Obamacare Architect Claims SCOTUS Doesn't Understand Constitution Ahead of Ruling
IMAGE CREDITS: CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY IMAGES.
Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber emerged to defend his healthcare bill ahead of a Supreme Court ruling after it had been ruled “unconstitutional” by a Texas federal judge last week.
In a CNN appearance Monday, Gruber, who infamously said in 2013 that Obamacare’s passage depended on the “stupidity of the American voter,” claimed the US Supreme Court didn’t understand the Constitution as well as “Senate constitutional experts.”
“The Supreme Court clearly does not represent the constitutional expertise of the broad Senate constitutional experts, who for example in 2012 by about an 80 percent to 90 percent margin said the mandate was constitutional. Yet the Supreme Court found it wasn’t,” he said.
Fortunately, he said, the SCOTUS takes the American people’s opinion into account, and over 50% view the Affordable Care Act favorably.
“So I’m nervous. What’s fortunate is the Supreme Court I think does care about the opinion of the American people. The American people have spoken. They believe that protecting people with pre-existing conditions against insurance market discrimination is a key contribution of this law. And indeed it is.”
However, those that hold a favorable view of the healthcare legislation likely don’t understand it, as also iterated by Gruber in 2013 when he said that “lack of transparency is a huge political advantage.”
Gruber also lamented the removal of the individual mandate because it was the major funding mechanism of the law, but said Obamacare would still be able to survive without it.
“We have now basically been proven that it’s important but not as important as we thought because look, we now have experience of the law without it, they removed the mandate. And we are seeing it weakens the law, it raises premiums, but the law still remains quite strong, albeit not as strong as it would have been,” he said.
However, in 2016, Gruber claimed that Obamacare would do better if the individual mandate penalty was increased.
President Trump praised the Texas judge’s ruling Friday, urging Congress to come together to work on better healthcare legislation for the American people.