By: dfitzgerald
Executive Summary
Health care advocates including, Families USA, Community Catalyst, National Health Law Program, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, and Services Union Employees International, filed an amici curiae brief in April in support of California and numerous other state attorneys general who urging the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse a lower court ruling the invalidated the entire Affordable Care Act as unconstitutional.
The groups’ brief concludes that the if the 5th Circuit were to allow the federal district judge’s decision to stand that it would subvert the intent of the ACA, to expand health care coverage to low-income individuals and families, and in the process harm tens of millions of people from coast to coast.
Because of the ACA, “the drop in the uninsured rate in 2015 was the largest since Medicare was passed and Medicaid first ramped up in the early 1970s. By 2016, the ACA had lowered the number of people without health insurance by more than 20 million people. Affirming the district court’s opinion would reverse these gains with devastating consequences to millions of adults and children in the United States. The district court’s decision should be reversed,” the groups conclude in their friend-of-the-court brief.
