Yesterday, the Trump Administration formally submitted their official brief with the Supreme Court of the United States asking SCOTUS to completely and fully strike down the entire Patient Protection & Affordable Care Act. This is the latest development in the utterly insane "California vs. Texas" lawsuit (formerly "Texas vs. U.S.", "Texas vs. Azar", or as I prefer to label it, "Texas Fold'em", a name originally coined by U of M law professor Nicholas Bagley but which doesn't seem to have caught on with anyone other than me so far.
I've written about this completely absurd lawsuit more times than I care to remember, but as a reminder, here's what it comes down to.
The image below is the "3-legged stool" of the Affordable Care Act.
The blue leg represents the various patient protections which the ACA requires health insurance carriers to provide--guaranteed issue, community rating, essential health benefits and so on.
Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's Senate confirmation hearings will start on Sept. 4 and last between three and four days, Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) announced on Friday.
That scheduling tees up the GOP to meet its goal of getting President Donald Trump's pick seated on the high court by the time its term begins in early October, barring unforeseen obstacles or a breakthrough by Democrats who are pushing to derail Kavanaugh's confirmation.
The Supreme Court battle so far has focused on documents related to Kavanaugh's five years in the George W. Bush White House. Democrats have excoriated the GOP for declining to seek records from the nominee's time as Bush's staff secretary and condemned the Republican decision to rely on a Bush-driven review process for the early round of vetting, while the majority party hails the vast scope of documents that are set for release.
