[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 1082 Introduced in House (IH)]
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116th CONGRESS
2d Session
H. RES. 1082
Expressing the sense of the House that the Department of Justice should
defend the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Public Law 111-
148; 124 Stat. 119) and halt its efforts to repeal, sabotage, or
undermine health care protections for millions of people in the United
States in the midst of the public health emergency relating to the
Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19).
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
August 11, 2020
Ms. Spanberger (for herself, Ms. Underwood, Ms. Schrier, Mr. Allred,
Mrs. Axne, Ms. Barragan, Mr. Bishop of Georgia, Mrs. Bustos, Mr. Carson
of Indiana, Ms. Judy Chu of California, Mr. Cicilline, Mr. Cisneros,
Mr. Cohen, Mr. Connolly, Mr. Cooper, Mr. Costa, Mr. Cox of California,
Mr. Crow, Ms. Davids of Kansas, Mr. Danny K. Davis of Illinois, Mr.
DeFazio, Ms. DeGette, Ms. DeLauro, Mr. Deutch, Ms. Escobar, Mr.
Espaillat, Mr. Evans, Ms. Finkenauer, Mr. Foster, Mr. Garamendi, Ms.
Garcia of Texas, Mr. Garcia of Illinois, Mr. Golden, Mr. Gomez, Mr.
Gottheimer, Mr. Grijalva, Mrs. Hayes, Mr. Heck, Ms. Kendra S. Horn of
Oklahoma, Ms. Houlahan, Ms. Johnson of Texas, Mr. Kildee, Mr. Kilmer,
Mrs. Kirkpatrick, Ms. Lee of California, Ms. Jackson Lee, Ms. Lofgren,
Mr. Lynch, Mr. Sean Patrick Maloney of New York, Mr. McEachin, Mr.
McGovern, Mr. Meeks, Ms. Mucarsel-Powell, Mr. Nadler, Ms. Norton, Mr.
O'Halleran, Mr. Pappas, Mr. Pascrell, Ms. Porter, Mr. Raskin, Ms. Blunt
Rochester, Mr. Rouda, Ms. Roybal-Allard, Mr. Rush, Ms. Scanlon, Ms.
Wasserman Schultz, Mr. Serrano, Ms. Sewell of Alabama, Ms. Shalala, Ms.
Slotkin, Mr. Smith of Washington, Ms. Speier, Ms. Stevens, Ms. Titus,
Ms. Tlaib, Mr. Trone, Ms. Velazquez, Mr. Welch, Ms. Wild, Ms. Wilson of
Florida, Mrs. Dingell, Mr. Brendan F. Boyle of Pennsylvania, Mr. David
Scott of Georgia, Mr. Kennedy, and Miss Rice of New York) submitted the
following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on the
Judiciary
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Expressing the sense of the House that the Department of Justice should
defend the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Public Law 111-
148; 124 Stat. 119) and halt its efforts to repeal, sabotage, or
undermine health care protections for millions of people in the United
States in the midst of the public health emergency relating to the
Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19).
Whereas more than 4,700,000 people in the United States have tested positive for
the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (referred to in this preamble as ``COVID-
19''), with many requiring costly health care;
Whereas, prior to 2010, a diagnosis of COVID-19 likely would have been
considered a pre-existing medical condition;
Whereas, in 2010, Congress passed and President Barack Obama signed the Patient
Protection and Affordable Care Act (Public Law 111-148; 124 Stat. 119)
(referred to in this preamble as the ``ACA'');
Whereas, prior to the enactment of the ACA, more than 133,000,000 nonelderly
people in the United States with a pre-existing medical condition were
consistently charged unaffordable premiums for health insurance
coverage, were subject to exorbitant out-of-pocket costs for care, faced
annual and lifetime limits on coverage, or were denied health care
coverage altogether;
Whereas, prior to the enactment of the ACA, millions of seniors with Medicare
coverage encountered steep out-of-pocket prescription drug costs once
those seniors hit a threshold known as the Medicare ``donut hole'', and
since the donut hole began closing in 2010, millions of Medicare
beneficiaries have saved billions of dollars on prescription drug costs;
Whereas, on March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared the outbreak
of COVID-19 a pandemic;
Whereas, as of August 4, 2020, more than 4,700,000 people in the United States
have been diagnosed with COVID-19;
Whereas, during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, millions of people in the United
States have relied on the ACA for coverage, health care access, and
diagnoses;
Whereas, as of the week ending July 11, 2020, more than 30,000,000 people in the
United States are claiming unemployment benefits;
Whereas, on February 26, 2018, 18 State attorneys general and 2 Governors filed
a lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Northern District
of Texas, Texas v. United States, No. 4:18-cv-00167-O (N.D. Tex.)
