California v. Texas
https://www.supremecourt.gov/docket/docketfiles/html/public/19-840.html
Texas and a number of other Republican states are suing to overturn the Affordable Care Act. They maintain that it is now unconstitutional because Congress zeroed out the tax penalty for not buying health insurance as a part of the Trump tax reform in 2017. They are having a tough time in their arguments before the Supreme Court today, but one never knows ‘til the votes are in. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/10/supreme-court-appears-willing-to-leave-obamacare-in-place-.html
The justices are having a hard time understanding the arguments of Texas and the Trump Administration that Congress intended to strike down the entire ACA in the tax reform package after earlier that year in a dramatic final vote of US Senator John McCain, the US Senate failed to strike down the entire ACA. One of the most telling comments was “it looks as if you failed to persuade Congress to repeal the ACA, now you want the Supreme Court to do it for you, that’s not our job.” Justice Kavanagh pointed out to Texas “it seems as if even if you are right, the proper remedy is to strike down the individual mandate and leave the rest of the ACA standing.”
Questions are also being raised as to whether Texas and the other states have any standing since no one is being harmed by the elimination of the tax penalty for not enrolling in or buying health coverage. The case might be dismissed for lack of standing.
Based on the oral arguments, one would think the ACA survives as a building block for extending coverage to the uninsured. This was kind of a “Hail Mary” from conservative Republican Attorneys General, that most legal observers had little chance of striking down the entirety of the ACA.
In that case, the ACA survives as a building block for expanding health coverage under divided governance between a Democratic President and House and a closely divided Senate. The best outcome is for the Supreme Court to drive a stake through the heart of this challenge so that Republicans and Democrats can move on to more productive debates as to how to further improve the nation’s health system in the light of the many deficiencies that have surfaced during the Covid 19 pandemic. To my mind, the highest priorities are the Medicaid expansion for the working poor in the non-expansion states and improving affordability of the premiums and the out of pocket for health coverage and care through the Exchanges.
Prepared by: Lucien Wulsin
Dated: 11/10/20