After two Washington law firms
backed out of earlier commitments to represent House Republicans in their legal
challenge, House Speaker John Boehner hired Jonathan Turley on Tuesday. Turley
is a George Washington professor who is an expert on constitutional law and well
known to cable TV viewers as a legal analyst
"Professor Turley is a renowned
legal scholar who agrees that President Obama has clearly overstepped his
Constitutional authority. He is a natural choice to handle this lawsuit,"
Boehner's spokesman Michael Steel said in a written statement.
House Democratic Leader Nancy
Pelosi criticized the move to continue the legal effort and referred to Turley
as "a TV lawyer" in a press conference Tuesday. Pelosi has criticized Boehner's
office for using taxpayer funds to pay for the litigation. The Democratic Leader
told reporters she hoped the latest announcement on the lawsuit was in response
to internal Republican politics, and that the legal fight wasn't a sign that GOP
leaders aren't interested in working across the aisle.
The House voted mostly along
party lines in July to approve a lawsuit against the President for unilaterally
making changes to Obamacare. Although many Republicans backed the delays the
administration approved last year, they maintained it was Congress' job to
change the law. But House Republicans have had trouble retaining a firm because
of the political blowback on the issue.
The House's Office of General
Counsel will represent the House in court, but the resolution that passed this
summer gives the Speaker the authority to hire outside lawyers to finalize the
legal strategy and file a formal complaint. Some are suggesting the GOP case be
broadened to respond to any executive action the President takes on
immigration.
Beyond the political concerns,
many constitutional experts have raised doubts that federal courts will take up
the Obamacare case pushed by the GOP-controlled House. The legal burden will be
on the House to demonstrate it was damaged as an institution by the President's
actions.
The Supreme Court may rule on
the controversial health care law before the House case makes its way through
the system. Earlier
this month the high court announced it would consider a challenge to the law
that on the tax credits that many Americans use to subsidize health plans they
purchase on the federal health exchange
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