A place to find news updates, legal analysis, and all official documents related to the various constitutional challenges to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (as amended by the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010)
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
The ACA on life support
I am now about 75 minutes into the argument, and it seems clear all five Republican appointees are leaning against upholding the minimum coverage provision. I thought the Chief might be the swing vote, but it certainly does not sound that way from what I've heard thus far. Almost all the questions for the SG came from the Republican appointees, and almost all the questions for Clement are coming from the Democratic appointees. Whatever the merits of the constitutional question, this is slowly looking more and more like Bush v. Gore--with potentially more significant long-term damage to the Court's prestige.