A sign outside the baggage claim area of Terminal B at LaGuardia Airport alerts passengers from states with high COVID-19 cases to quarantine themselves for 14 days. Photo: Kathy Willens/AP

A federal lawsuit is challenging Gov. Andrew Cuomo's authority to require people to quarantine if they come to New York from states with high coronavirus infection rates. 

The litigation, filed in the federal Northern District of New York last week, was brought by an Arizona resident who planned to fly to New York to help pack up a home. The lawsuit says she had to cancel her plans because of the executive order from Cuomo.

Last month, the third-term governor announced that people entering New York from states with high coronavirus infection rates must quarantine for 14 days. The move was codified in an executive order, which stipulated that a violation of a quarantine or isolation order could lead to a $10,000 civil penalty.

The order applies to people traveling from states that exceed a certain coronavirus infection rate. As of last week, people entering New York from Florida, Texas, Arizona and California would be required to quarantine, along with other states.

"The State of New York is not an independent country," the lawsuit argues. "The Governor of New York does not have dictatorial powers that permit him to require healthy, law-abiding citizens to remain quarantined, which is akin to a house arrest, for 14 days as a condition on their right to freely travel in and through the State of New York."

The lawsuit argues the executive order violates the equal protection guarantee in the Fourteenth Amendment.

The restrictions from the executive order are "arbitrary, capricious, and irrational," according to the litigation. It argues that a person with the coronavirus can travel freely between New Jersey to New York, while a healthy person in Arizona would not be allowed to travel to New York without undergoing a 14-day quarantine.

Cuomo issued the order as some states saw record highs in new coronavirus cases for a single day and many other states witnessed overall upticks in new cases.

Dr. Howard Zucker, the state health commissioner, is listed as a defendant in the suit, along with Cuomo. The state's Department of Health has issued interim guidance for quarantine restrictions.

To safely quarantine, a person must not be in public and must have the ability to self-quarantine from others in the household as soon as symptoms develop, according to the document. It says food should be delivered to the person's quarantine quarters too. 

States with an rising infection rate are a threat to New York and air travelers can bring the virus with them, Cuomo argued Monday.

"An outbreak anywhere is an outbreak everywhere. That's the new mentality we have to have," he said.

The suit follows several other legal challenges in recent months aimed at state-imposed restrictions spurred by the coronavirus pandemic. In one case, a suit brought by two priests and three Orthodox Jewish residents of Brooklyn challenged gathering limits.

Last month, a federal judge ordered New York officials to not enforce any outdoor gathering limitations, if people are following social-distancing requirements.

Earlier this year, the Cuomo administration did away with the state's near total ban on gatherings after a legal challenge from the New York Civil Liberties Union over exceptions made to the rule.

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