Title: Supreme Court Health Care Decision: Individual Mandate Survives | HuffPost
Headings: Supreme Court Health Care Decision: Individual Mandate Survives
Supreme Court Health Care Decision: Individual Mandate Survives
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Content: In effect, they contend that even if the Constitution permits Congress to do exactly what we interpret this statute to do, the law must be struck down because Congress used the wrong labels.” But the majority was not persuaded by that argument. Roberts wrote that the mandate provision “need not be read to do more than impose a tax. That is sufficient to sustain it.” On Medicaid expansion, the court upheld the expansion but with a critical caveat: The federal government may not threaten the states that don’t comply with the loss of their existing funding. Essentially, the Medicaid expansion is now optional for the states. “As for the Medicaid expansion, that portion of the Affordable Care Act violates the Constitution by threatening existing Medicaid funding,” Roberts wrote. “ Congress has no authority to order the States to regulate according to its instructions. Congress may offer the States grants and require the States to comply with accompanying conditions, but the States must have a genuine choice whether to accept the offer.