States sue to end Obamacare

Twenty states sued the federal government Monday seeking to invalidate Obamacare now that Congress has axed the tax penalty for not having individual health insurance. In the lawsuit, the states claim Congress’ decision to undo the individual mandate penalty, part of the Republican tax bill President Donald Trump signed into law in December, invalidates the entire healthcare law. Republican attorneys general Ken Paxton of Texas and Brad Schimel of Wisconsin organized the effort and filed the complaint in the U.S. District Court in the Northern District of Texas. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Affordable Care Act (ACA) after a legal challenge in 2012, ruling the individual mandate was constitutional because it provided government funding through a tax, which Congress has the power to levy. Without a tax penalty, the new lawsuit argues, the individual mandate is unconstitutional, and without the individual mandate, “the remainder of the ACA must also fall.” The attorneys general pointed out both Congress and four Supreme Court justices have said the individual mandate is “not severable” from the rest of the law, which included broad healthcare reforms. “With no remaining legitimate basis for the law, it is time that Americans are finally free from the stranglehold of Obamacare, once and for all,” Paxton said in a statement.