The Hill reports that the Supreme Court is adding the toss the entire ACA case, Texas v. Azar to its conference at the end of February:
The Supreme Court on Wednesday listed a closely watched case seeking to strike down the Affordable Care Act for discussion at the justices’ private conference on Feb. 21.
The justices will consider whether to take up the case and on what schedule.
There is at least some possibility they could decide to take the case this term, meaning a ruling would be issued by June. But most observers expect a ruling will not come until after the 2020 election, either because the court waits until the next term to hear it, or because it decides not to take up the case at all until lower courts have finished considering it.
The logic of the case is bananapants as the government brief conceded in a recent brief that there was no damage being alleged or inflicted that was resolvable by a judicial decision. But that does not matter. What matters is what five justices think on any given day. A faster resolution increases the odds that the NFIB v. Sebelius coalition of Roberts, Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayer and Kagan will re-affirm their rulings. A long slow process through the courts makes actuarial tables far more relevant.
Shalimar
There is almost 0 possibility The Supreme Court will take the case this term and damage Republican election chances in November. They will take away healthcare from tens of millions of voters next term, and hope everyone forgets by 2022.
Omnes Omnibus
@Shalimar: It takes four justices to grant cert.
JMG
@Shalimar: That’s not the sort of thing voters forget.
Tim C.
I know it takes four to grant cert, can four get it in front of the court this term though? Likewise. Roberts ain’t dumb. I don’t see him voting to rip health care from rural whites right after Trump gets reelected (god forbid) the politics play differently with a Democrat in the white house of course.
Frankensteinbeck
I doubt Roberts wants to overrule his own previous decision.
PenAndKey
My son was born three months early. Without the ban on lifetime insurance limits he has already cost the insurance industry enough that he will be uninsurable for the rest of his life despite being perfectly healthy and having no long-term complications from an expensive birth if the court decides to strike down the ban on the practice that’s part of the ACA.
If the GOP thinks that this sort of thing won’t make enemies, or thinks they’re insulated enough to not care when it does, they’re fools. The Fox News crowd may be largely idiots, but even they hate the insurance industry and support the ACA policies (while hating the law). When those policies get cut there’ll be hell to pay for the people who made it happen. In the meantime? Yeah, I’m definitely pushing him to look outside the US when he starts applying for colleges even if my wife and I can’t qualify to emigrate and likely never will. I’ll stay and fight “the good fight”. There’s no reason he needs to, and I’d sleep better knowing he no longer has to deal with the bullshit that has defined America in my lifetime.
Shalimar
@Omnes Omnibus: Are the liberal justices really going to vote for cert to force a decision this term? That would be the smart thing to do politically, but they’re really not supposed to be making those decisions for the benefit of a party.
Omnes Omnibus
@Shalimar: I have no idea. It could also be the four knuckleheads who want to go nuts. Or a mix. Or who the fuck knows.
mrmoshpotato
@PenAndKey:
Oh there are people who are still pissed that the GOP even attempted to destroy healthcare coverage, and that happened in 2017.
Baud
Every case gets listed for conference.
PenAndKey
@mrmoshpotato: I’m one of them. Their attempt, and watching many in my family support that attempt despite having multiple relatives who will suffer if it succeeds, is what drove me to be the driving force in permanently splitting my extended family. My mother has been disabled since her 30s. My son can was premature. When half my family started getting indignant over being told, in explicit terms, what their support meant to me I said “fuck it, you want to side with enemies of my family? I’ll treat you as such”.
My mother is a much kinder person than me. She was all about making peace and not upsetting anyone at gatherings. Me? When my relatives told me that “it’s not my job to pay for those losers healthcare” I didn’t turn the other cheek. I told them that with language like that “those losers” included my own mother, my own son. That they effectively told me they’d rather two of the people I care most about in the world die than see their taxes go up.
Just… fuck that. There were only a few loudmouths, but by the end of that Christmas my family was pretty much split 50/50 and I can name at least a handful of them who have already left out of the “GOP-voting faithful” camp because the party’s actions and rhetoric are a direct threat to someone we love. It’s a single anecdote, but I have a hard time thinking it’s unique.
Duane
@Frankensteinbeck: I was assured here at Balloon Juice that this case would be laughed out of town. Yet here we are.
laura
I think that chief justice balls-n-strikes would happily overturn his prior decision so long as he can wait until after the 2020 and see if the Senate maintains a republican majority and trump reelection. He along with Alito Gorsuch and Kavanaugh want a return to the Lochner era.
Shalimar
@Frankensteinbeck: Roberts doesn’t want consequences. If he can overrule it after the election, after Trump is in office for 4 more years, after we turn into a dictatorship, he will be more than happy to drive the final nail.