Courts cannot be depended upon to save the Constitution and country

Fairfax, Va. – The Supreme Court today rejected a challenge to the Affordable Care Act, the third time it has preserved the 2010 healthcare law.

Texas and other Republican-leaning states, backed by the Trump administration, sought to strike down the law on technical arguments after Congress reduced to zero the tax penalty for failing to carry health insurance. Thursday’s 7-2 decision, written by Justice Stephen Breyer, found that none of the plaintiffs suffered any injury from zeroing out the penalty and thus they lacked legal standing to bring the lawsuit at all.

Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning issued the following statement in reaction:

“Sen. Ted Cruz was right when in 2013, he led a charge to defund Obamacare which passed the House of Representatives but flamed out in the Senate amid promises of future repeal of the hated federalization of health care.  Today’s Supreme Court decision that the 18 states, all of which had mandates put on them by the law, did not have standing with the Court, shows how weak the Court is when faced with threats of political court packing.

“It also shows that promises to rip the law out “root and branch,” depended upon a Court filled with originalists.  As Americans for Limited Government has asserted time and again, the framers intended for Congress to be the most powerful branch of government.  It should be no surprise that conservative jurists defer to this reading of the Constitution, even if they abhor the law to be decided.

“The Court held that the states did not suffer any damage due to the zeroing out of the individual mandate by Congress and hence were not eligible to bring the case.  This is an obvious dodge, as the underlying case would have forced the Court to make the determination if the thin reed that the individual mandate was a tax used by Chief Justice John Roberts used as a cover to save the law had been destroyed by Congress’ later decision to zero out funding for the individual mandate.  Ironically, the case may have been different if Congress had actually repealed the mandate which forced people who did not want to or could not afford, the crummy and expensive Obamacare insurance to pay a tax as a penalty for making the choice to not enroll.  But Congress did not take this step.  It is unclear what the final decision would have been because by simply defunding the individual mandate, the law remained in place, but is unenforced.

“This disappointing decision makes clear that the battles over the Courts matter in terms of keeping people off the bench who would use it to usurp the will of the people. This sobering thought makes the current fight over maintaining the filibuster and defeating the Democrat election changes all the more important.  If candidates who support limited government fail to gain control of the Senate in 2022, it is clear the Courts cannot be depended upon to save the Constitution and country.”

For media availability contact Catherine Mortensen at 703-478-4643 or cmortensen@getliberty.org.