Court Rebuffs Attack on Obamacare Subsidies

Steven D. Schwinn, John Marshall Law School

The Supreme Court ruled today that the Affordable Care Act means exactly what Congress thought it meant in the first place: everybody should get--and be able to get--health insurance.

The Court ruled in King v. Burwell that the ACA authorizes federal tax subsidies for qualified purchasers of health insurance on federally-subsidized exchanges. The ruling means that qualified purchasers will continue to receive federal tax subsidies for their health insurance, that they won't go without insurance (at least not for a lack of subsidies), and that Obamacare remains intact.

Opponents attacked the subsidies, arguing that the ACA authorized subsidies only for purchasers on state exchanges, not federally-facilitated exchanges, and that the IRS had to stop extending subsidies to purchasers on federally-facilitated exchanges. Their argument turned on a single phrase in the Act, that subsidies extend to "an Exchange established by the State," despite the overwhelming evidence that the Act, as a whole, was designed to provide universal coverage. Our oral argument preview is here.

The Court today rejected the opponents' arguments. Chief Justice Roberts wrote the majority opinion, joined by Justices Kennedy, Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan. He wrote that the phrase "an Exchange established by the State" was ambiguous, given the way the rest of the Act hung together, and that the Court therefore should give the phrase a reading that harmonizes with the rest of the Act, including the Act's clear purpose to provide universal coverage. That reading, he wrote, meant that tax subsidies extend to purchasers on both state-created and federally-facilitated exchanges.

Chief Justice Roberts's opinion is notable for its recognition of the several key components of Obamacare (guaranteed issue, community rating, individual mandate, and tax subsidies) and how they are designed to operate together to ensure universal (or close to universal) coverage. The majority opinion also discussed in some detail how these components evolved and ended up in the ACA and the health-care and health-insurance problems they were designed to solve (including the death spiral).

But Chief Justice Roberts also took the opportunity make a dig on process--how the legislative road to the ACA was hurried and lacked transparency.

Justice Scalia wrote the dissent, joined by Justices Thomas and Alito. The dissent was predictably colorful, but comes down to this:

The Court holds that when the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act says "Exchange established by the State" it means "Exchange established by the State or the Federal Government." This is of course quite absurd, and the Court's 21 pages of explanation make it no less so.