White House boasts 11.4 million now enrolled in Obamacare

WASHINGTON — To hear the White House tell it, 11.4 million Americans can’t be wrong.

President Obama trumpeted the success of his signature healthcare law today (Feb 18), r eleasing a video on Facebook that boasted that 11.4 million people who have signed up or re-enrolled in Obamacare in 2015. Sunday marked the latest deadline for Americans to sign up in an open enrollment period for coverage under the Affordable Care Act.

“The Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, is working. It’s working better than we anticipated, certainly working a lot better than many of the critics talked about early on,” Obama said in the video shot in the Oval Office featuring the president and Health and Human Services secretary Sylvia Burwell.

While the number of people signed up for healthcare under the Affordable Care Act has given the White House reason to celebrate, the administration has reason to worry about whether the news will remain positive for Obamacare. With the April 15 tax deadline approaching, an estimated 6 million Americans are expected to to face a penalty for not enrolling in a healthcare plan. While last year’s penalty starts at US$95 (S$129), it will rise this year to $325.

Even more troubling for the healthcare law, the Supreme Court will soon begin hearing arguments in the King v. Burwell case, which will decide the ultimate fate of the program’s federal subsidies. If the court rules the subsidies unconstitutional, millions of Americans will lose their insurance and costs are expected to skyrocket. BLOOMBERG