BREAKING>>>>SCOTUS upholds federal Obamacare exchange subsidies in 6-3 vote

[jmyrlefuller]

Developing…

For: Breyer, Sotomayor, Kagan, Ginsburg, Roberts and Kennedy
Against: Scalia, Thomas, Alito

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_SUPREME_COURT_HEALTH_OVERHAUL_SUBSIDIES?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2015-06-25-10-20-37

[jmyrlefuller]

Roberts, again writing for the majority:
"Congress passed the Affordable Care Act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them"

[Relic]

Totally expected. Americans still believe that obamacare is something good, and the SCOTUS is not going to take it away from them.

The media will do any required damage control.

It's an interesting thing to watch this country fall apart. Not joyful, but absolutely interesting.

[andy58-in-nh]

Roberts, again writing for the majority:
"Congress passed the Affordable Care Act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them"

And once more, in the Humpty Dumpty Land of modern American jurisprudence, legislative good intentions are held to trump the plain meaning of legal language.
 
It was a nice country, while it lasted.

[mystery-ak]

Just damn...what a total disappointment Roberts turned out to be..

[aligncare]

Wait till 2016 when employer mandates kick in. That's when the pain of Obamacare will be most intensely felt.

Get ready for massive layoffs and cutbacks, folks.

[ABX]

Roberts, again writing for the majority:
"Congress passed the Affordable Care Act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them"

that is a political statement of opinion, not a statement relevant to the facts of the case or the law.

[mystery-ak]

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_SUPREME_COURT_HEALTH_OVERHAUL_SUBSIDIES?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT


Jun 25, 10:20 AM EDT

Supreme Court upholds nationwide health care law subsidies

By MARK SHERMAN
Associated Press

The Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the nationwide tax subsidies under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul, in a ruling that preserves health insurance for millions of Americans.

The justices said in a 6-3 ruling that the subsidies that 8.7 million people currently receive to make insurance affordable do not depend on where they live, under the 2010 health care law.

The outcome is the second major victory for Obama in politically charged Supreme Court tests of his most significant domestic achievement.

Chief Justice John Roberts again voted with his liberal colleagues in support of the law. Roberts also was the key vote to uphold the law in 2012. Justice Anthony Kennedy, a dissenter in 2012, was part of the majority on Thursday.

"Congress passed the Affordable Care Act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them," Roberts wrote in the majority opinion.

Nationally, 10.2 million people have signed up for health insurance under the Obama health overhaul. That includes the 8.7 million people who are receiving an average subsidy of $272 a month to help pay their insurance premiums.

Of those receiving subsidies, 6.4 million people were at risk of losing that aid because they live in states that did not set up their own health insurance exchanges.

The challenge devised by die-hard opponents of the law, often derided by critics as "Obamacare," relied on four words - established by the state - in the more than 900-page law.

The law's opponents argued that the vast majority of people who now get help paying for their insurance premiums are ineligible for their federal tax credits. That is because roughly three dozen states opted against creating their own health insurance marketplaces, or exchanges, and instead rely on the federal healthcare.gov to help people find coverage if they don't get insurance through their jobs or the government.

In the challengers' view, the phrase "established by the state" demonstrated that subsidies were to be available only available to people in states that set up their own exchanges. Those words cannot refer to exchanges established by the Health and Human Services Department, which oversees healthcare.gov, the opponents argued.

The administration, congressional Democrats and 22 states responded that it would make no sense to construct the law the way its opponents suggested. The idea behind the law's structure was to decrease the number of uninsured. The law prevents insurers from denying coverage because of "pre-existing" health conditions. It requires almost everyone to be insured and provides financial help to consumers who otherwise would spend too much of their paycheck on their premiums.

The point of the last piece, the subsidies, is to keep enough people in the pool of insured to avoid triggering a so-called death spiral of declining enrollment, a growing proportion of less healthy people and premium increases by insurers.

