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In a significant setback for the Obama administration, the Supreme Court just agreed to review King v. Burwell, the Fourth Circuit’s decision upholding an IRS rule extending tax credits to federally established exchanges. The government had asked the Court to take a pass because there’s no split in the circuit courts over whether the IRS rule is valid. At least four justices—it only takes four to grant certiorari—voted to take the case anyhow. As I see it, what’s troubling here is not that the Court took King in the absence of a split. Its rules permit it to hear cases...

The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to take up a new challenge to the Affordable Care Act, a move that will again thrust the law into a high-profile battle before the high court.The Supreme Court's move is somewhat surprising, considering there is still no split in the lower, circuit courts. But the high court agreed to King v. Burwell, a case in which the Fourth Circuit court upheld an IRS rule that extends the distribution of health insurance subsidies to states served by the federal insurance marketplace.The challenge to the law is viewed as having the potential to cripple Obamacare in...

The Supreme Court agreed Friday to hear a new challenge to President Barack Obama's health care law. The justices said they will decide whether the law authorizes subsidies that help millions of low- and middle-income people afford their health insurance premiums. A federal appeals court upheld Internal Revenue Service regulations that allow health-insurance tax credits under the Affordable Care Act for consumers in all 50 states. Opponents argue that most of the subsidies are illegal.

The Obama administration has funded a new study by top consulting firm RAND Health that startlingly finds that if taxpayer subsidies are eliminated, Obamacare exchanges will fall into a “death spiral.” The study comes in the wake of a number of lawsuits which are challenging the Obama administration’s implementation of Obamacare subsidies. Three lawsuits have made it to U.S. Circuit Courts, just one step from the Supreme Court, arguing that the text of the Affordable Care Act allows premium subsidies for state-run exchanges only. The report was sponsored by HHS’s Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, which,...

The top lawyer arguing a case to overturn Obamacare subsidies believes he can succeed at crippling the law even if it's upheld in every district and appellate court. A three-judge panel on the D.C. Circuit invalidated the federal exchange subsidies in June. The full court subsequently vacated the ruling and announced it'll re-hear the case, called Halbig v. Burwell. The conservative opponents have a tough battle because the en banc ruling will feature 8 Democratic-appointed judges — four of whom were appointed by President Obama himself — and 5 Republican-appointed judges. Michael Carvin, the lawyer for the plaintiffs, has appealed...

Obamacare enrollees are straining the finances of community health centers around the country, some health center leaders say. The issue is that many lower-income patients with insurance coverage through the federal and state exchanges bought bronze-tier plans with lower premiums but high deductibles, coinsurance and copayments and no federal cost-sharing subsidies. When these patients face high out-of-pocket costs for care that falls below the deductible, they can't afford it. So the centers are subsidizing that care by offering them means-tested sliding-scale fees. When the centers, which are not allowed to turn away patients for inability to pay, try to get...

It’s a major blow to the MNsure health insurance exchange – the insurance company with the lowest rates and the most customers signed up through MNsure will not be back in 2015. The decision is expected to have a major impact on health insurance customers and the governor’s race. Golden Valley-based PreferredOne Health Insurance just notified MNsure and the Minnesota Department of Commerce of their decision through a letter. Sources tell KSTP’s Tom Hauser that MNsure CEO Scott Leitz was notified by phone Tuesday morning. PreferredOne Spokesman Steve Peterson tells Hauser this is “purely a business decision.” He says the...

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals has agreed to revisit a ruling that struck down the ObamaCare subsidies issued through the federal exchange. The announcement of the second hearing is a victory for the Obama administration, which suffered a defeat in late July when a three-judge panel threw out the subsidies, ruling they were not legitimate under the Affordable Care Act. A decision by the full D.C. appellate court, in which Democratic appointees outnumber Republicans, could favor the administration. Arguments are scheduled for Dec. 17.

In a victory for the Obama administration, a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. Thursday threw out an earlier ruling that said financial subsidies are not available for people who bought health insurance on the federal exchange. A three-judge panel of the D.C. Court of Appeals reached that conclusion in late July. On the same day, a federal appeals court in Richmond reached the opposite conclusion and said the subsidies are available. But Thursday, the full D.C. Court of Appeals said it will re-hear the case, which erases the lower court ruling that went against the subsidies. This greatly diminishes...

The Affordable Care Act cannot be broken down into sound bites. This holds true for both its most ardent supporters and its most fervent opponents. The law is simply too complex to be labeled either a total failure or a smashing success. But that doesn't mean it isn't trending in one of those two directions. Across the country, individuals and families are beginning to learn whether their insurance premiums will change for 2015—early estimates indicate an overall national increase of 7.5 percent, according to a PricewaterhouseCoopers analysis. That's what is expected despite the early promise that the ACA would lower...

