A coalition of attorneys general will be allowed to intervene in a lawsuit seeking to dismantle the ACA, reports The Hill.
That's after a federal judge granted a motion to intervene filed by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, who is joined by attorneys general in Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Virginia, Vermont, Washington, and the District of Columbia.
Mr. Becerra and the other attorneys general sought the motion after a lawsuit filed Feb. 26 by 20 state attorneys general in U.S. District Court in the Northern District of Texas. The lawsuit — led by the attorneys general of Texas and Wisconsin — claims the ACA was deemed unconstitutional when President Donald Trump in December signed aRepublican tax law that repealed the penalty payment for those failing to meet the individual insurance mandate.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has argued the U.S. Supreme Court "already admitted that an individual mandate without a tax penalty is unconstitutional."
However, Mr. Becerra, in a statement released May 16, said he argued in his motion to intervene that the ACA has not been repealed via the Republican tax bill, and that the Supreme Court has upheld the constitutionality of the ACA.
Mr. Cecerra said he is pleased the court ruled in his favor.
The "ruling allows us to protect the health and well-being of these Americans by defending affordable access to healthcare. Before the Affordable Care Act, Americans had shorter lives and paid twice as much for their healthcare as other developed countries. The passage of the ACA was the first step toward fixing that problem. We must continue to move forward, not backward," he said.
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