President Joe Biden is hailing the Supreme Court’s decision to dismiss a lawsuit brought by Republicans to challenge the Affordable Care Act, often called “Obamacare.”
In a statement on Thursday, Biden said, “Today’s U.S. Supreme Court decision is a major victory for all Americans benefitting from this groundbreaking and life-changing law. It is a victory for more than 130 million Americans with pre-existing conditions and millions more who were in immediate danger of losing their health care in the midst of a once-in-a-century pandemic.”
“It is a victory for every American who, prior to the Affordable Care Act, stayed up at night staring at the ceiling, wondering whether they would lose everything if they or a loved one got sick. Because of this law, they don’t have to worry about being denied coverage due to a pre-existing condition,” he continued.
The president added, “After more than a decade of attacks on the Affordable Care Act through the Congress and the courts, today’s decision – the third major challenge to the law that the U.S. Supreme Court has rejected – it is time [to] move forward and keep building on this landmark law.”
The high court ruled 7-2 on Thursday that Texas and other Republican-led states did not have a right to bring the lawsuit against the law in federal court. The court’s newest member, Justice Amy Coney Barrett, joined the majority in voting to dismiss the lawsuit.
Democrats claimed during Barrett’s confirmation hearings in 2020 that she would vote to strike down the healthcare law and strip millions of Americans of their insurance.
However, when Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) was asked if he regretted Democrats rhetoric since Barrett voted with the majority on the court, he said, “If we hadn’t done that, maybe they would have” struck down the law.
"If we hadn’t done that, maybe they would have" killed the law, Whitehouse said. "It may be (saved) because we did so many warnings."
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) June 17, 2021
“It may be [saved] because we did so many warnings,” he added.
As the Associated Press reports, “The law’s major provisions include protections for people with pre-existing health conditions, a range of no-cost preventive services and the expansion of the Medicaid program that insures lower-income people, including those who work in jobs that don’t pay much or provide health insurance.”
Additionally, the ruling leaves in place a provision that requires that Americans get health insurance or pay a penalty. Congress lowered the penalty to zero in 2017.