When a federal appeals court ruled last month that a seemingly arcane wording flaw in the Affordable Care Act should invalidate a central part of the law, many of those who drafted the statute five years ago reacted with shock and anger.. In 2009, they had spent months piecing together a compromise that sought to create a national system of subsidized insurance — but one run by the states. Now, they fear their work could be undone by what some call a "drafting error" and others portray as a political miscalculation. The judges from the U.S. Court of Appeals for...

Taxpayers accustomed to filing a simplified 1040EZ will not be able to do so if they received health insurance tax credits this year. Some highlights: -- You may have heard that the IRS cannot use liens and levies to collect the law's penalty on people who remain uninsured. But there is no limitation on collection efforts in cases where consumers got too big a tax credit. If your refund isn't large enough to cover the repayment, you will have to write the IRS a check. "They are not messing around," Brandes said. For families, the cap is double the amount...

In the hospitals, we see the consequences. While the poor and the illegal immigrants get absolutely free care, the middle-class patients are collapsing financially under the strain of their deductibles and their lost income from their time off work, not to mention the additional stress of their illness. In our clinics, sick patients are choosing to forego testing, medicines, and surgery that they need solely because of cost. Instead they are living with their illnesses, often with cheap antibiotics as a means of delaying the inevitable. To make matters worse, the patients getting their health care for free will ask...

Some people want you to suspend your imagination and your memory regarding what the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) actually states in terms of who can receive subsidies for their health insurance. Of course, as usual, when you have right on your side, truth does not matter. But we will explain why the subsidies disbursed from the federal exchange fails the test of what is right. As you know by now, there were two rulings issued in a Court of Appeals that were diametrically opposed to each other. The issue revolves around whether the federal exchange (operating in 36 states)...

Many of you probably heard about the “Halbig” decision, in which a federal court struck a blow against Obamacare by ruling that the IRS was wrong to arbitrarily grant subsidies for health insurance policies purchased through a federal exchange. And why did the judges rule against the IRS? Well, for the simple reason that the Obamacare legislation specifically says that subsidies are only available for policies purchased through exchanges set up by state governments. My Cato colleague Michael Cannon explains: The PPACA authorizes the IRS to issue health-insurance tax credits only to taxpayers who purchase coverage “through an Exchange established...

The group seeking to invalidate the Affordable Care Act’s subsidies to Americans purchasing health insurance through federally run state marketplaces is asking the Supreme Court to take up the case early. The Competitive Enterprise Institute, the conservative group funding challenges to the IRS rule allowing subsidies to flow to state exchanges, announced Thursday that it was asking the Supreme Court to intervene. The challengers argue that the Affordable Care Act only allows subsidies in exchanges set up by states – an interpretation that could lead to millions of people being unable to afford coverage. Owing largely to Republican resistance, only...

Obamacare has proven again to be the biggest legislative failure in history, with last week's ruling that its subsidies are illegal. These subsidies induced some 5 million Americans to sign up for Obamacare but are prohibited by law as held by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in Halbig v. Burwell. This humiliation to the Obama administration was a devastating setback to legislation already disfavored by a 59-40 percent margin among the public, according to the latest CNN poll. Twice as many Americans say they are being hurt rather than helped by Obamacare. Officially known as the...

The Obama administration on Tuesday will publish a proposed rule that would give thousands of temporary and seasonal government workers access to the government’s health care program, even though current law would appear to prohibit them from using that program. The rule from the Office of Personnel Management would let these federal workers sign up for coverage under the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, and also allow some of them to enjoy a government contribution to their insurance premiums. Both steps would be done through OPM’s proposed regulation, and not through an act of Congress. The proposed rule indicates that...

UNKNOWN QUESTIONER:“Um, you mentioned the Health Insurance Exchanges for the States. And it’s my understanding that if the States don’t provide them, that the Federal Government will provide them.”M.I.T. economics Prof. Jonathan Gruber:“Yeah, so these Health Insurance Exchanges —once you go on MA-HealthConnect.org and CRS [is] in Massachusetts—will be these new shopping places. And they’ll be the place that people go to get their subsidies for health insurance. “In the law it says [that] if States don’t provide them, the federal backstop will. The Federal Government has been sort-of slow in putting in this backstop, I think partially, because they...

The Supreme Court may soon need to decide whether the federal government can be considered a "state" in our federal republic in the same sense that Iowa, Wyoming and Wisconsin are states. On the face of it, this question may seem absurd. In fact, given any level of reflection, it is absurd. The federal government is not one of the states. But this absurd question was at the heart of Halbig v. Burwell, decided this week by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, and it could soon become a defining issue in American life. Section 1311...