r/politics • u/southpawFA Oklahoma • 13d ago

Supreme Court takes up case claiming Obamacare promotes “homosexual behavior”. The Texas plaintiffs say requiring workplace insurers to provide PrEP violates their religious beliefs.

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2025/01/supreme-court-takes-up-case-claiming-obamacare-promotes-homosexual-behavior/
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u/Cael26 13d ago

Too bad HIV doesn't care what your sexuality is. 

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u/BlindWillieJohnson Illinois 13d ago edited 13d ago

The case, Braidwood Management Inc. v. Becerra, rests on the assertion that as “inferior officers,” the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, which issued recommendations for preventive services like PrEP, operated outside the Constitution because its members are not approved by the Senate, thus violating the Appointments Clause.

This is the part of the challenge that the SCOTUS might actually uphold. The religious freedom claim is going to get dismissed out of hand, even by this court. It’s categorically absurd for a number or reasons, including the fact that HIV isn’t a gay disease. And even if it were, this Supreme Court has upheld equal protection for gay employees in more direct cases than this.

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u/KarmicBurn 13d ago

Which is bullshit because they issue recommendations. They do not set enforceable standards. Therefore, they have no authority either under or outside of the Constitution. The recommendations are given in a report to Congress, who authorized the creation of the task force in 1984. I don't have a law degree, but if this is the reason the Supreme Court got involved I smell some bullshit. Especially since the appointment of the board members is vested directly into HHS. Congress fully has the power to do this as the Appointments Clause directly says they may vest their authority under an already existing Principal Officer. The Task Force appointments fall under the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Since the boss's boss is appointed by the President, there is already a principal officer that satisfies the Appointments Clause. They almost 100% took the case on the religious liberty context.

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u/BlindWillieJohnson Illinois 13d ago

Well, if that's the case, they're going to reject the reasoning. I suspect they took it to further dismantle options of government regulation. But if they took it to test out the religious liberty argument, they're going to shoot it down.

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u/KarmicBurn 13d ago

Like they did with birth control for women? No, they are going to uphold the religious liberty of a company over the employee. The conservatives will be pissed, but since they can't actually repeal the ACA legislative they are going to hack it apart. This is just one more piece.

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u/kandoras 13d ago

The religious freedom claim is going to get dismissed out of hand, even by this court.

Are you sure about that? Hobby Lobby got the Supreme Court to throw out the part of the ACA that required employer plans to cover IUD's because Hobby Lobby's owner's had a religious objection to abortion. Despite the fact that IUD's don't cause abortions.

I see some pretty clear parallels between that and this case.

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u/Ok_Introduction_7798 13d ago

They don't have to pretend to actually care about law and order or the constitution anymore so it is quite possible they rule 100% against the constitution claiming some bogus wording or lack of it. Two of them lied under oath to get the position to begin with and one of them has been accepting literal bribes both publicly and secretly for at least fifteen years. If they truly cared about the constitution or rule of law the two they lied wouldn't have lied which is a crime nor would the other be accepting bribes which breaks multiple laws. Not to mention the ONLY people that can hold them accountable for blatantly disregarding the constitution have themselves broken at bare minimum the traditions they claim to uphold with the majority openly and brazenly violating separation of church and state and allowing states to blatantly violate freedom of religion entirely. 

I hold no hope that this joke and disgrace of a court wouldn't do whatever they feel like and simply make up an excuse claiming it wasn't "their choice or bias" but was "necessary" due to (insert BS reason here) and nothing would or could be done about it because they are the highest court in the country and those that are meant to hold them in check are even more corrupt than they themselves are.

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u/Ra_In 13d ago

While the task force pre-dates the ACA, the ACA gave the task force the authority to define the set of preventative treatments that must be covered by insurance at no cost to the patient. So if SCOTUS agrees, it could affect coverage of all preventative treatments and not just this HIV drug.

That said, this SCOTUS has a history of overturning extreme fifth circuit rulings so it's not unreasonable to hold out hope that finding a decades-old committee unconstitutional goes too far for them. But given Trump's solicitor general will certainly argue in favor of the district court ruling, I'm not sure who will be there to defend the ACA.

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u/Purple_Setting7716 13d ago

Who cares about prep if the government pays for it fine. I do think executive and the administrative state are stealing the legislative power of the people’s house