After the court’s decision was made public, the president called on businesses to voluntarily implement vaccine requirements to slow the spread of COVID-19. In a statement, Biden said:

The Court has ruled that my administration cannot use the authority granted to it by Congress to require this measure, but that does not stop me from using my voice as President to advocate for employers to do the right thing to protect Americans’ health and economy.

This is likely what we will see from the president, along with high-profile Democrats and members of the activist media: A full-on pressure campaign to cajole, coerce, and shame companies into enacting their own vaccine mandates. Since they cannot use the power of the federal government – at least for the time being – to compel businesses to institute vax requirements, they will use the bully pulpit.

We can expect the same at the state level as well. Leftists will attempt to pressure state governments to put vaccine mandates into place that would mirror Biden’s plan. These tactics will likely yield some results but is unlikely to sway businesses whose leadership would rather not force their employees to get vaccinated.

Even though Biden’s mandate failed, companies can still require vaccines – and some were already doing it before the president issued the order. CNBC explained that “[e]mployers may turn greater attention toward frequent testing, indoor masking and encouraging people to stay home while sick.”

The New York Times noted that companies instituting their own mandates might be a bit complicated:

Employers can still enforce their own mandates, but it may be more fraught.

The blocking of a federal rule subjects larger employers to a patchwork of city and state vaccine rules, which would have been pre-empted by a single federal rule. New York City, for example, requires all on-site workers to be vaccinated, while Florida passed a law banning such requirements. And the administration’s separate mandate for federal contractors is on hold and likely headed to the Supreme Court, too. Some companies, like Boeing, have delayed mandates until its fate is certain, while others, like Citigroup, have said they are going ahead regardless.

The author also acknowledged that “[c]ompanies that were on the fence now probably won’t introduce mandates.”

There is also the likelihood that the Biden administration will simply try again. CNBC noted that the Supreme Court’s decision “doesn’t fully resolve whether the OSHA rule can go into place.” The report continued:

The rule now goes back to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, in Cincinnati, which said the federal vaccine mandate appeared to be lawful. The decision will likely go back to the Supreme Court in the next few months.

The New York Times suggested that the White House could make another attempt before the Supreme Court with a “new rule.” The author wrote:

Devising a more tailored emergency rule for a specific set of higher-risk companies, addressing the court majority’s criticism of the employer mandate as a “blunt instrument,” could be quick. Or the agency could use the traditional rule-making process, but that might take years.

It has become apparent that the Biden administration is simply not going to get what it wants when it comes to forcing companies to require vaccines. If the court already struck down the original mandate, it is unlikely to accept a more watered-down version. The fact of the matter is that the federal government – as Biden has already admitted – cannot solve the COVID-19 problem. It is the states who are best suited for protecting their residents.

The vax authoritarians won’t stop trying to coerce the public into getting vaxxed. But now that their options are more limited, it seems unlikely they will achieve their objectives. Now that the nation appears to be gradually entering into the post-COVID era, the battle over mandates might be coming to a conclusion later in the year.