Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal that would anger progressives in his own party. Up first, the Major Supreme Court decision with a giant impact on your health care, the new ruling is 72. It dismisses a challenge to the Affordable Care act. The decision leaves intact how millions of you pay for your doctors visits, pay for your Prescription Drugs, its the third challenge to the Health Care Law since president obama signed it and it is the third time a conservative tilted Supreme Court agreed to save it. Cnns joan joins us now. Reporter its very important for the millions of americans who depend on the Affordable Care act. Its important to the legacy of barack obama. Its important to the administration of joe biden. But its really important to the roberts court. Those two prior rulings, upholding the act, they were narrowly divided, 54, then 63 back in 2012 and 2015. This one is 72. Chief Justice John Roberts had a strong majority. He has signed it to Justice Steven briar who said that the challengers, that sued to try to get rid of the Affordable Care act had no legal standing to even bring a complaint. They had no injury. They were complaining that the individual Health Care Mandate that required people to obtain there was no longer any penalty. Congr congress zeroed out that penalty but what the court said again by just steven briar, the senior liberal on this court. There was no injury. Nobody was hurt, ruled on no other part of the case, just essentially said go home, were finished and again 72, thats a major headline for this court thats been so closely divided on obamacare. John . 72, a very big deal. Joan, appreciate you setting that up for us. And straight to the white house with cnns jeremy diamond. It was Vice President biden when this law was signed into action and now its President Biden saying thank you to the high court. Yeah, and it was then President Biden with that hot mic moment saying this was a big blanking deal, the white house fully using that term today as they react to this Supreme Court ruling, you see a tweet from the president a few moments ago calling this a big win for the American People and he also went on to say with millions of people relying on the Affordable Care act for coverage it remains a bfd, and its here to stay. That followed from the white house chief of staff. Saying its still a bfd. The white house is reappropriating and using that term in a new meaning today as they celebrate this victory at the Supreme Court. Imagine the scene we would have been seeing here today at the white house had the Supreme Court ruled the other way and struck down this law. The white house would be dealing with trying to find some kind of way to keep 21 Million People from losing their Health Insurance and not coming up with many good options. This administration, though, is not only celebrating this win, but also as you can see in that tweet there, using this as an opportunity to encourage more americans to continue signing up for the Affordable Care act, the Biden Administration had extended that special Enrollment Period and so theyre fully looking to capitalize on that as well. And also, very glad that they are this is not adding to their plate of issues that they are already dealing with, including that bipartisan Infrastructure Deal that is blooming on capitol hill. It gets complicated but just a little welcome home present for the president of the United States. From an unlikely source, a conservative Supreme Court. Jeremy, appreciate live reporting from the white house and with me in studio to share their reporting and insights, niamalika henderson, paul cain from the washington post, and Katherine Lucy of the wall street journal. This is a bf deal to follow the Vice President , now president s term. Obamacare has been the Driving Force in American Politics really since 2009 when it hassed. 2010 midterms obama loses the house. Gets reelected in 2012 and 2014 its part obamacare of the tea party movement. He loses the senate but then nancy pelosi is speaker today because it swung and chained so much. Why is this so important in the sense it takes obamacare off the table in 2022 . Yeah, i think youre its it shall youre not going to call it obamacare anymore. Youre just going to call it health care. Its the law of the land. Theyve now had three straight rulings at the Supreme Court over nine years, and the margin has only grown. Even as the courts gotten more conservative the margin supporting the law has grown. Republicans honestly, they dont want to talk about this anymore. They know its just not in their wheel house. Their voters dont really like it but they have no idea how to create a law that they can get enough support around and if they dont have control of the house and the senate now anyway, they want to move on and just get into other topics that, you know, both excite their base and try to win back some of those suburban voters that they lost in 2018 in part because they tried to gut this law without any way of how to replace it. We all lived through that in the early days of the Trump Administration where the house actually passed a plan and the president pulled the rug out of it. And President Trump pulled the rug of it. Obamacare passes in 2009, in 2010 it had a 46 favorable rating, 46 . But thats not a big number. In the sense of a big 50year legacy democratic initiative. Look at it now. It is overall popular when you move forward a decade. More importantly as paul noted. Republicans still dont like obamacare but if you look among independent voters. Republicans in competitive races dont want to touch this. Back in 2010 it was critical to them, only 36 of independents liked it. 55 favorable rating among independent voters. If youre a republican, running statewide in pennsylvania or in an ohio or in a suburban district somewhere thats competitive, you do not want this issue back on the table. We talk a lot about bipartisanship here, and how washington is doing with that, but certainly the bipartisan size of relief today on both sides of the aisle and youre right, republicans see the numbers, they know what they the issues that they want to talk about, next year, and increasingly, you know, weve just been through a pandemic. And a lot of americans were relying on this for health care. And imagine to jeremys point, imagine if the court had thrown this out. Yeah. Number one, you would have the burden on republicans but number two, President Bidens challenge managing the Democratic Party right now, getting to the specifics later, is quite difficult because of the diversity of the party. Can you imagine if obamacare was thrown out, and they had to start from scratch, and medicare for all progressives would have cede we have a plan, but thats right, we have a plan and we saw this debate right, in 2020, among the democratic primary folks who were trying to get the nomination. Single payer plan with progressives, thats what they want, people like Bernie Sanders and Kamala Harris back and forth and not really deciding which one she necessarily wanted, but that was the debate you would have, and i think Going Forward were going to have this debate anyway among democrats, the idea that the aca now, at one point, sort of a dream of democrats now is sort of the floor, right, and where do you build on it from there . That was the big debate in 2020, it will be the debate Going Forward. It is a great point in the sense that its now the floor, and how do you build on it . People dont like it, people who are controversial at the time, dont like it when you take it away. Kids on no preexisting conditions, other things you like about it. What does it tell us about the town in the sense that if you just look, to pauls point, the cement is drying or at least many legal scholars will tell you the cement is drying. 