based on the commerce clause of the constitution. but it was upheld based on the tax writing provisions of the u.s. congress, and the executive branch of the u.s. government. a 5-4 decision. the key decision by the chief justice of the united states, john roberts. he sided with the other, the democratic appointed members of the supreme court, breyer, ginsberg, kagan, sotomayor, together with chief justice john roberts, they were in the majority. kennedy, scalia, alito and thomas, they were in the minority. the health care reform law stays in full -- fully remains the law of the land in the united states. kate baldwin has been watching all of this unfold. kate, you're outside the supreme court. give us some more on what was going on inside the supreme court. >> reporter: what was going on inside the supreme court is the chief justice, he announced the ruling and began reading part, a summary, really, of the opinion, the majority of opinion of the court. and that has been happening. and of course, we then quickly got word from my colleague, bill mears, who is inside on the press office, receiving this ruling as soon as it came down, to read it back to me. >> hold on a second, kate, hold on. tom harkin, the democratic senator is standing in front of the u.s. supreme court. the senator from iowa, i want to hear what he's saying. never mind, we got that audio coming from the rally. you see some senators there with tom harkin. kate, sorry i interrupted. but go ahead and pick up your authority. >> not a problem at all. as you and our colleagues have been skus idiscussing, there wa confusion early on. that it was not upheld under the commerce clause but could be upheld under the taxing provision. it sums up the thinking of the court in why they allowed this individual mandate in the law to be upheld. it says, and this is the opinion written by chief justice john roberts, it says the federal government does not have the power to order people to buy health insurance. the federal government does, he goes on to say, have the power to impose a tax on those without health insurance. therefore, the individual mandate is therefore constitutional because it can be reasonably read as a tax. there is probably the most clear language we've seen so far from the chief justice himself writing pretty clearly how their thinking was going and how they narrowly crafted this ruling to uphold the original mandate, wolf. >> stand by for a moment, kate. suzanne malveaux has a special guest with her right now. suzanne, i think you're in aspen, colorado, tom daschle, the former majority leader in the senate, someone who spent a lot of time working on the health care issue in the senate. >> absolutely, wolf. that's absolutely right. tom daschle, thank you for joining us. obviously you are a key player in all of this. literally writing health care reform back in 2008, pushing for it and working with an organization now with the states for a bipartisan implementation of this. but first of all, your initial take on this, on the ruling today. >> well, suzanne, i'm euphoric. obviously this is a green light with an exclamation point. what this says is let's go forward now with full speed. we can implement, innovate, do all kinds of things that were held back in part because of the court decision. now we know, now we can go forward. that won't stop the politics and stop the policy debate, but we can go forward with implementation and that's good news. >> what do you make of the fact that a lot of republicans are saying essentially, we knew this was a tax increase, it is a tax increase, the supreme court is also saying now you can implement through this through a tax increase. does that in any way hurt the argument of the administration or even hurt the president? >> the politics will continue to play itself out. you'll see ads of all kinds from here to the election, and a lot of money spent trying to persuade people about the negative side of this ruling. but the bottom line is, we've mandated retirement insurance through social security, as a tax, we've mandated hospital medicare part "a" insurance as a tax. this is not unprecedented. this is something we've done on at least two occasions with great success before. >> how do you convince the american people that this is actually the right way to go about implementing health care? because all the polls are showing that people do not have a lot of faith in this legislation, in this law. they don't appreciate it. and this is something that has been done, really, step by step. they haven't really seen a lot of results they were hoping for, because it's not until 2014 even that the mandate would take place. >> i take great satisfaction in watching the people's reaction to the things they do know. they know they've got insurance protections, and they love it. they know they've got an opportunity to close the doughnut hole, the payment they have to pay for drugs, for seniors. they love that. they know what they've got, and what they know they've got, they really like. and so as we continue to implement, my expectation is, that number's going to continue to change of the the more they see, the more they're going to like. >> you still have a very big job ahead. >> we sure do. >> thank you, senator. i really appreciate it. >> thank you. >> wolf, back to you. >> suzanne, thank you. and thank senator daschle for us as well. john king is with us. i'm looking at some of the notable parts of this opinion, the majority opinion written by the chief justice john roberts, and