Justice Department move on health law has risks for GOP
The Trump administration’s decision to stop defending in court the Obama health law’s popular protections for consumers with pre-existing conditions could prove risky for Republicans in the midterm elections — and nudge premiums even higher. The Justice Department said in a court filing late Thursday that it will no longer defend key parts of the Affordable Care Act, beginning with the unpopular requirement that people carry health insurance, but also including widely-supported provisions that guarantee access for people with medical problems and limit what insurers can charge older, sicker adults. Friday, the insurance industry warned in stark terms of “harm that would come to millions of Americans” if such protections are struck down, causing premiums “to go even higher for older Americans and sicker patients.” Weighing in on a Texas challenge to the health law, the Justice Department argued that legally and practically the popular consumer protections cannot be separated from the unpopular insurance mandate, which Congress has repealed, effective next year. That argument is likely to be lost on consumers, said Robert Blendon, a polling expert at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health — particularly in the heat of an election that will determine control of Congress. “The pre-existing condition thing is what the ads will be run on,” said Blendon. “Pre-existing conditions have gotten to be an issue that people walking on the streets understand … it’s very emotional.” Some Democratic politicians didn’t waste much time. “Democrats will not allow Republicans to get away with quietly trying to strip away pre-existing conditions protections for millions of Americans through a legal backdoor,” said Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., a spokesman for his party on health care. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York urged President Donald Trump to reverse the decision. Administration officials at the departments of Health and Human Services and Treasury would not comment, instead pointing to the Justice Department filing, which said other parts of the health law would continue to stand, including its Medicaid expansion covering about 12 million low-income people. HHS and Treasury administer the health law’s coverage and subsidies. Loosening the health law’s rules on pre-existing conditions and on charging more to older adults is a key goal for the Trump administration. Partly that’s because those consumer protections also raise premiums across the board, as the cost of covering the sick is spread among all customers, including healthier people who previously benefited from lower rates. Indeed, people who pay the full cost of their individual health plans and aren’t eligible for subsidies under the health law have been clamoring for relief from several years of double-digit premium increases. Economist Gail Wilensky, who’s advised Republicans, said she’s not sure about the timing of the administration’s action. “You can definitely assume Democrats will use it to whip up their side,” said Wilensky, administrator of Medicare under former President George H.W. Bush. “For the people not affected by the ACA, or not particularly supportive, I don’t know that it will matter much.” The issues in the court case are unlikely to be resolved quickly, but some experts said the added uncertainty could prompt insurers to seek higher premiums in 2019 for health plans sold to individuals. “Insurance companies hate uncertainty, and when they face uncertainty they tend to increase premiums and hedge their bets,” said Larry Levitt of the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation. America’s Health Insurance Plans, the main industry trade group, bemoaned the Justice Department’s stance, saying it could upset a market that is becoming “more steady” for most consumers. “Zeroing out the individual mandate penalty should not result in striking important consumer protections,” the group said. It will lead to “renewed uncertainty in the individual market” and a “patchwork of requirements in the states” and make it more challenging to offer coverage next year. The lawsuit, filed in February by Texas and other GOP-led states, is in many ways a replay of the politically divided litigation that ended with the Supreme Court upholding the health care overhaul in 2012. In this case, California is leading a group of Democrat-led states in defending the law. The Trump administration’s stance is a rare departure from the Justice Department’s practice of defending federal laws in court. Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a letter to Congress that Trump, who campaigned on repealing the law and nearly did so his first year in office, approved the legal strategy. Donald Verrilli Jr., President Barack Obama’s top Supreme Court lawyer who defended the law, called the decision “a sad moment.” “I find it impossible to believe that the many talented lawyers at the department could not come up with any arguments to defend the ACA’s insurance market reforms, which have made such a difference to millions of Americans,” Verrilli said. Shortly before the government’s court filing Thursday, three career lawyers at the Justice Department withdrew from the case and were replaced by two political appointees, according to court filings. Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
Benghazi takes center-stage with Hillary Clinton testimony
