CHARLESTON, W.Va. (WCHS) — The West Virginia State Board of Education held its first meeting since a Raleigh County mother filed a lawsuit against the board last week over religious exemptions for vaccines, a suit with backing from Gov. Patrick Morrisey.

Before going into executive session to discuss the suit, BOE member and legislative liaison Paul Hardesty addressed those in attendance at Wednesday's meeting.

“It has been well-documented that the board is now in possession of a lawsuit, which we are named with regard to immunizations," Hardesty said.

Although a spokesperson said the board has not yet been served with the lawsuit, they have retained outside counsel to begin preparing for litigation.

“The board has hired outside counsel to represent us. Mr. Ben Bailey of Bailey & Glasser is going to be representing the board in this endeavor," Hardesty said.

This goes back to January when the governor signed an executive order allowing for religious exemptions for mandatory school vaccines. When the House rejected a measure to make it law, the state board said they would not follow the executive order and instead, continue on as they have, only honoring medical exemptions and not religious ones going by state law.

In response, Morrisey has thrown his support behind a lawsuit out of Raleigh County. A mother is suing the state BOE and the Raleigh County BOE, arguing that her child was already granted a religious exemption under the executive order that is no longer being honored by the county board. The lawsuit argues this violates religious freedom and religious objections to vaccines.

Morrisey held a press conference last week to announce his support for the suit as he said his executive order was applying both vaccine law as the 2023 Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

“I’m not going to let an unelected body of bureaucrats stop and strip religious liberty protections that are afforded to them under West Virginia law. Period," Morrisey said last week.

Still, a handful of people showed up on Wednesday to show support for the board, including Brenda Isaac, who was once the lead nurse for Kanawha County Schools.

“I wanted to thank the school board for standing strong and protecting children’s health," Isaac said. "This is all about keeping our kids healthy and keeping our kids in school.”

Counties have been instructed to not accept religious exemptions for vaccines, even though the West Virginia Department of Health is still granting them, so ultimately it will be up to the courts to have the final say.