Hobby Lobby Willing to Pay a Million Dollars a Day to Avoid Providing Employees with Coverage for Emergency Contraception
The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that the craft store chain Hobby Lobby and its sister-company Mardel must provide employees with access to copay-free contraception as part of its health-care plan while it continues its legal battle to be exempted from the federal mandate on religious grounds.
Back in September, Hobby Lobby's conservative Christian owners filed a lawsuit in federal court asserting that the Obamacare provision requiring the company to provide employees with no-cost coverage for emergency contraception such as the so-called "morning-after pill" violated their freedoms of religion and speech.
"We simply cannot abandon our religious beliefs to comply with this mandate," Hobby Lobby founder and CEO David Green said then.
Following the Supreme Court ruling this week, an attorney on behalf of the Green family released a statement saying the company plans to defy the law, even if that means racking up as much as $1.3 million a day in fines.
"They're not going to comply with the mandate," said Beckett Fund for Religious Liberty general counsel Kyle Duncan. "They're not going to offer coverage for abortion-inducing drugs in the insurance plan."
Asked about the possibility that Hobby Lobby would be required to pay significant fines for disregarding the mandate, Duncan would only say, "we're just going to have to cross that bridge when we come to it."
It's worth noting that the morning-after pill does not induce abortions.
