Supreme Court Sides With Obamacare Yet Again

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The original Obamacare legislation created something called “risk corridors,” which guaranteed insurers certain payments if they lost money on the exchanges. Republicans have been trying ever since to cut off the payments, arguing that they were never appropriated. The insurers, conversely, argue that they joined the exchanges in good faith, assuming that the word of the federal government was sufficient to guarantee them payment if they suffered unexpected losses.

Today the Supreme Court ruled that Obamacare should be allowed to work as intended. That’s good news. The better news is that the ruling was 8-1, with only Samuel Alito dissenting. Perhaps I’m being overly optimistic here, but this might signal that the Court is getting tired of endless challenges to Obamacare. If that’s the case, it means they’re likely to toss out the ridiculous challenge being brought by Republican governors later this year. They claim that the individual mandate penalty can no longer be considered a tax because Congress zeroed it out in 2017 and you can’t have a zero tax. The governors go on to argue that if it’s not a tax, then the mandate is unconstitutional; and if the mandate is unconstitutional then the entire act is unconstitutional.

Aside from everything else, the patent absurdity of Congress being able to yo-yo between constitutional and unconstitutional simply by passing changes to a tax rate should give everyone pause. And perhaps it will.

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Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

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And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

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