Judge rules Obamacare reimbursements unconstitutional

House Republicans won a legal victory against Obamacare today when a federal judge in Washington, D.C., ruled the Obama administration does not have authority to spend the money it’s paying insurers to offset healthcare costs for low-income Americans.

U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer, a George W. Bush appointee, declared unconstitutional President Barack Obama’s plan to spend $175 billion not authorized by Congress. The money, allocated to reimburse insurers to lower the cost of co-payments, is supposed to be paid out over a decade.

But Congress never appropriated the funds and has denied the administration’s request to fill the account created by the Affordable Care Act. The Obama administration claims the money it is using to pay insurers is coming from another source of previously approved funds.

Although Collyer ruled the payments unconstitutional and ordered them stopped, she put her ruling on hold pending the administration’s planned appeal.

House Republicans authorized the lawsuit in 2014, and Collyer ruled it could proceed, despite the administration’s objection that lawmakers had no legal authority to sue. Some conservatives also questioned the suit, saying it’s up to the legislative branch to restrain an unruly executive, not the judicial branch.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.