On July 27, 2021, Ha Kung Wong was quoted in Westlaw Journal Employment on the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the Affordable Care Act’s requirement that most people have a minimum amount of health insurance coverage.
According to the article, in a 7-2 opinion issued on June 17, 2021, Justice Stephen Breyer said Texas and 17 other states, as well as two individuals, could not show they had suffered an injury attributable to the individual mandate, since Congress set the penalty for noncompliance at $0. The high court thus reversed a Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that the mandate is unconstitutional.
“It appears the Supreme Court believes substantive issues surrounding the ACA as a whole should be addressed via legislation. However, it’s yet to be seen whether more targeted attacks, like Kelley v. Becerra, will be successful on constitutional grounds,” said Wong.