10 things you need to know today: October 14, 2020

Senators grill Barrett on ObamaCare, abortion, and election disputes, the Supreme Court lets administration end census count, and more 

Amy Coney Barrett speaks
(Image credit: Caroline Brehman-Pool/Getty Images)

1. Senators question Barrett on ObamaCare, abortion, election disputes

Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett said during the second day of her confirmation hearing that she would not "pre-commit" on how she would rule on such critical cases as the Affordable Care Act, abortion rights, or a dispute over the November election. Barrett, a conservative judge picked by President Trump to replace the late liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, did say that she was "not here on a mission to destroy the Affordable Care Act." Democrats have framed her confirmation, which would expand the court's conservative majority to 6-3, as a step toward killing the health-care reform law, also known as ObamaCare. Judge Barrett has criticized a past Supreme Court decision that stopped short of striking down a key element of ObamaCare, but she said she could not say "in the abstract" whether that would lead her to recuse herself in a pending health-care case.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us
Harold Maass, The Week US

Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.