Supremes OK O’Care Reject ‘Texas suit’

The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a GOP bid pushed by ex-President Donald Trump to invalidate ObamaCare — ruling that Texas and other challengers had no legal standing to file suit.

The 7-2 ruling authored by liberal Justice Stephen Breyer — and backed by Trump appointees Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett — did not decide broader legal questions about whether a key provision in the Affordable Care Act was unconstitutional and, if so, whether the rest of the statute should be struck down.

The provision, called the “individual mandate,” required Americans to obtain health insurance or pay a financial penalty. It marked the third time the court has preserved ObamaCare since its 2010 enactment.

President Biden’s administration in February urged the Supreme Court to uphold ObamaCare.

The president lauded the ruling, saying the Affordable Care Act “remains the law of the land.”

“Today’s US Supreme Court decision is a major victory for all Americans benefiting from this groundbreaking and life-changing law,” Biden said in a statement released by the White House. “It is a victory for more than 130 million Americans with preexisting conditions and millions more who were in immediate danger of losing their health care in the midst of a once-in-a-century pandemic.”

The ruling came in a lawsuit by Texas and 17 other Republican-governed states and later joined by Trump’s administration. A coalition of 20 states including Democratic-governed California and New York and the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives intervened in the case to try to preserve ObamaCare after Trump refused to defend the law.

The two dissenting justices were conservatives Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch.