Two federal district courts recently issued injunctions on the final rules providing exemptions from the ACA’s contraceptive mandate. As background, the ACA requires most employers to provide certain preventive services, including contraceptive services and items, without cost-sharing. Under the ACA, certain qualifying religious employers were already exempt from the contraceptive coverage requirement, and other employers that held religious objections could also request an exemption via an accommodation process.
However, in October 2017, HHS published two interim final rules that significantly expanded the religious exemption (as outlined in our Oct. 17, 2017, article here) by allowing any employer (including non-closely held companies and publicly traded companies) to claim a religious or moral objection to offering certain contraceptive items and services. The government went on to issue final versions of the rules (as outlined in our Nov. 13, 2018, article here).
Following the publication of the interim final rules, a number of states filed lawsuits, challenging the new exemptions. They argued that the DOL had failed to follow the Administrative Procedures Act (APA) and that the new exemptions would harm their state residents and run afoul of the ACA. The federal district courts in Pennsylvania and California initially issued injunctions blocking enforcement of the interim final rules.
After government appeals, the courts again chose to enjoin the enforcement of the final rules. Specifically, on Jan. 13, 2019, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California enjoined the implementation of the final rules in the states of California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, and Washington and the District of Columbia. In its decision, the court agreed that the states could succeed on their claims that the final rules violated the ACA and APA.
On Jan. 14, 2019, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania issued an injunction that blocks implementation of the final rules nationwide. The Pennsylvania court also found that the states that filed (Pennsylvania and New Jersey) are likely to prevail on their claim that the final rules violate the APA.
We expect the government to continue to appeal these decisions, and it is also likely that the filing states will do the same should an appeals court rule in the government’s favor. Ultimately this means that the future of these exemptions remains uncertain. For employers, neither the court decisions nor the final rules settle the issue. As such, employers wishing to claim any expanded religious exemptions to the ACA’s contraceptive mandate should work with outside counsel to better understand the risks inherent in going forward with doing so.
Source: NFP BenefitPartners
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