The Supreme Court ruling upholding a key part of President Barack Obama’s health care law probably will not be a significant factor in his chances of reelection, a Los Angeles-based analyst said today.
U.S. Supreme Court (Credit: leadingage.org)
“In all likelihood, this ruling probably isn’t going to have an impact on President Obama’s chances of reelection, given that the court largely upheld the law,” Dan Schnur, director of the Unruh Institute of Politics at USC, told City News Service.
“The true believers in both parties will find plenty here to talk about,” Schnur said. “For the next several days, both campaigns are going to have a lot to say. But after that, neither Obama nor (Mitt) Romney will have much incentive to talk about health care. The real issue is the economy.”
The court ruled that the mandate can stay as part of Congress’ power to tax.
As a matter of public policy, the ruling represents a victory for Los Angeles County’s uninsured population, said Dr. Mitchell Katz, L.A. County
director of health services, in the county’s formal reaction.
“As a result of today’s decision by the Supreme Court to uphold the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), over 80 percent of the 2.2 million people who are currently uninsured in Los Angeles County stand to gain access to affordable insurance coverage,” he said in a statement.
The ruling also received praise from California’s biggest nurses’ union in a statement from its San Dimas headquarters.
“This is not just an abstract legal decision. Real lives and the heartbreak of real families will be saved because of it. We’ve got more people in California dying each year because they don’t have health insurance than any other state in the country. But thanks to the Affordable Care Act, the vast majority of us will be covered,” said nurse Barbara Blake, secretary-treasurer of United Nurses Associations of California/Union of Health Care Professionals.
Democratic Southland politicians were delighted with the ruling.
“Today’s decision by the Supreme Court affirms the principle that access to affordable quality health care is a right, not a privilege,” said L.A. County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky. “It’s high time in our nation that everyman, woman and child have the opportunity to meet their health care
needs.”
Yaroslavsky said the county has been preparing for the act for the past two years. “With the Supreme Court decision behind us, we can turn our attention to full implementation of the law in 2014,” he said.
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