Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/20-1263diff_868c.pdf
Page Number: 29

12 

GALLARDO v. MARSTILLER 

SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

section of the same Act, it is generally presumed that Con-
gress acts intentionally and purposely in the disparate in-
clusion or exclusion.’ ”  Russello v. United States, 464 U. S. 
16,  23  (1983).    This  is  unpersuasive.  Putting  aside  the
many  contextual  clues  that  support  Gallardo’s  reading  of 
the assignment provision, see supra, at 6–7, the presump-
tion  the  Court  cites  is  “ ‘strongest’  in  those  instances  in
which  the  relevant  statutory  provisions  were  ‘considered 
simultaneously when the language raising the implication
was inserted.’ ”  Gómez-Pérez v. Potter, 553 U. S. 474, 486 
(2008).  It  has  less  force  where,  as  here,  different  Con-
gresses  enacted  the  provisions  at  issue  over  the  course  of 
multiple decades.  The presumption is especially unhelpful
in this case because it cuts both ways: Since 1965, the anti-
lien provision has specified that a State may not impose a
lien against a beneficiary’s property “on account of medical 
assistance paid or to be paid on his behalf.”  §1396p(a)(1)
(emphasis  added).  Accepting  the  Court’s  logic,  Congress
should  have  required  an  assignment  that  unambiguously 
reached payments for both furnished and unfurnished care 
using  this  existing  “paid  or  to  be  paid”  language,  but  it 
failed to do so in the assignment provision.  See ante, at 11. 
Meanwhile, the Court fails to give due regard to the clear
textual limitations imposed by the Act as a whole.  For in-
stance, as to the assignment provision’s mirror image in the
insurer acceptance provision, see supra, at 7, the Court rea-
sons  that  the  latter’s  “narrower  focus  on  health  insurers, 
who typically pay only once medical services are rendered, 
explains  its  application  to  a  narrower  category  of  third-
party payments,” ante, at 10, n. 3.  This is beside the point.
In the assignment provision, Congress required beneficiar-
ies to assign certain rights to the State; in the insurer ac-
ceptance  provision,  it  required  insurers  to  accept  that  as-
signment.  It makes no sense that Congress would require
insurers  to  accept  only  a  sliver  of  the  mandatory  assign-
ment, regardless of how insurers typically pay.