Today, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the highly anticipated case King v. Burwell.
After the 85-minute long arguments, Hans von Spakovsky, senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, spoke to The Daily Signal on the steps of the high court to provide an analysis of the proceedings.
The Supreme Court is examining whether the Obama administration can grant subsidies to those enrolling in the Affordable Care Act’s federal exchange. As it’s written, the law states that only states operating their own exchanges are eligible for the tax credits. However, the IRS issued a ruling extending those subsidies to include the 34 states selling insurance through the federal exchange.
In his analysis, von Spakovsky discussed the questions the nine justices asked of Michael Carvin, attorney for the plaintiffs, and Donald Verrilli, solicitor general and attorney for the federal government.
“[Carvin] had very quick answers to even the toughest questions he was being asked,” he said. “I thought that the solicitor general, Donald Verrilli, was really trying to paddle uphill because he was constantly trying to get the court away from a plain interpretation of the statue, which is pretty clear. And that is the big weakness of the government’s case.”
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