They're Coming For Obamacare Again, Con't

The US Supreme Court will take up the Republican lawsuit to invalidate the Affordable Care Act, just not this term that ends in June. Unfortunately, that means they could hear the lawsuit say, right before the election in November.

The Supreme Court on Monday said it will take up a Republican challenge to Obamacare, in a move that boosts Democrats who want to highlight the lawsuit’s threat to health care coverage during campaign season.

The justices said they would hear the case, likely later this year, after turning down an earlier request from Democrats to fast-track a ruling by June. The decision increases pressure on President Donald Trump over health care, a top concern for voters and an issue that has benefited Democrats since the GOP's failed effort to repeal Obamacare during Trump's first year in office.
However, it’s unlikely the justices will rule before the election on the lawsuit, which could wipe out the Affordable Care Act’s insurance protections and coverage for millions of people. The court is expected to hear the case during its next term starting in October, but the court did not yet say when it will hear oral arguments.

The suit, brought by more than a dozen red states, emerged as a threat to Obamacare in December, when a panel of federal appeals court judges found the law unconstitutional. Instead of ruling on the entire law, the appellate panel sent the challenge back to a federal judge in Texas who previously invalidated the entire law, jolting Democrats who feared the move would extend the legal fight over Obamacare for years.

Democratic state attorneys general and the Democratic-led House of Representatives, who are defending the law in court, quickly asked the Supreme Court to intercept the case. The Trump administration, which supports the Texas-led lawsuit, and the states challenging Obamacare urged the justices against intervening right away.

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, who's leading the Democrats' Obamacare defense, hailed the court's decision to take the case.

"As Texas and the Trump Administration fight to disrupt our healthcare system and the coverage that millions of people rely upon, we look forward to making our case in defense of the ACA. American lives depend upon it,' he said in a statement.

Although the justices last month rejected Democrats’ request to expedite a ruling on the case by June, at the time they left open the possibility they would take the case on a regular schedule.

Though the court doesn’t disclose how justices vote on whether to review a case, legal observers believed the bench’s four liberal members likely supported Democrats’ petition. To accept a case, at least four justices must agree.

Still, it's rare that justices review a case before it's received full consideration in lower courts — and the decision to do so underscores the monumental stakes of a case could upend coverage for millions of people and create chaos across the health care system.

Republican states want out of Obamacare because they want their people with no private health insurance to, you know, go away.  The problem is now, ten years later, Obamacare is popular among even Republican voters.

A Kaiser Family Foundation poll finds that 55 percent of the public views the health law favorably, the highest level since KFF began polling the question about 10 years ago. Just 37 percent said they view it unfavorably.
ObamaCare was long viewed more unfavorably than favorably, especially during the troubled rollout of the healthcare.gov website in late 2013.

But that changed with President Trump’s election in 2016, when favorability began rising amid the Republican push to repeal the law in 2017.

The health care law has now become a political asset for Democrats, who highlighted Republican repeal attempts to help win back the House in 2018. The law's protections for people with pre-existing conditions have been particularly popular.

The push by the GOP to get rid of Obamacare in 2017 set the stage for them losing the House in 2018.  The push in 2020 to do the same through the courts will hopefully help cost Trump his current job.

We'll see what the Roberts Court decides, but don't expect a decision on this until June 2021.