Posted on 03/04/2015 10:30:33 AM PST by E. Pluribus Unum
The Supreme Court appeared sharply divided Wednesday as it began hearing arguments on the fate of Obamacare.
Justices seemed “bitterly divided” during “heated” arguments over the law, reported The New York Times. If they rule that the federal subsidies the Internal Revenue Service has doled out for Obamacare plans are illegal, millions of people would no longer be able to afford their plans, and the entire law would be crippled.
The four liberal justices indicated strong support for the Obama administration’s position, in opposition to the most conservative members of the court. Those four will likely have to win over either Chief Justice John Roberts Jr., who didn’t say much, or Justice Anthony Kennedy, who said he’s not comfortable with the administration’s position.
The law states that only people who buy Obamacare “though an Exchange established by the state,” are eligible for subsidies, but the IRS has subsidized plans for millions of people who purchased them through the federal exchange.
The law’s challengers argue that language effectively bars subsidies for plans bought through the federal exchange, but the Obama administration argues that the bill clearly intends for subsidies in all 50 states.
Kennedy indicated he doesn’t favor the administration’s argument, but also isn’t comfortable with the challengers’ argument. “Your argument raises a serious constitutional question,” he told Michael Carvin, who is representing the challengers against Solicitor General Donald Verrilli Jr.
House Republican chairmen Paul Ryan, John Kline and Fred Upton, who are leading a group of Republicans tasked with finding an Obamacare replacement, attended the arguments. “We are here today because the Obama administration forced a flawed and partisan law on the American people,” they said in a joint statement.
“Its implementation has been one problem after another, and today’s case underscores just how far beyond the law the administration has gone to prop up this fatally flawed plan. The law is clear — and the Supreme Court should order the IRS to enforce the law as it is written.”
Oh yeah.
This will not end well.
First, I do not think Roberts will vote to gut Obamacare after the lengths he went to last time to rewrite the whole thing as just one big tax bill. From oral arguments this morning, it appears that Kennedy will also flip this time. So it is extremely likely that the Court will rewrite Obamacare to extend the subsidies by either a 5/4 or 6/3 vote.
In the unlikely event that the Court actually follows the law and throws out the subsidies then we will have a replay of the amnesty budget debacle.
The Democrats and the lamestream media will loudly blame the evil Republicans for stealing subsidies and insurance from millions of poor people who are now relying on it. The House will respond by passing a bill extending subsidies for this year and then terminating or scaling back Obamacare. The Democrats in the Senate will insist on a “clean” bill just extending the subsidies.
The Republicans will then cave and that will be that.
I don’t buy the
“Roberts is compromised”
scare
Roberts ruled in favor of the constitutionality of the individual mandate in 2012 because
- he didn’t want to intrude on the separation of powers, and
- he wanted restraint on the Commerce clause
If you recall, Roberts struck down the Medicaid provisions in Obamacare. This protects the states against Federal funding threats.
Roberts defended his position by stating (in essence) that “elections have consequences”
The present case is NOT argued on Constitutional grounds. It is being argued that the letter of the law is not being followed.
I strongly believe that Roberts will shoot down the law on the basis that “words have consequences”
Democrats wrote the bill. They own it entirely.
Does this not connote that being the swing vote is unusually important to a USSC justice ego?
So?
Seriously. All the lamestream media will report and all the sheeple will hear is that those mean spirited Republicans took away their free Obama money.
I also feel pretty good about Kennedy’s prospects of killing the law.
He felt the strongest that the individual mandate was unconstitutional in 2012 when he sided with the conservatives. It was Kennedy who lobbied the strongest to get Roberts to side with the conservatives and himself.
Kennedy doesn’t like this law at all.
In the case of justice Kennedy, that seems to be his big motivation in life, to be annotated as the swing vote in major decisions in legal textbooks. However, this means that on big issues, the SCOTUS is a liberal court.
Roberts will make this a liberal court if he votes for this.
It shouldn’t matter whether it is a clerical error or not. It says what it says. The courts job shouldn’t be to figure out intent but just to observe what it says.
Voting against Obamacare would just send the issue back to Congress which should satisfy the courts IMO.
There hasn’t been a case before the Court in quite a many moon, where the Constitution was even acknowledged.
Foreign Law, foreign declarations and ‘legal president’ have been used by the tyrants.
If the Constitution was even a factor, it should have taken only 5 minutes before the gavel was down and 15 min. later the one paged ‘NO’ vote released.
Instead, we’ll have another 1000pages of what the meaning of the word IS is by our ‘lawyer-ly betters’
It was meant to force the states into an exchange.
Talk about tortured reasoning. Shaking my head.
I have a feeling SCROTUS will twist this around to make it “work”. Here’s what they’ll say:
“Article 8 of the Constitution ensures uniform application of tax laws. As such, the Affordable Care Act is in violation, and therefore subsidies must be applied equally amongst all states regardless of participation.”
That means they’ll side with the IRS brownshirts. And even if they go against the law as written, the Marxist moonbat Republicrats will extend the subsidies immediately to “avoid Republic fallout” anyway.
The four liberal justices indicated strong support for the Obama administration’s position, in opposition to the most conservative members of the court. Those four will likely have to win over either Chief Justice John Roberts Jr., who didn’t say much, or Justice Anthony Kennedy, who said he’s not comfortable with the administration’s position.
The law states that only people who buy Obamacare “though an Exchange established by the state,” are eligible for subsidies, but the IRS has subsidized plans for millions of people who purchased them through the federal exchange.
PFL
Drink 32oz of coffee before reading this:
Seven Things You Should Know about the IRS Rule Challenged in King v. Burwell
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3264041/posts
Great article, took me an hour to read it since I hadn’t made coffee yet.
I’m telling you folks, we are just ONE vote away from becoming a third world country.
ONE VOTE!
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