there's a line here that stands out on page 44. and it is a very -- take a look at it, it's a huge, huge, lengthy opinion. the federal government, he writes, does not have the power to order people to have health insurance. but then he goes on to say, the federal government does have the power to impose a tax on those without health insurance. that's a key phrase in this decision, allowing the affordable care act, the obama health care reform law to remain in effect. >> and wolf, as we read through this, more than 100 pages, about 110 pages of this decision, it is history. we are reading it, analyzing it, only 500 people were allowed in the room to actually watch it unfold. one was jeffrey toobin. take us inside as this played out. and explain to some of our viewers, we got the initial parts of this decision wrong because the chief justice started by saying -- >> well, let me start from the beginning. it was just an extraordinary and such a swirling turn of events in the course of, really about ten minutes. the chief justice took the bench at about 10:06. there were five minutes on an earlier case. but at 10:06, the chief justice announced that he was going to announce the opinion of the court in the health and human services versus the national federation of independent businesses. i guess that's how the case will be known for history. and he started reading, and the first issue he addressed was the commerce clause. does congress have the authority under the commerce clause to enact the individual mandate. the requirement that all americans have insurance. and he basically adopted, in its entirety, the argument of the challengers to the law. he said that this was outside the federal government's power. this had been the -- we need to go to jessica yellin. that's what we're going to do. i guess not. >> jessica is not ready at the moment. these things happen. >> so it looked to all the world, for all the world like the chief justice for the majority was going to strike down the law. but then he turned. and he said there is a separate justification that the government has offered to support the constitutionality of the requirement that people have health insurance. and he turned to the taxing power. and you could see the smiles of the conservatives in the room. i happened to be sitting right near orrin hatch, the senator from utah. you could see their eyes almost roll back in their head, are you kidding? he's going to support it under this ground? because the vast, vast majority of the time, in oral argument and during the public discussion of this law has been about the commerce clause powers of the constitution. but roberts said, we don't have to -- if there is any plausible ground on which to support the constitutionality of an act of congress, we should cite that law. and it became clear he was going to uphold it under the taxing power. and you could see, i saw senator hatch's face just fall. michele bachmann also in the courtroom. you saw her astonishment. and then he turned to the issue of the medicaid expansion. which it was quite clear during oral argument the justices were very skeptical about it. what we learned in the chief justice's opinion was not just the five conservatives who struck down the -- who were roberts, scalia, kennedy, alito and thomas, they were joined by two of the more liberal justices, justice breyer and justice kagan in striking down the expansion of medicaid. only two justices thought the expansion of medicaid was constitutional. ginsberg and sotomayor. so it was an extraordinary turn of events, because five minutes into chief justice roberts' opinion, you would have asked anyone in that room whether this law was constitutional -- was going to be held unconstitutional, we would all have said yes. but we had to sit to the end. and the turn of events surprised me, that's for sure. >> on the medicaid provision, he essentially helped them out saying, this way it's unconstitutional, but as long as states can opt out, we can leave it in. >> that's right. and this is going to be an administrative difficulty for the obama administration. the law had been, in most cases, he who pays the piper calls the tune. that if the federal government gives the states money, for anything, they can determine how that money is spent. but what the chief justice said in this opinion was the federal government went too far here. they commandeered -- that's the term he used -- commandeered money from poor people. and too coercivcoercive. so that part of the law is going to have to -- is gone. but most of it is intact. >> so wolf, fascinating day. we'll continue to talk to jeff about inside the courtroom. the headline is, by a 5-4 decision, chief justice roberts of the united states supreme court upholding the constitutionality of the president's signature health care act. incredibly important landmark decision today. as we've noted, the politics already playing out. you hear them in the protesters still outside the court. they're already talking, republicans, about repealing it. the court has spoken. the debate is not over. >> and the president of the united states will be getting ready to speak. he's going to be addressing the nation around 12:15 p.m. eastern. that's in a little bit more than an hour or so from now. we'll hear from the president of the united states. we'll also hear from mitt romney at some point today. we'll get his reaction. we'll get the president's reaction. the bottom line, though, in all of this, is that the president's health care