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 The justices turned away appeals brought by private insurers Maine
Community Health Options, Community Health Choice Inc and Common
Ground Healthcare Cooperative.
The insurers had said they were collectively owed millions of
dollars for each year they did not receive payments the government
had pledged to make under the 2010 law, formally called the
Affordable Care Act. Litigation will now continue in lower courts
over how much the insurers can claim.
The Supreme Court left in place an August 2020 ruling by the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that the insurers'
reimbursement for money owed could be offset by other income they
received from the government in the form of premium tax credits.
The Supreme Court in an 8-1 ruling in April 2020 in a related case
decided that the federal government must "honor its obligations" and
pay various private insurers up to $12 billion owed to them.
That ruling concerned payments to the insurers via the law's
so-called risk corridor program designed to mitigate insurers' risks
from 2014 to 2016, when they sold coverage to previously uninsured
people through exchanges established under Obamacare.
The latest case was related to a separate Obamacare provision that
requires the government to reimburse insurers for cost-sharing
payments such as deductibles and co-payments. The administration of
former President Donald Trump announced in 2017 that it would cease
making the payments.
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 Unlike other litigation
involving Obamacare - long targeted by
Republicans for repeal in Congress or
invalidation through the courts - this case
concerned only payments to insurers and did not
directly challenge the law itself.
The court in a 7-2 ruling last Thursday rejected
a Republican challenge to the law, the third
time that the justices preserved Obamacare over
the past decade.
The law has enabled millions of Americans who
previously had no medical coverage to obtain
insurance, including those with pre-existing
medical conditions, though an expansion of the
Medicaid program for the poor and though private
insurers.
(This story corrects to refer to cost-sharing
provision of law, not risk corridor program,
paragraphs 6-7)
(Reporting by Lawrence Hurley; Editing by Will
Dunham)
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