Justices Debate What Happens to Obamacare if Individual Mandate Falls
The Supreme Court battle over the fate of Obamacare rages on, with Supreme Court justices deciding the fate of the package should the individual mandate fail the ruling. As it stands, most of the justices seem content to at least let some of Obama’s controversial legacy-making program stand and take effect in 2014.
If Obama’s individual mandate program is found to be unconstitutional, the rest of Obamacare won’t necessarily die along with it. Supreme Court justices debated that very question today in the third and final day of arguments, after the challengers’ lead attorney Paul D. Clemen stated: “If the individual mandate is unconstitutional, then the rest of the act cannot stand,” in his case.
A sympathetic Antonin Scalia responded, “My approach would be to say that if you take the heart out of this statute, the statute’s gone.” Ruth Bader Ginsburg disagreed, saying, “There are so many things in this act that are unquestionably OK,” she said. If the choice is between “a wrecking operation and a salvage job, a more conservative approach would be a salvage job.” Sonia Sotomayor agreed with Ginsburg, passing the buck back to Congress, saying, “Why shouldn’t we let Congress” decide what to do. “What’s wrong with leaving this in the hands of those who should be fixing this?”
Would provisions outside of Obamacare’s individual mandate be safe in the eyes of the Supreme Court? Most early media coverage shies away from any sort of opinion. The AP and the Wall Street Journal both note one comment from potential swing-vote justice John Roberts that seems government-sympathetic. He said that many of the law’s provisions have “nothing to do” with the insurance mandate. Politico concurs, thinking “most justices” sounded amenable to not throwing out the entire package, though there was a marked differences on what parts should be salvaged.
Despite yesterday’s arguments and the following commentary, there is still no certainty as to whether or not the individual mandate is indeed moribund. It’s an interesting debate, and only time will tell the fate of Obama’s individual mandate and Obamacare as a whole.
