Legal experts indicate that the ACA is likely to survive but a ruling may not occur until spring 2021.
If the US Supreme Court decides to overturn the Affordable Care Act (ACA), health insurance plan coverage among Californians could face the biggest risk in the country.
Millions of people across the state rely on billions in federal funds to afford their policies.
The state has implemented a spectrum of forms of health insurance plan coverage and programs since Obamacare went into place. These include initiatives that expand well beyond the federal Affordable Care Act. That said, if the ACA is overturned, it would pull the legs out from under the system currently in place.
“We have made great strides, and we don’t want to go back,” said non-profit Insure the Uninsured Project executive director Katie Heidorn. “This is real and we have to get our ducks in a row.”
The Supreme Court has been hearing arguments in the case known as California v. Texas. In it, with the support of President Donald Trump and his administration, Texas and 18 Republican attorneys general argue that the ACA is unconstitutional. They state that the reason for it being unconstitutional is that it would not exist without the tax penalty component of its individual mandate which makes health coverage a requirement.
This risks the California health insurance plan coverage millions have come to rely upon for care.
The Republican-controlled Congress took aim at the tax penalty from the individual mandate as a component of its 2017 tax bill. At that time, the Republican attorneys general called both the individual mandate and the remainder of the ACA unconstitutional.
California Attorney General Xavier Becerra is at the head of the defense of the ACA and says the healthcare law would still be capable of standing even without the individual mandate.
Legal experts have stated that its unlikely that the Supreme Court will make a ruling until spring 2021 at the earliest. That said, this could result in the striking down of the entire law, or it may leave certain components intact, such as the capacity for states to expand their Medicaid programs to more adults. That Medicaid expansion 
has brought health insurance plan coverage to approximately 12 million Americans. The justices may also decide to uphold the current version of the law.