To congressional Republicans, “Benghazi” is shorthand for incompetence and cover-up. Democrats hear it as the hollow sound of pointless investigations targeting presidential front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton. It is, in fact, a Mediterranean port city in Libya that was the site of two attacks within hours of each other on a U.S. compound on the 11th anniversary of 9/11 and into the next day. The attacks killed Chris Stevens, the U.S. ambassador to Libya, and three other Americans. That’s nearly all that U.S. politicians can agree on about Benghazi. It’s been a political rallying cry since just weeks before President Barack Obama‘s re-election in November 2012. With the House investigation likely to continue into next year, Benghazi will remain a buzz word for the 2016 presidential race. Clinton’s testimony at a widely anticipated public hearing on Thursday could make or break the credibility of the inquiry led by Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C. A guide to the controversy: — SETTING THE SCENE The 2011 revolt that deposed and killed Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi, with the help of NATO warships and planes, began in Benghazi. A year later, the city of 1 million remained chaotic, in the grip of heavily armed militias and Islamist militants, some with links to al-Qaida. The temporary U.S. diplomatic mission, created to build ties and encourage stability and democracy, was struck by homemade bombs twice in the spring of 2012. British diplomats, the Red Cross and other Westerners were targeted that spring and summer. Stevens, based in the capital city of Tripoli, chose to visit Benghazi on the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, when U.S. embassies around the world were on alert for terrorism. In Egypt that day, a different sort of trouble struck. Protesters angry about an anti-Muslim video made in America stormed the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, clambering over the walls and setting flags on fire. Hours later, the assault in Benghazi began. — A FIERY ASSAULT AND FOUR DEATHS The Benghazi attacks came in three waves, spread over eight hours at two locations. According to accounts from congressional investigators and the State Department’s Accountability Review Board: Around 9:40 p.m. local time, a few attackers scaled the wall of the diplomatic post and opened the front gate, allowing dozens of armed men in. Local Libyan security guards fled. A U.S. security officer shepherded Stevens and Sean Smith, a State Department communications specialist, into a fortified “safe room” in the main building. Attackers set the building and its furniture on fire. Stevens and Smith were overcome by blinding, choking smoke that prevented security officers from reaching them. Libyan civilians found Stevens in the wreckage hours later and took him to a hospital, where he, like Smith, died of smoke inhalation. Stevens was the first U.S. ambassador to be killed in the line of duty in more than 30 years. A security team from the CIA annex about a mile away arrived to help about 25 minutes into the attack, armed only with rifles and handguns. The U.S. personnel fled with Smith’s body back to the annex in armored vehicles. Hours after the first attack ended, the annex was twice targeted by early morning mortar fire. The second round killed Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty, two CIA security contractors who were defending the annex from the rooftop. A team of six security officials summoned from Tripoli and a Libyan military unit helped evacuate the remaining U.S. personnel on the site to the airport and out of Benghazi. — THE FALLOUT BACK HOME Word hit Washington in the final weeks of the presidential race. Over the next several days, the Benghazi news blended with images of angry anti-American demonstrations and flag-burnings spreading across the Middle East over the offensive video. Political reaction to the Benghazi attack quickly formed along partisan lines that hold fast to this day. GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney and other Republicans said Obama had emboldened Islamic extremists by being weak against terrorism. But the public still credited Obama with the successful strike against al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden a few months earlier in Pakistan. The accusation that took hold was a Republican charge that the White House intentionally misled voters by portraying the Benghazi assault as one of the many protests over the video, instead of a calculated terrorist attack under his watch. Obama accused the Republicans of politicizing a national tragedy. He insists that the narrative about the video protests was the best information available at the time. After at least seven investigations, more than a dozen public hearings and the release of more than 50,000 pages of documents over the past three years, the arguments remain the same. — WHY WAS DIPLOMATIC POST SO VULNERABLE? Republican and Democratic lawmakers agreed: The State Department under Clinton kept open the Benghazi mission, which employed a few State employees and more than two dozen CIA workers, with little protection in the midst of well-known dangers. The attack probably could have been prevented if officials had heeded intelligence warnings about the deteriorating situation in eastern Libya, a bipartisan report by the Senate Intelligence Committee said. Britain closed its Benghazi mission in June 2012, after an attack on the British ambassador’s convoy. Stevens’ requests for more security, made clear in cables to State Department headquarters during July and August, went unheeded, according to the Senate report, as did those made by his predecessor earlier that year. But Stevens also twice declined the U.S. military’s offer of a special operations team to bolster security and otherwise help his staff. The month after the fatal assault, Clinton declared she had been responsible for the safety of those serving in Benghazi, without acknowledging any specific mistakes on her part. Obama said the blame ultimately rested on his shoulders as president. The administration continued to distance both of them, however, saying neither Clinton nor Obama was aware of the requests for better protection because security decisions were handled at lower levels. Four senior
