Ingo Rademacher, the actor who was fired from General Hospital (GH) for declining to comply to ABC’s health mandate, is suing his former network.
The case was brought forth by John W. Howard, a lawyer who has challenged health mandates in several, previous cases. According to the lawsuit, Rademacher had sought a religious exemption from the health mandate, which took effect on November 1st, but ABC rejected it.
“ABC’s actions are blatantly unlawful,” reads court documents which were filed on Monday, December 13th, in Los Angeles Superior Court and sourced by Deadline. “ABC does not have the authority to force a medical treatment on its employees against their will.”
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With the filing, Variety has published new details around Rademacher’s attempts to receive an exemption from Disney, which is ABC’s parent company.
“I am entitled to a religious exemption against mandatory vaccination on the basis of my deeply and sincerely held moral belief that my body is endowed by my creator with natural processes to protect me,” Rademacher wrote to Disney’s HR department on October 11th. “Its natural integrity cannot ethically be violated by the administration of artificially created copies of genetic material, foreign to nature and experimental.”
Following this letter, the actor spoke with one of Disney’s HR lawyers, a conversation the lawsuit characterizes as “more akin to cross-examination”. Since these attempts to instate his exemption failed, the case accuses ABC of religious discrimination.
Co-star Steve Burton has previously acknowledged that ABC also refused his application for religious exemption in the wake of his firing.
Rademacher, who had portrayed Jasper “Jax” Jacks on GH for over 25 years, recently spoke out about his exit on Instagram. In the video, he promised that he’d have more to say in the future.
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Ryan Pratt
Ryan is an avid runner, reader, hiker and music collector. When he isn't writing and editing for Fame10 Soaps, he's relishing in the fine company of his two cats, Penny and Gus.