Common Ground Healthcare Coop. v. United States

• Decision Date: 15 February 2019
• Docket Number: No. 17-877C,17-877C
• Parties: COMMON GROUND HEALTHCARE COOPERATIVE, Plaintiff, v. THE UNITED STATES, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. Claims Court

COMMON GROUND HEALTHCARE COOPERATIVE, Plaintiff, v. THE UNITED STATES, Defendant.

No. 17-877C

United States Court of Federal Claims

February 15, 2019

Affordable Care Act; Cost-Sharing Reduction Payments; 42 U.S.C. § 18071; Motion for Summary Judgment, RCFC 56; Motion to Dismiss, RCFC 12(b)(6)

Stephen Swedlow, Chicago, IL, for plaintiff.

Christopher J. Carney, United States Department of Justice, Washington, DC, for defendant.

OPINION AND ORDER

SWEENEY, Chief Judge

Plaintiff Common Ground Healthcare Cooperative contends, for itself and on behalf of those similarly situated, that the federal government ceased making the cost-sharing reduction payments to which it and other insurers are entitled under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act ("Affordable Care Act"), Pub. L. No. 111-148, 124 Stat. 119 (2010), and its implementing regulations. Currently before the court are plaintiff's motion for summary judgment and defendant's cross-motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. For the reasons set forth below, the court finds that plaintiff is entitled to recover the unpaid cost-sharing reduction reimbursements. Therefore, it grants plaintiff's motion and denies defendant's motion.

I. BACKGROUND

A. The Affordable Care Act

Congress enacted the Affordable Care Act as part of a comprehensive scheme of health insurance reform.¹ See generally King v. Burwell, 135 S. Ct. 2480 (2015). Specifically, the Act includes "a series of interlocking reforms designed to expand coverage in the individual health insurance market." Id. at 2485. In conjunction with these reforms, the Act provided for the establishment of an American Health Benefit Exchange ("exchange") in each state by January 1, 2014, to facilitate the purchase of "qualified health plans" by individuals and small businesses. 42 U.S.C. §§ 18031, 18041 (2012); accord King, 135 S. Ct. at 2485 (describing an exchange as "a marketplace that allows people to compare and purchase insurance plans"). Qualified health plans can be offered at four levels (bronze, silver, gold, and platinum) that differ based on how much of a plan's benefits an insurer must cover under the plan.² 42 U.S.C. § 18022(d)(1).

Among the reforms included in the Affordable Care Act were two aimed at ensuring that individuals have access to affordable insurance coverage and health care: the premium tax credit enacted in section 1401 of the Act, 26 U.S.C. § 36B (2012), and the cost-sharing reduction program enacted in section 1402 of the Act, 42 U.S.C. § 18071. "The premium tax credits and the cost-sharing reductions work together: the tax credits help people obtain insurance, and the cost-sharing reductions help people get treatment once they have insurance." California v. Trump, 267 F. Supp. 3d 1119, 1123 (N.D. Cal. 2017).

1. Premium Tax Credit

The first of these two reforms, the premium tax credit, is designed to reduce the insurance premiums paid by individuals whose household income is between 100% and 400% of the poverty line. See 26 U.S.C. § 36B(c)(1)(A); 42 U.S.C. § 18082(c)(2)(B)(i); accord 26 C.F.R. § 1.36B-2(a) to (b) (2017); 45 C.F.R. § 156.460(a)(1) (2017). The Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services ("Secretary of HHS") is required to determine whether individuals enrolling in qualified health plans on an exchange are eligible for the premium tax credit and, if so, to notify the Secretary of the United States Department of the Treasury ("Treasury Secretary") of that fact. 42 U.S.C. § 18082(c)(1). The Treasury Secretary, in turn, is required to make periodic advance payments of the premium tax credit to the insurers offering the qualified health plans in which the eligible individuals enrolled. Id. § 18082(c)(2)(A). The insurers are required to use these advance payments to reduce the premiums of the eligible individuals. Id. § 18082(c)(2)(B)(i); see also 26 U.S.C. § 36B(f) (describing the process forannually reconciling an individual's actual premium tax credit with the advance payments of the credit). To fund the premium tax credit, Congress amended a preexisting permanent appropriation to allow for the payment of refunds arising from the credit. See 31 U.S.C. § 1324 (2012) ("Necessary amounts are appropriated . . . for refunding internal revenue collections as provided by law . . . . Disbursements may be made from the appropriation made by this section only for . . . refunds due from credit provisions of [26 U.S.C. § 36B].").

