House Republicans have just filed a lawsuit against the Obama administration over the President’s executive actions related to Obamacare.
Two lawyers – including the one who first proposed suing President Barack Obama – have quit rather than pursue the case but this morning the House GOP has filed a lawsuit against not President Barack Obama but against the Obama administration. Jonathan Turley, a well-known attorney who often appears on CNN, will now lead the case. He was hired on Tuesday.
At the center of the case is the claim that the Obama administration exceeded its authority via executive actions in how it implemented Obamacare. Turley will have to prove both that the administration acted outside its legal authority, and that the House of Representatives has been harmed or damaged in order to win the case.
But first, the courts will have to grant standing to the House for the case to continue.
“The lawsuit — filed against the secretaries of the Health and Human Services and Treasury Departments — focuses on two crucial aspects of the way the administration has put the Affordable Care Act into effect,” the New York Times reports.
The suit accuses the Obama administration of unlawfully postponing a requirement that larger employers offer health coverage to their full-time employees or pay penalties. (Larger companies are defined as those with 50 or more employees.)
The suit also challenges what it says is President Obama’s unlawful giveaway of roughly $175 billion to insurance companies under the law. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the administration will pay that amount to the companies over the next 10 years, though the funds have not been appropriated by Congress. The lawsuit argues that it is an unlawful transfer of funds.
Democrats question why the GOP would sue the President for delaying implementation of a law they have voted 54 times to repeal.
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