When Congress passed Obamacare in 2010, notably absent from its 2,000-plus pages was anything remotely resembling tort reform. This was the case, even though repeated studies have shown over the years that restraining out-of-control class-action lawsuits would reduce health care costs by as much as $56 billion annually. Even President Obama said he would give it a look, but when he signed Obamacare into law, tort reform was not in it. Coincidentally, Rep. Henry Waxman, the California Democrat and uber liberal was then chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee when it considered Obamacare in 2009. The bill that came out of his panel had no trace of tort reform. It happens that Waxman’s single biggest career contributor, according to OpenSecrets.org, is the American Association for Justice. If that name doesn’t ring a bell, it’s not supposed to because AAJ was formerly known as the American Trial Lawyers Association. The group changed to a more innocuous moniker after public opinion surveys showed class-action trial lawyers were among the least respected professionals in America.
Among AAJ’s top legislative priorities during the Obamacare debate was making sure tort reform wasn’t included. With the help of Waxman, and the many other congressional Democrats who received more than 90 percent of the trial lawyers group’s campaign donations, AAJ kept tort reform out of Obamacare. But we don’t recall any investigative pieces about this in the pages of the New York Times.
