The Supreme Court will ultimately decide that Congress overstepped its authority when it passed Obamacare last year, Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, tells Newmax.TV. The leader of the Senate Tea Party Caucus predicted other senators will come around and join his small band.
Lee has more than just a casual knowledge of the law and the Supreme Court. He clerked for Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, and his father, Rex Lee, served as solicitor general in the Reagan administration.
“I hope and expect the Supreme Court will reach the right conclusion, and the right conclusion in this case happens to be is that Congress overstepped its authority,” he said in an interview at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C.
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“Never before in the history of this country has Congress undertaken so bold a step as to tell Americans that they must purchase a particular product, health insurance. Not just any health insurance, but that kind of health insurance, that specific type that Congress in its infinite wisdom has told every American they have to purchase. It’s unprecedented and it falls outside, far outside, Congress’ authority.”
Calls that Justice Clarence Thomas should recuse himself in the case because of the tea party activities of his wife are not be taken seriously and are part of the same smear campaign that nearly scuttled Thomas’ confirmation in 1991, he said.
Lee was a bit perplexed that his Tea Party Caucus has pulled in just three members, including himself, and has been avoided by such tea party stalwarts as Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla.
“I’m not sure why they haven’t joined,” he said. “I mean, Marco Rubio has expressed some concern that the tea party movement is one that is leaderless and he wants it to continue to be that way. And I understand and respect his reasoning on that, and at the same time we have gone out of our way to make sure we don’t purport to speak for the tea party movement. It is leaderless. We want it to continue to maintain its organic, grass-roots, leaderless character.
“So I hope and expect that other members of the Senate will join us. We’ve invited all 100 senators to join us. I’d be pleased to have that happen. But regardless of what happens we have to remember that our three-member caucus is today three members larger than it was a year ago.”
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