We have covered this latest Texas challenge extensively (with its antecedents going back almost a decade now -- to 2012). Even with a potentially reactionary conservative added to the court, it remains true that she would have to repudiate the thinking of late Justice Scalia, for whom she clerked, on the court two decades ago. . . in order to find that "Congress really has hidden an elephant, in a mousehole" (as Texas alleges). Here is one of dozens I've written on the topic over the last decade.
No -- this one is safe. The real question now is what will President-Elect Biden do to shore up the reform of health care delivery. Stay tuned for that, in the coming months here. Here's a well reasoned quote from NPR's reporting on it, this morning:
. . .In the ACA case, Verrilli, representing the House, will tell the justices that "the easy and obvious answer is to sever the rest of the law and let it continue to operate just as Congress intended in 2017."
"It is Congress' job to make policy, not the court's," and "Congress has repeatedly refused to repeal the law, including in 2017" when it zeroed out the penalty, Verrilli contends.
To do otherwise, he says, would "throw the health sector into chaos."
In fact, there would be enormous practical consequences were the court to throw out the whole ACA. Health care accounts for about one-fifth of the U.S. economy. . . .
So -- for Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett to hold that Obamacare is stricken entirely, they would have to directly repudiate their mentor, Scalia -- who regularly said it is the Congess, not the courts that sets policy. And the Congress has spoken -- at least five distinct times since 2010, chosing not to repeal -- but modify. . . the law. Full stop, on these insane efforts.
नमस्ते
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