2. Cost-Sharing Reductions

The other reform, cost-sharing reductions, is designed to reduce the out-of-pocket expenses (such as deductibles, copayments, and coinsurance³) paid by individuals whose household income is between 100% and 250% of the poverty line. See 42 U.S.C. §§ 18022(c)(3), 18071(c)(2); accord 45 C.F.R. §§ 155.305(g), 156.410(a). Insurers offering qualified health plans are required to reduce eligible individuals' cost-sharing obligations by specified amounts,⁴ 42 U.S.C. § 18071(a), and the Secretary of HHS is required to reimburse the insurers for the cost-sharing reductions they make, see id. § 18071(c)(3)(A) ("[T]he Secretary [of HHS] shall make periodic and timely payments to the issuer equal to the value of the reductions.").

The Secretary of HHS is afforded some discretion in the timing of the reimbursements: once he determines which individuals are eligible for cost-sharing reductions, he must notify the Treasury Secretary "if an advance payment of the cost-sharing reductions . . . is to be made to the issuer of any qualified health plan" and, if so, the time and amount of such advance payment. Id. § 18082(c)(3). Pursuant to this authority, the Secretary of HHS established a reimbursement schedule by which the government "would make monthly advance payments to issuers to cover projected cost-sharing reduction amounts, and then reconcile those advance payments at the end of the benefit year to the actual cost-sharing reduction amounts." Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act; HHS Notice of Benefit and Payment Parameters for 2014, 78 Fed. Reg. 15,410, 15,486 (Mar. 11, 2013) (to be codified at 45 C.F.R. § 156.430); see also 45 C.F.R. § 156.430(b)(1) ("A [qualified health plan] issuer will receive periodic advance payments [for cost sharing reductions]."). The amount of the cost-sharing reduction payments owed to insurers is based on information provided to HHS by the insurers. See 45 C.F.R. § 156.430(c) (requiring insurers to report to HHS, "for each policy, the total allowed costs for essential health benefits charged for the policy for the benefit year, broken down by . . . (i) [t]he amount the [insurer]paid[,] (ii) [t]he amount the enrollee(s) paid[, and] (iii) [t]he amount the enrollee(s) would have paid under the standard plan without cost-sharing reductions").

The Affordable Care Act did not include any language appropriating funds to make the cost-sharing reduction payments.

3. Requirements for Insurers

To offer a health insurance plan on an exchange in any given year—and become eligible to receive payments for the premium tax credit and cost-sharing reductions—an insurer must satisfy certain requirements established by the Secretary of HHS. See, e.g., 42 U.S.C. § 18041(a)(1) (authorizing the Secretary of HHS to "issue regulations setting standards for meeting the requirements under [title I of the Affordable Care Act] with respect to—(A) the establishment and operation of Exchanges . . . ; (B) the offering of qualified health plans through such Exchanges; . . . and (D) such other requirements as the Secretary determines appropriate"). The requirements include (1) obtaining certification that any plan it intends to offer is a qualified health plan, see, e.g., 45 C.F.R. §§ 155.1000, .1010, 156.200; and (2) submitting rate and benefit information before the open enrollment period for the applicable year, see, e.g., id. §§ 155.1020, 156.210. In addition, in most circumstances, insurers must make their qualified health plans available on the exchanges for the entire year for which the plans were certified. 45 C.F.R. § 156.272(a).

B. Termination of Cost-Sharing Reduction Payments

On April 10, 2013, before the exchanges opened for business, President Barack H. Obama submitted to Congress his budget for fiscal year 2014. See Office of Mgmt. & Budget, Exec. Office of the President, Fiscal Year 2014 Budget of the United States Government to Congress (2013). The budget included a request for a line-item appropriation for cost-sharing reduction payments. See id. at App. 448; accord Ctrs. for Medicare & Medicaid Servs., Dep't of Health & Human Servs., Fiscal Year 2014 Justification of Estimates for Appropriations Committees 184 (2013). However, Congress did not provide the requested appropriation. See Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2014, Pub. L. No. 113-76, 128 Stat. 5; see also S. Rep. No. 113-71, at 123 (2013) ("The Committee recommendation does not include a mandatory appropriation, requested by the administration, for reduced cost sharing assistance . . . as provided for in sections 1402 and 1412 of the [Affordable Care Act]."). In fact, it is undisputed by the parties that Congress has never specifically appropriated funds to reimburse insurers for their cost-sharing reductions.⁵ It is further undisputed that Congress has never (1) expressly prevented—in an appropriations act or otherwise—the Secretary of HHS or the Treasury Secretary from expending funds to make cost-sharing reduction payments or (2) amended the Affordable Care Act to eliminate the cost-sharing reduction payment obligation.

Although Congress did not specifically appropriate funds for cost-sharing reduction payments, the Obama administration began making advance payments to insurers for cost-sharing reductions in January 2014. See Ctrs. for Medicare & Medicaid Servs., Dep't of Health & Human Servs., Guidance Related to Reconciliation of the Cost-Sharing Reduction Component of Advance Payments for Benefit Years 2014 and 2015...