JUST IN: US Supreme Court will take up a legal challenge to Obamacare, agreeing to hear the case in its new term that begins in October.
The Supreme Court said Monday that it will take up a legal challenge to Obamacare, agreeing to hear the case in its new term that begins in October. That means the program will continue for at least another year and any ruling will come after Election Day.
Texas and 17 other red states brought the lawsuit against the key part of Obamacare, arguing that the individual mandate was unconstitutional, and in December, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans agreed. The Supreme Court upheld the law in 2012, ruling that it was a legitimate exercise of Congress's taxing authority. After the then-Republican-led U.S. House set the individual mandate's tax penalty to zero in 2017, conservative-leaning states brought the lawsuit, and a Texas trial judge ruled that because the tax was eliminated, the law could no longer be saved as a use of Congress' taxing power.
In its December ruling, the federal appeals court concluded that without the tax, Congress has no authority to require Americans to buy health insurance. In the ruling, the court sent the case back to the trial judge for another look at whether the entire law is invalid or some parts of it can survive.
The appeals court directed the judge"to employ a finer-toothed comb on remand and conduct a more searching inquiry into which provisions of the ACA Congress intended to be inseverable from the individual mandate."Pete Williams is an NBC News correspondent who covers the Justice Department and the Supreme Court, based in Washington.
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