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New York gyms are ramping up legal pressure against coronavirus-spurred restrictions that have forced their doors to stay closed for months on end.

An upstate New York fitness center on Thursday filed a state-level class action lawsuit challenging a series of executive orders ordering gyms and fitness centers to remain closed. The lawsuit aims for a judicial declaration that the orders, from Gov. Andrew Cuomo, are unconstitutional under the equal protection clause and the due process clause.

Litigation and other similar lawsuits reflect boiling frustration from businesses still not allowed to bring back their operations under the state's reopening plan. Nearly every part of the state is now in the fourth and final stage of Cuomo's reopening plan, but gyms are not listed among the businesses allowed to reopen in that phase.

The lawsuit says the upstate New York fitness center and similarly situated businesses have lost hundreds of millions in revenue and laid off a minimum of 70,000 employees statewide.

The class representative in the suit is Thousand Island Fitness Center in Jefferson County. The fitness center, according to the lawsuit, will permanently shut its door if it does not open immediately. 

They are represented by James Mermigis from The Mermigis Law Group.

Mermigis, in an interview Friday, argued that gyms have been singled out and said many are faced with going out of business. Mermigis noted he would not have brought the suit earlier on in the pandemic, but said the coronavirus crisis has waned in New York.

Jason Conwall, a spokesman for Cuomo, issued a statement saying infections are spiking in many other states and the governor's actions are "wholly consistent" with the powers given to him by state lawmakers.

"Every public opinion survey has shown an overwhelming majority of New Yorkers support our re-opening approach," he said in the statement. "I understand some people aren't happy—but better unhappy than sick or worse."

The suit argues the fitness center and other gyms have been forced to close their operations, "depriving them of their liberty and property interests without due process." The litigation says the state continues to govern "impartially and arbitrarily" by ordering gyms to remain closed but allowing personal care businesses like tattoo parlors and salons to open.

It states that the Thousand Island Fitness Center and other gyms can provide their service in a sanitary and socially distanced environment.

An athletic club in central New York, also represented by Mermigis, filed a lawsuit earlier this month over the mandates forcing gyms to close.

In that suit, the Aspen Athletic Club argued Cuomo did not provide any procedural due process before issuing lockdown orders. The litigation says the athletic club operates four gyms throughout Onondaga County and employs 160 county residents.

Both lawsuits pointed to Cuomo's comments about demonstrators who had gathered in large crowds to protest the killing of Black Americans by police. The third-term governor has expressed support for the demonstrations.

"The only conclusion you draw from that is that thousands of people can march together throughout the State and there is no public health issue for marches, but someone who wants to open their gym with CDC safety guidelines is endangering the public," the lawsuit from the Aspen Athletic Club reads.

Meanwhile, Plasse Strength & Fitness filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. The business is a personal training facility where people are at least six to 12 feet apart and customers are inside for no more than an hour at a time, according to the litigation.

"There is no rational basis why the plaintiff's business should remain closed while other businesses, such as nail salons and tattoo parlors, and other indoor businesses have been allowed to reopen," the lawsuit reads.

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