in his opinion in king v. burwell chief justice roberts wrote, quote, congress passed the affordable care act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them. if at all possible, we must interpret the act in a way that is consistent with the former and avoids the latter. mr. lazarus, can you apply this same reasoning to the csr program? >> well, i would say that if you take the approach that chief justice roberts elaborated there, he was applying it to the premium assistance tax credits and stating that under that approach the law -- an ambiguous provision in the law should be interpreted to make them applicable in all states and not just in states with state-run exchanges. i would say that the cost sharing reductions part of the subsidies is on exactly the same shooting as the premium assistance tax credits and would fit into that analysis in the same way and, therefore, the administration's interpretation is the proper interpretation. >> very well. mr. chairman, we have heard today that the cost sharing red

prior to king burwell, we heard the same litany, the tax credits in federal change was a violation of the law and the supreme court didn't agree with that. but we are larrying it over and over again. it turns out it was a good program, i can personally testify to that, when it was implemented there were delays because it is very complicated in implementing these complicated laws. they said it was quote wise unquote to do this. i think these charges of overreach reflect the reflection of this administration demonizing the act. >> it is reason to believe the executive branch acted appropriately in executing the law. my republican colleagues have been examining this for two years. today's hearing is the filing of a lawsuit questioning the constituti constituti constitution constitutionality of the program. it follows interviews with 13 current and government officials from four federal agencies. my question is congress has a wealth of tools. have they used their legislative authority to review this. >> i think the fact that congress republicans have taken no such steps to pass such legis

in his opinion in king v. burwell chief justice roberts wrote, quote, congress passed the affordable care act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them. if at all possible, we must interpret the act in a way that is consistent with the former and avoid the latter. mr. lazarus, can you apply this same reasoning to the csr program? >> well, i would say that, if you take the approach that chief justice roberts elaborated there he was applying it to the premium assistance tax credits and stating that under that approach they, the law, ambiguous provision in the law should be interpreted to make them applicable to all states, rather than not just states with state-run exchanges. i would say that the cost sharing reductions part of the subsidies is on exactly the same footing as the premium assistance tax credits and would fit into that analysis in the same way and therefore the administration's interpretation is the proper interpretation. >> very well. mr. chairman, we have heard today that the cost sharing

prior to king burwell, we heard the same litany, the tax

i'm referring to king versus burwell for anyone who has followed the litigation surrounding the aca. but i did want to ask the panelists about an area of law or areas of law that you as lawyers see the influence of justice scalia or which parts of jurs pruns has he had a big impact on and especially if it relates to work, feel free to explain to us how. if each of the three panelists would like to respond with that. we'll start with erin and move to the left. >> justice scalia had a tremendous impact on a number of areas of law. but i'll take a quick step back and look at his overarching impact. so justice scalia as we all know believed in originalism. and what originalism means, there's variants of it but basically that if you're looking at the constitution and interpreting it as applied to a case today, the fourth amendment, for example, you need a warrant to search a cell phone. those questions go back to what the fourth amendment meant at the time of the finding, he has changed the debate, not only looking at the constitutional test but looking at statutory text. as megan mention

just one year ago in king v. burwell the supreme court rej t rejected a similarly perverse contrived interpretation which in the words of its architects was contrived to drive a stake through the heart of obamacare. i believe at a conference at the american enterprise institute i think that was stated. in that case chief justice john roberts held for a six justice majority in terms which i think everyone interested in how to interpret the provisions at issue here, the cost sharing reductions provision should read very carefully. he said: congress passed the affordable care act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them. if at all possible we must interpret the act in a way that is consistent with the former and avoids the latter. section 36 b can fairly be read consistent with what we see as congress' plan and that is the reading we adopt. one year later aca opponents have mounted a transparent rerun of the same strategy. once again they brandish an a contextual hyper literalist contrived interpretation ign