Dr. Hotze’s Landmark U.S. Supreme Case

The landmark challenge to ObamaCare by Steven F. Hotze, M.D., is scheduled for oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday morning, April 21, 2025. The case is styled Kennedy v. Braidwood Management Inc., No. 24-316. Dr. Hotze is the owner of Braidwood Management. Jonathan Mitchell, J.D., will be presenting the oral arguments in favor of Braidwood Management.

This is the culmination of a lawsuit that Dr. Hotze initially filed in 2020 in the Northern District of Texas, which attacks the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) preventive-care coverage mandates. Braidwood prevailed at the federal district court and in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.

ObamaCare, known as The Affordable Care Act, requires health insurers to cover “preventive health services” without any cost-sharing arrangements such as deductibles or co-pays. See 42 U.S.C. § 300gg-13(a). But the statute does not specify or delineate the preventive care that insurers must cover. Instead, it delegates this authority to the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, which is empowered to dictate and decree the preventive items and services that insurers must cover. See 42 U.S.C. § 300gg-13(a)(1).

Since the ACA’s enactment, the Task Force has issued numerous decrees that force private insurers to cover items and services without cost-sharing. In June of 2019, for example, the Task Force decided to require coverage of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) drugs such as Truvada and Descovy. These drugs must now be covered without any cost-sharing arrangements and are funded entirely by premiums paid by others, without any marginal costs imposed on the beneficiary.

The ObamaCare Task Force could mandate mifepristone, the chemical abortion drug, if Dr. Hotze’s lawsuit’s wins in lower courts were to be reversed by the Supreme Court.

Braidwood is arguing that the Task Force’s preventive-care coverage mandates are invalid because its members have not been constitutionally appointed as “officers of the United States.” The Appointments Clause in Article II of the Constitution requires “officers of the United States” to be appointed by the President with the Senate’s advice and consent. But the Task Force members were not appointed by the President and Senate; they were appointed by the Director of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ).

The government has conceded in response to this lawsuit that the Task Force members are “officers of the United States” and that they were unconstitutionally appointed by the AHRQ Director. But the government tried to rectify this problem by having then-Secretary Xavier Becerra reappoint the Task Force members and “ratify” the “prior appointments” that they had received from the AHRQ Director. The government also had Secretary Becerra produce a document purporting to adopt and ratify the preventive-care coverage mandates that the Task Force had previously recommended. Braidwood claims that these maneuvers do nothing to salvage the legality of the previously issued Task Force coverage mandates, and the Supreme Court will decide these issues after it hears oral argument on Monday, April 21st.

This case has enormous importance to any business that operates a self-insured health plan or purchases health insurance for its employees. The preventive-care coverage mandates imposed by the Task Force bind all self-insured plans. A victory at the Supreme Court would empower businesses to decide for themselves whether, and to what extent, they wish to cover preventive care in their self-insured plans, and whether they wish to impose cost-sharing arrangement such as co-pays or deductibles on beneficiaries to use this preventive care. A victory at the Supreme Court would also allow businesses with self-insured plans to opt out of covering preventive care that violates their religious beliefs. Many of the Task Force’s preventive-care coverage mandates force employers to subsidize unbiblical and irresponsible lifestyle choices.

Please pray, in Jesus’ name, for our attorney, Jonathan Mitchell, that he would give a powerful and persuasive argument in favor of this lawsuit. Pray also that God would turn the hearts of the Supreme Court justices in favor of this lawsuit.