Supreme Court backs Obamacare contraception mandate religious exemption

  Back in 2017 Donald Trump expanded a rule allowing employers an exemption to the Obamacare contraception mandate for religious or moral reasons. This has been fought in the courts since it was announced back in 2017 and today the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the exemption. Here is more:

The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that employers with religious or moral objections do not have to help provide insurance coverage for contraceptives under the Affordable Care Act.

The ruling seeks to end a longstanding battle by the Little Sisters of the Poor and other religious groups that wanted no role in providing birth control coverage. It upholds a Trump administration policy allowing for both religious and moral exemptions.

“For over 150 years, the Little Sisters have engaged in faithful service and sacrifice, motivated by a religious calling to surrender all for the sake of their brother,” Thomas said. “But for the past seven years, they – like many other religious objectors who have participated in the litigation and rulemakings leading up to today’s decision – have had to fight for the ability to continue in their noble work without violating their sincerely held religious beliefs.”

  And this was a 7-2 decision with three of the courts liberal justices–John Roberts, Elena Kagan, and Stephen Breyer–siding with the four conservatives to hand Donald Trump this victory.

  However, while Elena Kagan agreed that Donald Trump has the authority to do this she said his reasoning might not have been sound and stated the case should again be referred back to the lower cases to adjudicate the reasoning.

Kagan argued in a separate opinion that the administration may not have used “reasoned decision-making” and may have swept too broadly in granting moral as well as religious exemptions. She left those questions for lower courts to resolve.

  She gave them the game plan to move forward with, I am sure we have not heard the end of this yet.

malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium