Kavanaugh Has His Most Important Meeting yet for the Supreme Court

Judge Brett Kavanaugh met with Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia for 90 minutes Monday, his first private interview with a Democratic lawmaker since his nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Manchin, who is standing for re-election this November in a state President Donald Trump won by 40 percentage points, pressed the judge on health care, as another challenge to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) advances through federal courts.

“Judge Kavanaugh and I had a productive meeting and talked about his experience, record and a variety of issues that will impact West Virginians, including his views on healthcare,” Manchin said after the interview. He noted another challenge to the ACA is currently advancing through the federal courts, which could imperil insurance coverage for some 800,000 of his constituents with pre-existing conditions.

Kavanaugh’s record with the ACA is somewhat complex. He was openly hostile to the law’s contraception mandate in a 2015 decision, arguing it placed a substantial burden on the rights of religious dissenters. However, in a 2011 opinion he declined to strike the ACA down, instead finding that the case before him should be dismissed for technical reasons.

In arguing for dismissal, Kavanaugh maintained that the ACA’s individual mandate — which requires people to obtain health insurance or pay a penalty — qualified as a tax for purposes of a federal law called the Anti-Injunction Act. One year later, a five-justice majority on the Supreme Court also concluded the mandate was a tax, but on different grounds than Kavanaugh. (Read more from “Kavanaugh Has His Most Important Meeting yet for the Supreme Court” HERE)

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