Sandoval pleased with judge’s ruling on federal health reform law

By Cy Ryan

Monday, Jan. 31, 2011 | 5:37 p.m.

CARSON CITY – Gov. Brian Sandoval said Monday he’s pleased with the ruling of a federal judge who sided with Nevada and 25 other states in ruling that the federal health care reform law is unconstitutional.

U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson ruled in Florida on Monday that the law violates individual rights by penalizing a person who doesn't have health insurance by 2014.

Nevada was one of 26 states that sued to block the law. Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto declined to bring the suit, so former Gov. Jim Gibbons got a Las Vegas attorney to file the action.

Sandoval said, “Since the beginning I have noted my concerns that the federal health care legislation has serious constitutional questions which need to be answered by the courts.”

He added, “Time is of the essence in settling this issue because we are being forced to implement portions of this law.”

The state Department of Health and Human Services has started implementing parts of the law. Director Mike Willden said the law has been declared invalid in some states and constitutional in other states. “We always knew it would end up in the Supreme Court.”

There are a number of things the law mandates and the state is doing in response. It requires the state to hire more auditors. That will cost Nevada’s Medicaid program $1 million, but should bring back $8 million from curbing waste, fraud and duplication, Willden said.

Vinson ruled a requirement in the law that people must buy health insurance or face a penalty is key to the entire act, so the entire law is unconstitutional because that section is invalid. But there other sections of the law that the state is starting to put into operation, Willden said.