The US Justice Department this Tuesday announced its intention to appeal a federal court’s ruling against a key part of the Obama administration's healthcare law.
Justice Department spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler said in a statement, “Virginia’s suit is based on a state statute that is not applicable nationwide, and the department believes this case should follow the ordinary course of allowing the courts of appeals to hear it first so the issues and arguments can be fully developed before the Supreme Court decides whether to consider it.”
U.S. District Judge Henry E. Hudson, a Republican appointed by former President George W. Bush had ruled this Monday that the healthcare law’s requirement that citizens buy health insurance or pay a penalty is against the constitution. In two other lawsuits in Virginia and Michigan, federal judges upheld the same provision. Republicans are calling for sending the lawsuit directly to the Supreme Court, bypassing the appeals court to make the process less time- consuming.
Legal experts believe that this bill which now covers 32 million Americans without previous coverage will eventually be dealt at the US Supreme Court, leaving one of President Barack Obama’s key domestic achievements in the balance. Elizabeth Wydra of the Constitutional Accountability Center however predicts that Hudson’s ruling would not stand on appeal, adding that it was “out of step with over 200 years of Supreme Court precedent on the powers of Congress.”
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