Circuit must redo its decision in light of Mahmoud v. Taylor,” Gibson said.

The Supreme Court’s decision comes amid a litany of lawsuits seeking to restore religious exemption rights. Gibson said those lawsuits will continue “just to make sure” the law is applied correctly.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced last week that it is investigating a complaint that a Midwestern school disregarded a valid religious exemption and failed to obtain parental consent when vaccinating a student.

“Today, we are putting pediatric medical professionals on notice: you cannot sideline parents,” HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in a statement. “When providers ignore parental consent, violate exemptions to vaccine mandates, or keep parents in the dark about their children’s care, we will act decisively. We will use every tool at our disposal to protect families and restore accountability.”

HHS did not disclose the name of the school under investigation or the student who was vaccinated.

Update: This article was updated on Dec. 9 to clarify that the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in a summary disposition.

Related articles in The Defender

• Two New York Families Sue Schools for Denying Medical Vaccine Exemptions
• CHD Threatens Legal Action Against New York Schools That Deny Medical Exemptions
• Judge Rules in Favor of Teen in Medical Exemption Lawsuit Funded by Children’s Health Defense
• Mom, Teen Sue School That Refused to Grant Hep B Vaccine Medical Exemption
• Public Support for Religious Exemptions Nearly Doubled Over Past 6 Years

United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit

November 18, 2024, Argued; March 3, 2025, Decided

Docket No. 24-681

Reporter

130 F.4th 258 *; 2025 U.S. App. LEXIS 4839 **; 2025 LX 50013; 2025 WL 665102

JOSEPH MILLER, EZRA WENGERD, JONAS SMUCKER, DYGERT ROAD SCHOOL, PLEASANT VIEW SCHOOL, SHADY LANE SCHOOL, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. JAMES V. MCDONALD, in his official capacity as Commissioner of Health of the State of New York, Defendant-Appellee, BETTY A. ROSA, in her official capacity as Commissioner of Education of the State of New York, Defendant.*

Subsequent History: Petition for certiorari filed at, 07/31/2025

Prior History: In 2019, New York repealed the religious beliefs exemption to its school immunization law. The law now applies to all students attending public, private, or parochial schools, except those who qualify for the law’s medical exemption. Two parents of Amish students, three Amish “community schools,” and an elected representative of all Amish schools in New York sued New York officials under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, claiming that the school immunization law infringes on their free exercise rights under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. The parents view their claims as similar to the combined parental and free exercise rights brought by Amish parents in Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205, 92 S. Ct. 1526, 32 L. Ed. 2d 15 (1972) [**1] . Plaintiffs moved for a preliminary injunction; Defendants opposed the preliminary injunction and moved to dismiss. The United States District Court for the Western District of New York (Elizabeth A. Wolford, Chief Judge) granted the motion to dismiss, concluding that Plaintiffs failed to allege a constitutional violation, and denied the preliminary injunction request as moot. We agree with the district court’s sound reasoning and therefore AFFIRM.