| California v. Texas Texas v. California | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Argued November 10, 2020 Decided June 17, 2021 | |
| Full case name | California, et al. v. Texas, et al.; Texas, et al. v. California, et al. |
| Docket nos. | 19-840 19-1019 |
| Citations | 593 U.S. 659 (more) |
| Case history | |
| Prior | |
| Holding | |
| Plaintiffs do not have standing to challenge §5000A(a)'s minimum essential coverage provision because they have not shown a past or future injury fairly traceable to defendants' conduct enforcing the specific statutory provision they attack as unconstitutional. | |
| Court membership | |
| |
| Case opinions | |
| Majority | Breyer, joined by Roberts, Thomas, Sotomayor, Kagan, Kavanaugh, Barrett |
| Concurrence | Thomas |
| Dissent | Alito, joined by Gorsuch |
| Laws applied | |
| Case or Controversy Clause, U.S. Const. Art. III | |
California v. Texas, 593 U.S. 659 (2021), was a United States Supreme Court case that dealt with the constitutionality of the 2010 Affordable Care Act (ACA), colloquially known as Obamacare. It was the third such challenge to the ACA seen by the Supreme Court since its enactment. The case in California followed after the enactment of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 and the change to the tax penalty amount for Americans without required insurance that reduced the "individual mandate" (26 U.S.C. § 5000A) to zero, effective for months after December 31, 2018.[1] The District Court of the Northern District of Texas concluded that this individual mandate was a critical provision of the ACA and that, with a penalty amount equal to zero, some or all of the ACA was potentially unconstitutional as an improper use of Congress's taxation powers.
Under the Donald Trump administration, the federal government had declined to challenge the lower court ruling, leading California and several other states to intervene and appeal the ruling, which the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals granted. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld the ruling that the individual mandate was unconstitutional, but determined that the mandate might be severable from the rest of the ACA. Both California and Texas petitioned review of the Fifth's decision to the Supreme Court; the Court consolidated both California v. Texas and Texas v. California under the same case.
In a 7–2 decision issued on June 17, 2021, the Supreme Court ruled that Texas and other states that initially challenged the individual mandate did not have standing, as they had not shown past or future injury related to the provision. The Supreme Court otherwise did not rule on the constitutionality of the individual mandate in this case.
- ^ Internal Revenue Code sec. 5000A(c)(2)(B)(iii), as amended by sec. 11081(a)(1) and (a)(2) of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, Pub. L. No. 115-97 (Dec. 22, 2017).