(referred to in this preamble as ``Texas v. United States''), arguing
that the requirement of the ACA to maintain minimum essential coverage
is unconstitutional;
Whereas the State and individual plaintiffs in Texas v. United States also seek
to strike down the entire ACA as not severable from the requirement to
maintain minimum essential coverage;
Whereas, despite the well-established duty of the Department of Justice to
defend Federal statutes where reasonable arguments can be made in their
defense, Attorney General Jefferson Sessions announced in a letter to
Congress on June 7, 2018, that the Department of Justice would not
defend the constitutionality of the minimum essential coverage
provision;
Whereas, in the June 7, 2018, letter to Congress, then Attorney General
Jefferson Sessions announced that the Department of Justice would
instead argue that provisions protecting individuals with pre-existing
medical conditions (specifically the provisions commonly known as
``community rating'' and ``guaranteed issue'') are not severable from
the minimum essential coverage provision and ought to be invalidated;
Whereas the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas
issued an order on December 14, 2018, that struck down the ACA in its
entirety, including protections for individuals with pre-existing
conditions, based on the ruling of that court that the requirement to
maintain minimum essential coverage was unconstitutional;
Whereas, on March 25, 2019, the Department of Justice, in a letter to the United
States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, changed its position and
announced that the central holding of the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Texas should be upheld and the entire ACA
should be declared inseverable from the minimum essential coverage
provision and struck down;
Whereas, on December 18, 2019, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth
Circuit in Texas v. United States, 945 F.3d 355 (5th Cir. 2019), upheld
the decision of the United States District Court for the Northern
District of Texas striking down the minimum essential coverage
provision, but vacated the decision on severability and remanded the
case to the United States District Court for the Northern District of
Texas;
Whereas the Supreme Court of the United States granted, on Monday, March 2,
2020, a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by 21 State attorneys
general and will review, in California v. Texas, No. 19-804 (U.S.) and
Texas v. California, No. 19-19109 (U.S.), the decisions of the United
States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in Texas v. United States,
945 F.3d 355 (5th Cir. 2019);
Whereas, if the ruling of the United States District Court for the Northern
District of Texas in Texas v. United States is upheld by the Supreme
Court of the United States, seniors enrolled in Medicare would face the
reopening of the Medicare donut hole and be subject to billions of
dollars in new prescription drug costs;
Whereas, as of August 5, 2020, 38 States and the District of Columbia have
expanded or voted to expand Medicaid to individuals with incomes below
138 percent of the Federal poverty level, providing health coverage to
more than 12,000,000 newly eligible people;
Whereas, if the ruling of the United States District Court for the Northern
District of Texas in Texas v. United States is upheld by the Supreme
Court of the United States, the millions of individuals and families who
receive coverage from Medicaid could lose access to health care coverage
altogether;
Whereas, as of April 2020, more than 7,200,000 consumers who purchase individual
health insurance are eligible for tax credits to subsidize the cost of
premiums and assistance to minimize out-of-pocket health care costs such
as copays and deductibles, which has made individual health insurance
coverage affordable for millions of people in the United States for the
first time;
Whereas, if the ruling of the United States District Court for the Northern
District of Texas in Texas v. United States is upheld by the Supreme
Court of the United States--
(1) the individual health insurance marketplaces established under the
ACA would be eliminated;
(2) the millions of people in the United States who buy health
insurance on those marketplaces could lose coverage; and
(3) the premium expenses for individual health insurance would increase
exorbitantly;
Whereas, if the ruling of the United States District Court for the Northern
District of Texas in Texas v. United States is upheld by the Supreme
Court of the United States, the permanent reauthorization of the Indian
Health Care Improvement Act (25 U.S.C. 1601 et seq.) would also be
repealed and millions of American Indians and Alaska Natives would have
less access to health services, less options for care, and worsened
health disparities;
Whereas, if the ruling of the United States District Court for the Northern
District of Texas in Texas v. United States is upheld by the Supreme
Court of the United States, the nearly 500,000 veterans who have gained
health insurance coverage, including the nearly 1 in 10 veterans that
have gained coverage through Medicaid expansion, would lose access to
care;
Whereas, if the ruling of the United States District Court for the Northern
District of Texas in Texas v. United States is upheld by the Supreme
Court of the United States, people in the United States would lose
numerous consumer protections, including the requirements that--
(1) plans offer preventive care without cost-sharing;
(2) young adults can remain on their parents' insurance plan until age
26;
(3) many health insurance plans offer a comprehensive set of essential
health benefits such as maternity care, addiction treatment, and
prescription drug coverage;
(4) individuals cannot be denied coverage due to, and coverage cannot
be medically underwritten to reflect, gender; and
(5) individuals cannot be denied coverage due to, and coverage cannot
be medically underwritten to reflect, a pre-existing medical condition;
Whereas a ruling by the Supreme Court of the United States that the ACA must be
struck down would cost the United States an estimated 3,000,000 jobs at
a time when national unemployment as a result of the global pandemic
exceeds 11 percent;
Whereas, in the midst of a global pandemic, the Department of Justice is
continuing to pursue a strategy to have the ruling of the United States
District Court for the Northern District of Texas in Texas v. United
States upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States, which would
result in health care coverage being torn away from millions of people
in the United States;
Whereas people in the United States who are facing the economic and physical
risks of a global pandemic cannot also face an ongoing threat that a
ruling by the Supreme Court of the United States could invalidate their
health care coverage; and
Whereas dismantling the health care system in the United States in the midst of
a global pandemic, when millions of people in the United States have
lost work and the ACA provides an alternative to employer-based health
insurance, would trigger chaos: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That it is the sense of the House that the Department of
Justice should--
(1) defend the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
(Public Law 111-148; 124 Stat. 119) rather than doubling down
on its position with respect to the decision of the United
States District Court for the Northern District of Texas in
Texas v. United States, No. 4:18-cv-00167-O (N.D. Tex.); and
(2) protect the millions of people in the United States who
newly gained health insurance coverage since 2014 and rely on
that coverage in the midst of the public health emergency
relating to the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19).
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