While we were busy fighting on the front lines, the dishonorable enemy crept up on our right flank and, with the help of their lackeys on the Bench, may yet score a decisive victory against poor people. Over 6.5 million people are in danger of losing their access to quality healthcare.
King versus Burrell
King v. Burwell is a challenge to a key component of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (“ACA”), a landmark law dedicated to achieving widespread, affordable health care. The ACA provides that individuals can purchase competitively-priced health insurance on American Health Benefit Exchanges (“Exchanges”) that may be run by either the States or the federal government. It also authorizes a federal tax credit for low- and middle-income individuals who purchase insurance on the Exchanges. The Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) issued a regulation confirming that the federal tax credit is available to all financially eligible Americans, regardless of whether they purchase insurance on a state-run or federally-facilitated Exchange.
As the President recently said,, the Supreme Court should not have even taken up the case. And while the president is hopeful that an early decision means that the Justices are "going to do what legal scholars would expect them to do” and uphold the law, a ruling for the plaintiffs will be devastating news for those whose premiums are subsidized.
According to DailyKos's own Brainwrap
many people currently enrolled in ACA exchange healthcare policies will be utterly screwed starting as early as July in the event of the Supreme Court ruling for the plaintiffs in King v. Burwell.
It's important to note that the "currently" caveat means that this only refers to the 6.5 million who would be directly screwed; this doesn't include the indirect casualties, which would likely add another 6.5 million to the pile.
More from Charles Gaba (Brainwrap):
A couple of days ago I noted that the primary damage (but by no means the only damage) of the Supreme Court ruling for the plaintiffs in King v. Burwell would be for appx. 6.5 million people to have to shell out an average of over $1,600 in extra taxes this year to keep their current healthcare policy through the end of 2015, plus a likely average 493% hike in premium rates if they want to keep the same policies in 2016.
We are hoping and praying that the Justices will listen to their better angels. That they will "faithfully discharge the duties" of their offices. That they remember that for millions of Americans - poor and middle class - the decision they make will not be abstract and or hypothetical, but that their judgement will impact real lives. Indeed, the decision the Justices make will determine whether millions of citizens of these United States will live or die.
Talk about a death panel.
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About Support the Dream Defenders
Members of the Daily Kos group Support the Dream Defenders invigorate three ongoing projects:
1. We coalesced to support the Dream Defenders in Florida and their mission, our first project and the origin of our name. The Dream Defenders defend the Dream of Martin Luther King Jr. by "develop(ing) the next generation of radical leaders to realize and exercise our independent collective power; building alternative systems and organizing to disrupt the structures that oppress our communities." Please donate here.
2. Our Michael Brown Over-Policed Rights Act, crowd-sourced at Daily Kos in the fall of 2014. This bill quickly gained the support of the NAACP and the ACLU. The NAACP forwarded our bill to members of Congress, and we distributed it to members of the Congressional Black Caucus and other progressive members of Congress. President Obama signed into a law a small piece of our bill in December 2014. Our state version of the MBOPRA is currently in committee in the Kansas legislature.
3. Our Freedom of Information Act project. Nineteen Republican governors chose to kill poor people by not expanding Medicaid. Ebola has killed about 9000 people in total; Republican governors kill 17,000 people PER YEAR by refusing federal support for Medicaid, a story ignored by traditional media. Our project forces those governors to out themselves, clapping them in a Catch 22. We will publicize our results through letters to the editor and via press releases. We no longer need volunteers to file FOIA requests, since we have already mailed all such requests.
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