The conservative legal case against ObamaCare keeps getting nuttier

In their fervor to strike down the law, conservatives have been forced to twist logic beyond recognition

ObamaCare
(Image credit: (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite))

In the latest legal battle over ObamaCare, sensible observers are having what can only be described as a crazy-pills moment. It was bad enough that conservatives of all stripes (wacko and non-) last month rallied around an absurd reading of the Affordable Care Act to defend a ruling that struck down one of the law's key provisions. Now a new argument is being floated to protect that ruling that manages to eclipse its nuttiness, revealing the intellectual and moral bankruptcy of the conservative cause.

In last month's ruling in Halbig v. Burwell, two members of a three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, using one instance of ambiguous wording in the ACA's text, ruled that the the bill does not authorize the federal government to funnel subsidies to states that had declined to establish their own health care exchanges. If allowed to stand, the ruling would have devastating consequences for the millions of Americans in more than 30 states who would be stripped of their health care coverage.

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Scott Lemieux

Scott Lemieux is a professor of political science at the College of Saint Rose in Albany, N.Y., with a focus on the Supreme Court and constitutional law. He is a frequent contributor to the American Prospect and blogs for Lawyers, Guns and Money.