Supes save Bamcare vs. latest suit in 7-2 vote

The Supreme Court voted Thursday to reject a challenge to the Affordable Care Act, keeping the Obama-era health care law in place with a 7-2 vote.

Justice Stephen Breyer ruled that Texas and other Republican-run states don’t have standing to challenge the so-called “individual mandate” in the law known as Obamacare.

“They have not shown a past or future injury fairly traceable to ... the specific statutory provision they attack as unconstitutional,” Breyer wrote.

Justices Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch, both conservatives, dissented.

The ruling rejected the conservative states’ argument that it is unconstitutional to require that individuals have health coverage. But it did so in a narrow way that could leave open the door to future challenges to the sweeping law.

President Biden called the vote a big step toward “fulfilling our moral obligation to ensure that, here in America, health care is a right and not a privilege.”

Democratic lawmakers also cheered the latest legal survival act for the law that has become widely popular, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The ruling is a landmark victory for Democrats’ work to defend protections for people with preexisting conditions against Republicans’ relentless efforts to dismantle them,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a statement.

“The Supreme Court has just ruled: The ACA is here to stay,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said.

The top court first upheld the health care law in 2012 with a majority opinion written by Chief Justice John Roberts who ruled that the individual mandate can be construed as a legitimate exercise of Congress’ power to tax.

In 2017, the Republican-led Congress sought to pull the legal rug out from under that ruling by setting the penalty for not having health insurance to zero.

Some 20 red states then sued, claiming the law was an unconstitutional effort to require all Americans to obtain something they may not want.

A conservative federal judge and an appeals court ruled in their favor, setting up the Supreme Court case.