Several portions of the law indicate that consumers can claim tax credits no matter where they live. No member of Congress said that subsidies would be limited, and several states said in a separate brief to the court that they had no inkling they had to set up their own exchange for their residents to get tax credits.

The 2012 case took place in the midst of Obama's re-election campaign, when he touted the largest expansion of the social safety net since the advent of Medicare nearly a half-century earlier. But at the time, the benefits of the Affordable Care Act were mostly in the future. Many of its provisions had yet to take effect.

In 2015, the landscape has changed, although the partisan and ideological divisions remain for a law that passed Congress in 2010 with no Republican votes.

The case is King v. Burwell, 14-114.

[mystery-ak]

King v. Burwell

[Scottftlc]

In hindsight, this entire dance was inevitable...as was the outcome.  This is the natural evolution of ALL western democracies (and was predicted by Monarchists as far back as before the American Revolution).

For the end game, just observe Greece.

[GourmetDan]

Just damn...what a total disappointment Roberts turned out to be..

Roberts is just doing what he was installed to do.

How do you get appointed Chief Justice the first day you show up, anyway?

[rb224315]

The states claimed they didn't know they had to set up their own exchanges for their residents to get subsidies.  They should have read the law instead of waiting for it to pass to find out what's in it.

Our side should have already been quietly chipping away at this thing but they're too scared.  Sure, they'll rail against the medical device tax and they'll actually try to do something to get rid of it, as long as the Dems say it's ok.  After getting the Dems' agreement on the medical device tax, the Repubs should have said "we're including a provision to allow insurance to be sold across state lines", then let the Dems vote against repealing the medical device tax.

Maybe keeping this monstrosity in place can work to our advantage, but I'm getting tired of waiting for a miracle when the people I vote for should be taking action.

[ArneFufkin]

It's becoming increasingly apparent that the GOP needs some street fighters in leadership.  They cannot depend on the executive, the "comity" of the Dem minority in Congress OR a Judiciary stuffed this past six years with radical leftists to behave lawfully or responsibly and stem this American descent into the abyss.   McConnell and Boehner refuse to use any of the House prerogatives in funding or any  "tricks" that Reid employed to subvert the filibuster and other traditional rules of the Senate.   This is a political fight to the death - the Democrats are like a Mongol horde and the GOP is playing patty cake.

Truth be told, had the SCOTUS struck down the subsidy portion of ACA in certain states the pressure would have been unfathomable for Boehner and McConnell to write those subsidies into existing law, and they likely would have done so in the absence of any coherent, WELL COMMUNICATED alternative to ACA that they could have implemented in its place. 

Let's say SCOTUS found for the plaintiffs.  What did the GOP have immediately ready as an alternative that a Congressional majority could sell to the American people - a majority of whom are getting used to insidious entitlement largess?   A big fat nuthin'. 

[mystery-ak]

It's becoming increasingly apparent that the GOP needs some street fighters in leadership.  They cannot depend on the executive, the "comity" of the Dem minority in Congress OR a Judiciary stuffed this past six years with radical leftists to behave lawfully or responsibly and stem this American descent into the abyss.   McConnell and Boehner refuse to use any of the House prerogatives in funding or any  "tricks" that Reid employed to subvert the filibuster and other traditional rules of the Senate.   This is a political fight to the death - the Democrats are like a Mongol horde and the GOP is playing patty cake.

Truth be told, had the SCOTUS struck down the subsidy portion of ACA in certain states the pressure would have been unfathomable for Boehner and McConnell to write those subsidies into existing law, and they likely would have done so in the absence of any coherent, WELL COMMUNICATED alternative to ACA that they could have implemented in its place. 

Let's say SCOTUS found for the plaintiffs.  What did the GOP have immediately ready as an alternative that a Congressional majority could sell to the American people - a majority of whom are getting used to insidious entitlement largess?   A big fat nuthin'.

