The Supreme Court has upheld a key provision of the Affordable Care Act, preserving the health insurance coverage of millions of people and handing President Obama a major victory. On Thursday, the court ruled 6 to 3 that Obamacare recipients can obtain tax subsidies for health insurance in states that use federal exchanges. Right-wing plaintiffs had argued the law’s wording excluded some 7.5 million people in 34 states who get their insurance through federal exchanges, after their states declined to run exchanges of their own. But writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts said: “Congress passed the Affordable Care Act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them.” If the government had lost, millions of people would have been left without the subsidies needed to help buy private insurance. At the White House, President Obama celebrated the ruling.

President Obama: “The Affordable Care Act is here to stay. This morning, the court upheld a critical part of this law, the part that’s made it easier for Americans to afford health insurance regardless of where you live. If the partisan challenge to this law had succeeded, millions of Americans would have had thousands of dollars’ worth of tax credits taken from them. For many, insurance would have become unaffordable again. Many would have become uninsured again. Ultimately, everyone’s premiums could have gone up. America would have gone backwards. And that’s not what we do. That’s not what America does. We move forward. So today is a victory for hard-working Americans all across this country whose lives will continue to become more secure in a changing economy because of this law.”

In a dissent from the bench, Justice Antonin Scalia denounced the majority opinion as “absurd,” adding: “We really should start calling this law Scotus-care.” Meanwhile, outside the Supreme Court, Obamacare recipients who will get to keep their insurance gathered to celebrate.

Gwen Jackson: “We are thankful today that the court upheld this and realized that affordable care is not just for — I don’t know — it’s for everybody, and it should be. It would have impacted over six million people, had they not agreed to this. But now we don’t have to worry about this anymore.”

Despite Obamacare’s expansion of healthcare to millions of people, some 35 million Americans remain without insurance under the patchwork U.S. system.