ObamaCare directs the Secretary of Health and Human Services to define the “essential health benefits” that all consumers in the individual and small-group health insurance markets must purchase. HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius kicked that decision to the states, giving them a deadline of this past Friday, September 30. Kaiser Health News reports that all of 16 states submitted an Essential Health Benefits (EHB) benchmark to HHS by the deadline.

But did Sebelius have the authority to kick this decision to states? In a September 26 letter to Sebelius, Pennsylvania Insurance Commissioner Michael Consedine writes:

[T]he PPACA clearly states that the Secretary of HHS is to define the EHB package for policies offered both inside and outside of health insurance exchanges. While the language in PPACA was plain that this statutory responsibility fell on HHS, in December of last year HHS issued guidance preliminarily indicating states must select a benchmark design, with HHS potentially acting as final arbiter…of that selection. (Emphasis added.)

Is September 30 even a deadline?

Some communications from your agency indicate that this is a suggested response date while others indicate that it is a deadline of some sort. We again are asking for clarity.

Letting states make that decision will increase flexibility, though. Right?

[I]n reality the guidance placed additional restrictions on the EHB selection rather than flexibility. HHS guidance appears to render the states’ ability to innovate and to make an independent choice illusory. (Emphasis added.)

Indeed, the 16 states who have complied may be in for a rude awakening.

HHS indicated that any selection by the states will be subject to additional review, but we have no definitive guidance as to what, if any, weight will be given to a state’s selection. The minimum amount of information provided to date invites concern that your agency will alter or override a state’s submission…raising serious questions as to whether states have any meaningful ability to make a definitive selection of an EHB benchmark. (Emphasis added.)

Pennsylvania thus declined to submit one, and effectively told Sebelius to do her job.

Louisiana went a step further, threatening to hold Sebelius accountable if she doesn’t. In a September 27 letter, Louisiana’s Secretary of Health and Hospitals Bruce Greenstein and Insurance Commissioner James Donelson noted that the December 2011 “bulletin” merely stated that HHS “intend[s] to propose” a deadline of  September 30 for making that decision—meaning that the bulletin “neither… has the force of law, nor commits federal regulators to any particular course of action.” Moreover:

[I]t is our State’s conclusion that while the bulletin states a decision is to be made by [September 30], this “deadline” has never been formalized through the official rulemaking process. As long as formal rules do not exist, the federal government can change its approach. Since the federal government is not bound by these bulletins, neither are the States. As such, the State of Louisiana is not legally required to submit a benchmark preference by [September 30,] 2012. The State of Louisiana will not permit the federal government to dictate to our residents a default benchmark plan, as the federal government, in its disregard of the requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act regarding essential health benefits and other provisions of the PPACA, has no authority to do so under federal or Louisiana law until regulations are published in the Federal Register, following established notice and comment procedure.

The process developed for defining the essential health benefit benchmark has been a completely new method of establishing law without proper rulemaking. Implementation of new policies without open and public comment and publication in the Federal Register is in clear violation of the law.

The administration has charged states to build what the federal government mandates, but the federal government has provided [only] informal guidance and incomplete rules and regulations…Accordingly, there will be no essential health benefits package for the State of Louisiana, and we will pursue all avenues to prevent the federal government from selecting one on behalf of our state. (Emphasis added.)

As I have written previously, “implementing these parts of the law can only lead to more regulation, fewer choices, and higher costs. And of course, state officials will take the blame when ObamaCare starts increasing costs and denying care to people. There is simply no good reason for states to assume this impossible, harmful, and thankless task.”