In the wake of a federal appeals court decision calling a halt to its controversial vaccine mandate for companies with at least 100 employees, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration announced it was suspending enforcement of the rule.

The suspension was announced on the federal agency’s website after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld a temporary stay and ordered OSHA to “take no steps to implement or enforce the mandate until further court order.”

More than half the states and a number of private businesses and religious organizations lodged immediate federal appeals when OSHA’s emergency standard was published Nov. 5.

The standard would have required every private company employing 100 or more people to institute policies requiring employees to obtain the COVID-19 vaccine or wear masks and undergo weekly tests to prove they are virus-free.

The Fifth Circuit granted an immediate temporary stay Nov. 5 and then extended the stay last week after both sides submitted briefs.

The three-judge panel called the mandate “staggeringly overbroad” and said it would force a large segment of the U.S. workforce to choose between “jobs and jabs,” while leaving other workers unprotected from what OSHA argues is a hazard in every workplace.

The court also described the OSHA rule as a “workaround” by President Joe Biden, allowing him to avoid seeking Congressional approval for an unpopular vaccine mandate.

The court’s stay will remain in effect until a decision is reached on the legality of the mandate.

OSHA and the Biden Administration are urging businesses to voluntarily institute their own mandates while awaiting the ruling.

However the Fifth Circuit justified extending its stay in part because the immense expense businesses would incur to follow a rule that may ultimately be overturned would not be recoverable.

The more than 30 cases filed in objection to the mandate will be consolidated and decided by the Sixth Circuit court of appeals in Cincinnati.

That court was randomly selected by a federal judicial panel so that all the cases can be consolidated.