From what I have been reading the last few days the GOP was afraid they would win this since they had nothing to fix it..

btw..just about all the GOP candidates that ran for office in 14 ran on repealing this POS law....they are all liars imho

[libertybele]

From what I have been reading the last few days the GOP was afraid they would win this since they had nothing to fix it..

btw..just about all the GOP candidates that ran for office in 14 ran on repealing this POS law....they are all liars imho

The GOP candidates need to come up with an alternate and better approach to Barrycare and sell it on the campaign trail.  You aren't going to get votes when repealing Barrycare is seen as taking something away from people AND a promise to the conservative base that is now hollow.

[ArneFufkin]

From what I have been reading the last few days the GOP was afraid they would win this since they had nothing to fix it..

btw..just about all the GOP candidates that ran for office in 14 ran on repealing this POS law....they are all liars imho

This is insane, I know, but this ruling reeks of the SCOTUS majority looking at the chaos that would ensue - absent any immediate GOP alternative plan - should they rule for the plaintiffs and so the majority made a policy judgement rather than a legal one.   Would Roberts and Kennedy have ruled the way they did had they been convinced that there was some immediately deployable legislative plan in place to manage the chaos and fortify the insurance markets?  Who knows, but Republican cowardice in fashioning a "Plan B" this past five months gave the politicians on the court all the reason they needed to step in to save the day.   Legal standing be damned.

The Fair Housing Act ruling is just as bad today.   I'm checking out of politics for a while.   I can't listen to talk radio any more -  too depressing.

[mystery-ak]

http://www.newsmax.com/Headline/Scalia-Supreme-Court-SCOTUScare/2015/06/25/id/652159/
Justice Scalia: 'Start Calling This Law SCOTUScare'

[GourmetDan]

Who knows, but Republican cowardice in fashioning a "Plan B" this past five months gave the politicians on the court all the reason they needed to step in to save the day.   Legal standing be damned.

The GOP aren't 'cowards'.  They're playing the role they are supposed to play... that of being an ineffective alternative to the Demonrats.

[mystery-ak]

http://www.newsmax.com/PrintTemplate.aspx/?nodeid=652153


Newsmax
Supreme Court Upholds Key Tool for Fighting Housing Bias
Thursday, June 25, 2015 10:31 AM

 

The Supreme Court handed a major victory to the Obama administration and civil rights groups on Thursday when it upheld a key tool used for more than four decades to fight housing discrimination.

The justices ruled 5-4 that federal housing laws prohibit seemingly neutral practices that harm minorities, even without proof of intentional discrimination. The case involved an appeal from Texas officials accused of violating the Fair Housing Act by awarding federal tax credits in a way that kept low-income housing out of white neighborhoods.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, often a swing vote, joined the court's four liberal members in upholding the use of so-called "disparate impact" cases.

The ruling is a win for housing advocates who argued that the Fair Housing Act allows challenges to race-neutral policies that have a negative impact on minority groups. The Justice Department has used disparate impact lawsuits to win millions of dollars in legal settlements from companies accused of bias against black and Hispanic customers.

In upholding the tactic, the Supreme Court preserved a legal strategy that has been used for more than 40 years to attack discrimination in zoning laws, occupancy rules, mortgage lending practices and insurance underwriting. Every federal appeals court to consider it has upheld the practice, though the Supreme Court had never previously taken it up.

The ruling is a defeat for banks, insurance companies and other business groups that claimed such lawsuits are not explicitly allowed under the Fair Housing Act, the landmark 1968 law that sought to eliminate segregation that has long existed in residential housing.

Both the Obama administration and civil rights groups have tried for years to keep the issue away from the Supreme Court, fearing that conservative justices wanted to end the use of disparate impact lawsuits in housing cases. In fact, two similar cases out of Minnesota and New Jersey previously had reached the court in recent years, but those cases were settled or strategically withdrawn just weeks before oral argument.

Yet the court took up the Texas case last year despite the fact that there was no split among lower courts over the issue. That led to major worries for the NAACP and other civil rights groups that the court was inclined to end the strategy.

