The Courts

Oral arguments in the lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s expansion of short-term insurance plans may be delayed or canceled after a federal appeals court suspended arguments in all cases in light of the COVID-19 crisis.

A group of House Republicans blasted Democrats for refusing to move a legislative fix that would preserve the Affordable Care Act’s key preexisting conditions protections should the Supreme Court rule the individual mandate to be invalid along with the rest of the ACA.

The Supreme Court will review the latest challenge to the Affordable Care Act, Texas v. USA, stripping the case from a conservative district court and potentially setting up a battle over former President Barack Obama’s legacy achievement just prior to this year’s high-stakes election.

Federal immigration officials on Monday (Feb. 24) began enforcing new rules that will deny green cards and some visas to immigrants who are in poor health or deemed likely to rely on Medicaid.

The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments during the last week of April in two contentious health care cases -- one involving states’ attempts to regulate pharmacy benefit managers and the other involving the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive mandate.

A U.S. district court judge will let drug maker Lannett intervene in Genus Lifesciences’ lawsuit against FDA in which the company argues the agency violated Hatch-Waxman by reviewing and approving Lannett’s cocaine hydrochloride nasal solution, Numbrino, even after Genus had obtained exclusivity on its own cocaine hydrochloride solution, Goprelto.

A group of Democratic senators sent a letter to President Donald Trump Friday (Feb. 14) urging him to direct the Department of Justice to drop its support of the high-profile Texas v. United States case challenging the Affordable Care Act after he failed to offer up alternative policies protecting people with preexisting conditions in his $4.8 trillion budget released Feb. 10.

The Supreme Court signaled it will consider whether to take up the high-profile ACA case during its Feb. 21 conference as Democrats had repeatedly urged, leaving open the possibility the case could be decided this term if the high court opts to review it.

Idaho and health plans that are now selling the newly created enhanced short-term plans (ESTPs) are urging a federal appeals court to reject industry stakeholders’ calls to strike the administration’s short-term plan rule.