Obamacare is on the ropes again. The Supreme Court of the United States agreed Friday to consider a new challenge to the Affordable Care Act (ACA).
At issue this time around is the validity of federal subsidies that are used to assist low and middle income Americans to purchase health insurance.
“This is a law that is working and has generated significant benefits for working families and small-business owners all across the country,” said White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest.
Opponents of the law question “whether the program of tax credits applies only in the consumer marketplaces set up by sixteen states, and not at federally operated sites in thirty-four states,” according to SCOTUSblog. If the Supreme Court “decides to limit the subsidies to the state-run exchanges, it is widely understood that that outcome would crash the ACA’s carefully balanced economic arrangements.”
In a surprise decision, Chief Justice John Roberts provided the crucial swing vote to uphold the law’s original challenge in 2012.
Since the inception of the Affordable Care Act, an estimated five million people have purchased health insurance through the program. The average premium of $80 per month could increase over 400 percent if the Court eliminates the subsidies.
A decision is likely in June 2015.
A recent chain email created panic when it claimed that more than 214,000 American doctors are “opting-out of Obamacare exchange plans” and refusing hundreds of thousands of patients. Politifact found that the survey was based on a small group of docs and even the makers of the survey said that the number “can’t be extrapolated for the entire country.” The claim was found to be false.
-Brad Broker
(Photo by FaceMePLS via Flickr)