[alicewonders]

From what I have been reading the last few days the GOP was afraid they would win this since they had nothing to fix it..

btw..just about all the GOP candidates that ran for office in 14 ran on repealing this POS law....they are all liars imho

 

[truth_seeker]

Wait till 2016 when employer mandates kick in. That's when the pain of Obamacare will be most intensely felt.

Get ready for massive layoffs and cutbacks, folks.

Does the mandatory health insurance count against the $15 per hour minimum "living" wage?

[mystery-ak]

http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/246128-president-obamacare-here-to-stay
President: ObamaCare 'here to stay'



 By Jordan Fabian - 06/25/15 11:40 AM EDT
President Obama on Thursday celebrated a Supreme Court decision that upheld a key provision of ObamaCare.
 
“After multiple challenges before the Supreme Court, the Affordable Care Act is here to stay,” Obama said during a statement in the Rose Garden.

[mystery-ak]

LMAO...we believe...NOT!

http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/senate/246120-gop-pledge-to-continue-obamacare-repeal-fight

June 25, 2015, 11:00 am
GOP pledges to fight 'tooth and nail' to repeal ObamaCare

By Jordain Carney

Senate Republicans quickly pledged Thursday to fight to repeal ObamaCare in the wake of a Supreme Court ruling upholding the law's federal subsidies.
 
The Supreme Court ruled in a 6-3 decision that 6.4 million people can continue to receive subsidies that allow them to purchase healthcare plans, handing a victory to the Obama administration.
 
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Republicans will "continue to fight tooth and nail to repeal" the Affordable Care Act.

“Today’s decision doesn’t change the fact that Obamacare has been a disaster for the millions of hardworking American families who have seen their health care costs skyrocket or lost their insurance entirely," the senior Republican senator added.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) quickly weighed in, saying that the decision "won't change ObamaCare's multitude of broken promises."

The Republican leader tried to pressure Democrats who supported the law, saying they face a choice to either "crow about Obamacare’s latest wobble toward the edge, or work with us to address the ongoing negative impact of a 2,000-page law that continues to make life miserable for too many of the same people it purported to help.”
Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) added that Republicans will continue to move forward with their legislative alternatives, including the Patient CARE Act, which would repeal ObamaCare. 
 
“Fortunately, Republicans have a plan to reverse this course by repealing and replacing Obamacare with reforms that put patients — not Washington — first," he said. "Moving forward, we will continue to seek input on our legislative proposal … and use every opportunity available to give both states and patients more freedom and flexibility."
 
Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), who has repeatedly come to the Senate floor to criticize the law and Democratic support for it, suggested Republicans would use every available avenue to change the law.

“We’ll take every action possible in Congress, in the courts and in statehouses across our country to stop this unworkable and unaffordable law from hurting more Americans," said Barrasso, chairman of the Senate Republican Policy Committee. "We’ll continue to look for opportunities to deliver real reform that lowers costs, improves access and helps all Americans live healthier lives.”

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) added that the Supreme Court's decision "does not repeal the problems with Obamacare."

"The fight to repeal and replace Obamacare to give patients the power must continue," he said.  “I remain committed to repealing and replacing Obamacare with conservative, free market solutions that give you the power.”

Democrats quickly doubled down on their support for the Afforable Care Act.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) suggested that it was time for Republicans to rethink their strategy.

"I say this respectfully to my Senate colleagues, and I mean that: Stop banging your heads against the wall on this legislation. It passed," he said. "Move on. Republicans should really, they should pause for a minute and look back. … I would hope Republicans would rethink what they've been up to."

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) added that he hopes "our Republicans colleagues will now give up their quest to repeal Obamacare and move on to more productive activities for the middle class.”

And Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) suggested that Republicans should focus on improving health insurance, saying "memo to the non-stop critics of the Affordable Care Act: Stop trying to kill this program and work to make it stronger."

[truth_seeker]

that is a political statement of opinion, not a statement relevant to the facts of the case or the law.

What congress giveth, congress could taketh away. That is where Roberts is coming from.

Wishful thinking "conservatives" hoped the SC would do what congress would not.

[alicewonders]

If their lips are moving, they are lying.