News and Commentary

Federal Appeals Court Rules Obamacare Individual Mandate Is Unconstitutional

Ryan Saavedra
Federal Appeals Court Rules Obamacare Individual Mandate Is Unconstitutional
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

A panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, which is based in New Orleans, ruled on Wednesday that Obamacare’s individual mandate, which required everyone to have health insurance, was unconstitutional in its present form.

“However, the appeals court ruling largely ducked the central question of whether the Affordable Care Act remained valid after Congress removed the penalty for not having health insurance and it sent the case back to a Texas federal judge who previously ruled the entire law was unconstitutional to reconsider how much of it could survive,” Politico reported. “The high-stakes ruling keeps the legal threat to Obamacare alive while reducing the likelihood the Supreme Court could render a final verdict on the law before the 2020 elections.”

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