Meet the Unusual Plaintiffs Behind the Supreme Court Case That Could Destroy Obamacare - MoJo

[WillyT]

Meet the Unusual Plaintiffs Behind the Supreme Court Case That Could Destroy Obamacare
One has called Obama the "anti-Christ." Another didn't realize her case might wipe out health coverage for millions.
By Stephanie Mencimer - MoJo
Mon Feb. 9, 2015 7:05 AM EST

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On March 4, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in King v. Burwell, a lawsuit designed by conservative advocates to destroy Obamacare. If the plaintiffs prevail, about 8 million people could lose their health insurance. Premiums are likely to skyrocket by 35 percent or more, threatening coverage for millions of others. Health policy experts have estimated that nearly 10,000 people a year could die prematurely if they lose their coverage. Obamacare itself could collapse.

The King case started out as a legal theory hatched by a group of conservative lawyers in 2010 at a conference sponsored by the American Enterprise Institute, the right-leaning think tank. Attendees were urged to devise a litigation strategy to bring down the Affordable Care Act, which months earlier had been signed into law. The libertarian Competitive Enterprise Institute, a think tank funded by big pharmaceutical firms, oil and gas outfits, the Koch brothers, Google, tobacco companies, and conservative foundations, answered the call. ("This bastard has to be killed as a matter of political hygiene," Michael Greve, then CEI chairman, said at the conference.) But CEI had to recruit plaintiffs—actual people who could claim they had been harmed by the Affordable Care Act in a particular way—to launch its lawsuit.

So who are the two men and two women that CEI handpicked to front its assault on Obamacare? What harm had they suffered as a result of the health care law? And why are they willing to put their names on a suit that could jeopardize the health coverage of millions of fellow Americans?

I set out to track down the plaintiffs to hear in their own words why they had decided to take part in the case, and it soon became evident that CEI had struggled to find suitable candidates. Three of the four plaintiffs are nearly eligible for Medicare, meaning their objections to Obamacare will soon be moot. Two of them appear to qualify for hardship exemptions—that is, they are not forced to acquire insurance or pay fines because even with a subsidy insurance would eat up too much of their incomes—so it's unclear how Obamacare had burdened them. These two plaintiffs seemed driven by their political opposition to President Obama; one has called him the "anti-Christ" and said he won election by getting "his Muslim people to vote for him." Yet most curious of all, one of the plaintiffs did not recall exactly how she'd been recruited for the case and seemed unaware of the possible consequences if she wins. Told that millions could lose their health coverage if the Supreme Court rules in her favor, she said that she didn't want this to happen.

The case is legally complex. It centers on the claim...

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More: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/02/king-burwell-supreme-court-obamacare

[riderinthestorm]

1. Great article Willy T. Thanks for posting some of the best info on DU

[WillyT]

2. You Are Quite Welcome !!!

[WillyT]

3. Kick !!!