Yet Another Supreme Court Setback for President Obama
By
Reid J. Epstein
People leave the Supreme Court in Washington on Thursday. —AP
It’s been a bad week for President Barack Obama at the Supreme Court.
The court’s 5-4 decision Monday to strike down another element of the Affordable Care Act – allowing “closely held” companies to decline to allow contraception coverage for employees – is the second major defeat for the White House since Thursday.
The decision in the Hobby Lobby case follows the court’s unanimous ruling last week that Mr. Obama exceeded his authority by making appointments to the National Labor Relations Board during a brief Senate break in 2012.
As a pair, the rulings play into Republicans’ 2014 sweet spot. Since the White House launched its campaign of executive actions earlier this year, Republicans have decried Mr. Obama as exceeding his authority – the cornerstone of the NLRB decision. And as gay marriage fades as a social issue most elected Republicans want to discuss, it has been replaced by a “religious liberty” argument that suits both social conservatives and Tea Partiers.
The Hobby Lobby case gets to both.
“The decision affirms that Americans, contrary to what the Obama Administration attempted to impose, have a right to live and work in accordance to their conscience and can’t be forced to surrender their religious freedom once they open a business,” Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas) said Monday.
Mr. Obama has suffered significant Supreme Court losses before. He so despised the Citizens United ruling that led to the unlimited political giving of the super PAC era so much that he famously chastised the justices during the 2010 State of the Union address.
But in the past two years the White House has been able to hang its hat on signature victories at the court: Obamacare was declared legal in 2012 and last year the court invalidated California’s gay marriage ban and declared married gay couples are entitled to federal benefits.
There was no such legal triumph for the White House this year. Democrats also found themselves on losing end of cases involving a buffer zone around abortion clinics in Massachusetts. The justices also removed a cap on individual political donations in a suit brought by Republicans.
The court did leave in place Environmental Protection Agency regulations on large power plants.
With Republican Sen. Thad Cochran‘s victory last week in Mississippi capping the early primary season, Monday’s ruling felt like the opening sequence to this November’s midterm elections. Republicans like Mr. Cruz declared it a landmark advance for religious freedom – a key issue for social conservatives as gay marriage recedes as an issue for elected Republicans.
“Today’s decision is a victory for religious freedom and another defeat for an administration that has repeatedly crossed constitutional lines in pursuit of its Big Government objectives,” said House Speaker John Boehner (R., Ohio).
And Democrats found themselves on the defensive, trying to use the court’s ruling to bolster their “war on women” narrative.
“If the Supreme Court will not protect women’s access to health care, then Democrats will,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.). “We will continue to fight to preserve women’s access to contraceptive coverage and keep bosses out of the examination room.”
