Administration May Not Enforce Obamacare Penalty/Tax If People Can’t Sign Up

October 22nd, 2013

A possible preview of things to come:

The health care reform law, known as the Affordable Care Act, may provide President Barack Obama’s administration with a way to shield people from the law’s individual mandate tax penalties, White House press secretary Jay Carney hinted Monday.

“The law is clear that if you do not have access to affordable health insurance then you will not be asked to pay a penalty,” Carney told reporters after Obama addressed the ongoing technological difficulties hampering enrollment into insurance viaHealthCare.gov.

There could be another way out. The Affordable Care Act includes language providing the administration with broad authority to specify who can avoid the mandate because of hardship, which the law describes as “an individual eligible for a hardship exemption, such information as the Secretary shall prescribe.”

Carney suggested as much Monday: “The law makes clear that people who do not have access to affordable care due to a state not expanding Medicaid or other factors will not be penalized.”

So would this be the President cutting taxes?