After lawsuit dismissed, Idaho daycare appeals challenge to law that bans vaccine, medical mandates

A Boise daycare that is challenging an Idaho law that bans vaccine and other medical mandates in businesses, schools and government has appealed a lower court decision throwing out its case.

In September, a federal judge in Idaho dismissed a lawsuit that argued the Idaho Medical Freedom Act was unconstitutionally vague, among other claims. But late last month, a Boise daycare and parents who sought to block the law from applying to daycares appealed the ruling to a federal appeals court. 

The case, now before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, is awaiting arguments from both sides.

The state law, passed in 2025, bans businesses, governments and schools from mandating vaccines or “medical interventions,” which are defined as: “a medical procedure, treatment, device, drug injection, medication, or medical action taken to diagnose, prevent, or cure a disease or alter the health or biological function of a person.” 

In a ruling granting Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador’s request to dismiss the lawsuit, Chief U.S. District Judge for the District of Idaho Amanda K. Brailsford wrote she agreed with Labrador’s interpretation of the law’s definition of “medical interventions,” writing that they refer to health actions that are “medical in nature.” 

“The (Idaho Medical Freedom Act) plainly and unambiguously sets out a standard of prohibited conduct that gives a person of ordinary intelligence fair notice of what is prohibited,” Brailsford wrote.

An attorney for the suing parties — Le Soleil Child Care LLC, and three parents whose kids attend the daycare or hope to — declined to comment. Labrador’s office couldn’t be immediately reached for comment.

Republican Idaho Gov. Brad Little vetoed an earlier version of the law over concerns that it could prevent schools from sending home sick kids. But in April, his spokesperson said the revised bill that the governor signed into law “does not jeopardize the ability of public schools or daycares to send home children sick with contagious conditions.”

Labrador, also a Republican, urged lawmakers to override the governor’s veto. A veto override attempt by the Senate failed. 

The bill’s author, Health Freedom Defense Fund President Leslie Manookian, wants Idaho’s law to become a national model for similar laws, ProPublica reported.