201254 decision. 2016 a 63 decision. This is a very conservative, the most conservative court to weigh in on this and theyre not weighing in on constitutional questions. Were done. This is the legacy of the trump court making this ruling, and that, plus the impact of health care on the 2018 midterms and on the 2020 president ial election i think really do cement this. Interesting side note that it is briar who was at the helm of this decision, hes 82 years old, will turn 83 later this summer and theres a lot of pressure among the progressive wing of the Democratic Party for him to retire, when i think of steven briar i dont think of individual Court Rulings that define him, i think of how he has used his role to define the judiciarys role in democracy, and kind of how american democracy functions. This could end up being a really important ruling to the extent that it cements health care essentially as a right and as an sb ent ent entitlement for the history of it, Justice Briar was a staff member for senator ted kennedy who fought for years for health care and helped obamacare get to the finish line in the later days in the senate and now Justice Briar the debate will continue. If you want to go inside that, a little Justice Briar saying hi, hi, you love me today, dont you . Again, its fascinating. Were still learning about the trump court, the first big term since Amy Coney Barrett is on the bench, Brett Kavanaugh is a relatively new member. They were among those who, you know, said, leave this in place. Again, if it were the first case, maybe they would have voted differently. Here it comes back again and they viewed the argument as you dont have standing. A Republican Attorney general is not affected by the individual mandate, per se, so they said go away. Its also, does the Supreme Court want to be in a position of taking away health care from 21 Million People in a pandemic . Were coming out of a pandemic but, you know, more people are on this than ever and we see the Favorability Ratings higher than ever as well, they are essentially saying if the legislature wants to do this, if the senate and the house and the republican president want to do this, sure, have at it and again weve seen what happened when they tried to do that. The role of barrett i think is significant here, you remember the fight, getting her on the court, one of the big warnings you heard from democrats is what will this mean for health care Going Forward . And today, this is as you say maybe this isnt the final word but its certainly a key moment. You see how shes ruled here today. We will have abortion right decisions and well talk in a few minutes about, another same Sex Discrimination issue and the issue of health care, this is andy slavitt, if you think about this, democrats fought for this for 50 years and then they finally passed it and spent a decade fighting over it again, in election after election, Court Challenge of court collage, he says game over. I think its great news for people who have been in a whirlwind over the last ten years being told to just be nervous that their coverage might be snatched from them at any moment. Americans have one more step towards a better country. There will be health care debates, some democrats still want medicare for all. Joe biden campaigned, you mentioned the primary, that was a Testing Issue early on, medicare for all or make obamacare better. This will continue. Bernie sanders who is the Senate BudgetCommittee Chairman is trying to Work Health Care pieces into this Budget Resolution that is mostly supposed to be about infrastructure. Some Human Infrastructure as nancy pelosi calls it but he wants to push on Prescription Drug issues, talking About Medicare expansion, things like that, and yeah were going to this is now the floor, and, you know, what do you build on top it . It will go on for years inside the Democratic Party because health care is an issue that they like to talk about, republicans basically dont like to talk about it except to complain about it, so thats where you stand, and, you know, we know what the floor is. Right, that is the biggest flip if you go back to the 2010 midterms to where we sit today this is an entirely different conversation than it was absolutely. Then and now. Up next, another big decision from the Supreme Court, why the justice decided with a Catholic Foster Agency that refused to work with same sex couples. Big rules from the Supreme Court right now, the justices say the City Of Philadelphia violated the First Amendment rights of a Catholic Foster Agency when the city froze a contract with the Catholic Social Services because the nonprofit refused to work with same sex couples looking to foster children. Help us explain what the court ruled and why this matters. Reporter this is june at the Supreme Court, all the biggies are coming. First of all, the chief justice, john roberts, was able to get a Unanimous Court for the basic principle that philadelphia could not stop Catholic Social Services from excluding same sex couples for their screening for foster care. The chief said that this violated the free exercise rights, because there had been exemptions in the law also for other kinds of situations like Marital Status and disability and there could have been a religious exemption here. But then heres the important part, john, three justices really wanted to go further in terms of benefiting religious interests, religious exemptions from general laws, and accommodations for religious believers. And those three were conservative, samuel alito, neal gorsuch and clarence thomas. The chief tried to write an opinion, certainly a loss for the City Of Philadelphia and a loss for same sex couples who wanted to be part of this. The one thing i should note, john, is that the chief did note that other social Services Agencies in philadelphia do screen samesex couples for foster care so theyre not being outright excluded from everything, and that was at least how he justified allowing Catholic Social Services to go that far. We just talked about the Supreme Court in the context of the Affordable Care act ruling and what does it tell us about this new trump centric, conservative centric court. Yeah, chief Justice John Roberts is very carefully trying to divide and conquer the trump justices because neil gorsuch went the other way here. He wanted to give much more of a religious accommodation, go stronger in terms of Supreme Court precedent for down the road in terms of favoring religious believers but justices Amy Coney Barrett and Brett Kavanaugh stuck with chief Justice John Roberts as did our liberal members of this court, justice alaina kagan signed onto this, as did Sonia Sotomayor and steven briar. There was some variation in the legal reasoning there but this decision showed that for now chief Justice John Roberts has not been overcome by the trump appointees in a very conserva