By John L. Micek | Pennsylvania Capital-Star
Pennsylvanians are sharply divided over employer vaccination mandates, with 50 percent saying employers should not be able to require their employees to get the jab, according to a new Morning Call/Muhlenberg College poll.
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Forty-nine percent of the poll’s 419 respondents, who were surveyed from Nov. 15 to Nov. 22 by the Allentown-based school, said employers should be able to require their workers to get vaccinated against the virus. The poll has a margin of error of 5.5 percent.
Nationally, a third of voters say they agree with the Biden White House’s Jan. 4 employer vaccination deadline, according to a Nov. 10 Morning Consult poll. That mandate, however, is currently tied up in court amid a blizzard of litigation, NPR reports.
When it comes to another bitterly contested issue of the pandemic — school mask orders, a solid majority of the poll’s respondents, 60 percent, agree that public school students should be required to wear masks.
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The Wolf administration’s mask mandate remains in place as the Democratic administration and Republicans in the General Assembly fight out the policy in state Supreme Court.
But, respondents gave poor marks to Gov. Tom Wolf and President Joe Biden for their respective management of the pandemic.
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Biden’s numbers have slid since last March, when 55% of Keystone State adults approved of his handling of the pandemic. Just 40 percent of respondents said the same thing in the new poll.
More Pennsylvanians disapprove (44%) of Wolf’s handling the pandemic than approve (35%) of his performance, the poll similarly found. Republicans have spent months lacerating the Democratic governor over his shutdown orders and other policies that they say are executive branch oversteps.
Credit: Tom Sofield/LevittownNow.com
Nearly 6 in 10 Republican (59%) respondents told Muhlenberg pollsters that they believe getting vaccinated presents a major health risk, compared to 20% of Democratic respondents, and 28% of independents.
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Despite those divisions, nearly 6 in 10 of all respondents (59%) say that people who have refused to get vaccinated have put others at risk and helped to prolong the pandemic, pollsters concluded.
And of the adult Pennsylvanians who have been vaccinated, more than three-quarters (76%) said they had gotten a booster shot, or planned to get one, the poll found.
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Pennsylvania Capital-Star is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Pennsylvania Capital-Star maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor John Micek for questions: info@penncapital-star.com. Follow Pennsylvania Capital-Star on Facebook and Twitter.
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