A bill to provide that the individual mandate under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act shall not be construed as a tax.

Bill: 113-s-560
Sponsor: full_name: Sen. Lee, Mike [R-UT]
Introduced: 2013-03-14
Policy area: Health
Subjects: Constitution and constitutional amendments

Health care costs and insurance

Health care coverage and access

Income tax rates
Latest action: action_date: 2013-03-14
text: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance.

Summaries:
action_date: 2013-03-14
action_desc: Introduced in Senate
text: <p>Amends the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA)&nbsp;to provide that&nbsp;provisions of such Act&nbsp;imposing a penalty&nbsp;for failure to purchase minimum&nbsp;essential health care coverage shall not be construed as imposing any tax or as an exercise of any power of Congress under the Constitution&nbsp;to impose a tax.&nbsp;Makes the effective date of the amendment made by this Act retroactive to the enactment date of PPACA.</p>

tv_txt: II 113th CONGRESS 1st Session S. 560 IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES March 14, 2013 Mr. Lee introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance A BILL To provide that the individual mandate under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act shall not be construed as a tax.

1. Findings Congress finds that on June 28, 2012, the Supreme Court ruled that the individual mandate imposed by section 1501 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act ( Public Law 111–148 ) and amended by section 10106 of such Act and sections 1002 and 1004 of the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010 ( Public Law 111–152 ), has certain functional characteristics of a tax and could be sustained as an exercise of Congress's power to tax under article I, section 8, clause 1 of the Constitution. 2. Classification of individual mandate as non-tax (a) In general Section 1501 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act ( Public Law 111–148 ) is amended by adding at the end the following new subsection: (e) Rule of construction Nothing in the amendments made by this section shall be construed as imposing any tax or as an exercise of any power of Congress enumerated in article I, section 8, clause 1 of, or the 16th amendment to, the Constitution. . (b) Effective date The amendment made by this section shall apply as if included in the enactment of section 1501 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.