…if they follow through on their policy of requiring a vaccine passport to attend Saints games in the Superdome. This popped out last night on Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry’s Facebook…

It really won’t do for the Saints to act essentially as an arm of the state in making vaccinations a condition of fulfilling their end of the contract they made with ticketholders.

And it’s really amazing that the team’s lawyers allowed them to take such a crazy position.

Now, the real culprit here is LaToya Cantrell, the mouth-breathing moron mayor of New Orleans who has taken the radical step of requiring proof of vaccination or negative COVID tests every 72 hours in order that people would have access to commerce in her city. It’s a matter of time before someone hauls Cantrell into court to contest her vaccine mandate scheme, and if there is any constitutional law left in the Eastern District of Louisiana she will get a rude spanking by a federal judge.

The issue isn’t that the Saints are complying with Cantrell’s vaccine mandate. They don’t have a choice in that regard. But you’ve got to allow your ticketholders the opportunity for a refund if they’re unwilling or unable to present their papers when they arrive at the Dome. That’s a straight-up contractual violation.

And as Dan Fagan noted here at The Hayride this morning, the vaxx Nazis like Clancy DuBos and Will Sutton, who are carrying all the water they can for Cantrell, are busy demonizing people who choose not to take the jab. It’s very obviously a pressure campaign, and it’s obnoxious.

We’re not anti-vaxx here at The Hayride. What we are is anti-mandate. Take the jab, don’t take the jab – it’s your business and it’s your body. It’s an entirely rational position to take that if you’ve already had the virus you don’t need the vaccine, or if you’re not in a risk group you’re better off just contracting it and getting past it and picking up natural immunity.

People who make that decision for themselves might be wrong. But it’s their decision, and their right.

And with some evidence that vaccination doesn’t actually prevent you from spreading the virus, it’s also not a particularly valid statement that refusing the jab is somehow a selfish decision. That’s a guilt trip laid on by people who don’t have a lot of good faith to them.

All of which is a little beside the point that the Saints sold season tickets to people under the agreed-upon terms that if they paid their money they’d be admitted into the stadium. Cantrell has changed those terms with her vaxx passport boondoggle, meaning that for some people a material condition affecting the fulfillment of that contract exists.

The Saints aren’t going to give them what they paid for.

You’ve got to give refunds in those circumstances. Landry is right.

And if they don’t, he’s also right that the Saints ought to be persona non grata in asking for anything from the state.

Of course, there’s a little bit of gamesmanship here, which is that Landry and Schroder are jockeying for position as the conservative favorite in the 2023 election, and Landry has just staked out a position Schroder will probably have to join him on. If Schroder does, it will really jam up Lt. Governor Billy Nungesser, who will never tell the Saints no.

But sometimes politics serves the greater good. And the Saints refusing to offer refunds to their anti-vaxx ticketholders needs a public rebuke.