reform law will in fact remain the law of the land. we'll take a quick break. much more of our coverage coming up right after this. ( whirring and crackling sounds ) man: assembly lines that fix themselves. the most innovative companies are doing things they never could before, by building on the cisco intelligent network. assure my patients get evthe very best care.ake but look at our health care system. everyone agreed we needed reforms -- but this new health care law -- it just isn't fixing things. president obama promised my patients that they could keep me -- but what if because of this new health care law -- i can't keep them? i've looked at this law. i know the consequences: delayed care and worse yet -- denied care. studies show the president's health care law is projected to add hundreds of billions of dollars to our deficit -- and increase spending by more than a trillion dollars. and the truth is -- we still don't know how much this law will eventually cost. i don't want anything to come between my patients and me -- especially washington bureaucrats. we need real reform that improves care, and the president's health care law just isn't it. it just isn't worth it. this is where health care decisions should be made. not in washington. the health care reform law remains the law of the land. the affordable care act has been authorized to continue by the united states supreme court. a 5-4 decision. the chief justice of the united states, john roberts, siding with the majority, saying that under the tax writing provisions of the constitution, the individual mandate is in fact constitutional. we're getting reaction from all over the country. i want to go to atlanta, cnn's fredricka whitfield is over at grady memorial hospital. what are they saying, fred, over there? >> well, of course, wolf, the white house will say this is a victory. you heard from tom daschle saying this is a green light. republicans calling it a defeat, mitch mcconnell saying the cure is worse than the disease. just what this ruling means, i'm with dr. curtis lewis, who is the chief of staff. you make the rounds, you have the patients, you see what the care and what the need is. you're also overseeing all of the medical doctors. what does this ruling mean, this point forward, for this hospital? a hospital that cares in large part for the uninsured and underinsured. >> i think it means a couple of things. one thing, it means that more people have access. and they've estimated there will be millions of people who will now get access to health care, which are having trouble to do so because of lack of insurance. and of course, that impacts us. we've always been in the business for 120 years, grady health system just had its birthday on june 1st, for 120 years serving the atlanta community for the uninsured and underinsured. a lot of these patients now that we've been serving will now get some coverage, which will help us continue with our mission. >> but this hospital, which is a safety net hospital, insures and assures the uninsured, that there is accessible care. but the problem is, there's a rising cost that's incurred by hospitals such as yours when people come here and they don't have insurance. >> right. >> so we're talking about measures that would kick into place 2014, now that this ruling has been upheld. how do you see the next two years of operating costs compared to what you envision come 2014 and beyond? >> i think there's still some concern, because as i understand the law, the law said that as this new law came into place, there were other funds that we would have that would become diminished, disproportionate share of hospital funds because we're a safety net hospital. we want to make sure that those don't go down before we get the funds to support us, and support us more than we had with the dish funds, so we can provide more care to our patients. i think there will continue to be a population of uninsured. but if we get some of the uninsured patients that are presently, we're receiving no funds for, insured, that will diminish the burden on the hospital to provideare to the uninsured. >> you've had conversations with the patients who don't have insurance. you've had conversations about whether they would get insurance, now that the affordable care act would perhaps make it more accessible to them. do you believe that in large part the 40% of patients that you have here who are uninsured will indeed take advantage of the individual mandate, and come to your hospital insured? >> we hope that they will. we will obviously work with them so they have access and take advantage of that opportunity. because it's a win-win for us, and them. you're talking about millions of people in the united states who will hopefully take advantage of this opportunity, improve the general health of the country, hopefully, you know, the health care of the country will translate into economic stimulus. so i hope all those things happen as a result of this. we're still very concerned that, you know, it's a big law. i understand it's several thousand pages long. a lot of it is going to be in the details and how it's interpreted and what happens. we're still trying to sort through it ourselves. >> dr. curtis lewis, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> wolf, back to you. >> fred, thanks very much. just want to remind our viewers the president of the united states will be in the east room of the white house in about an hour or so. and we will hear from the president. but before then, we expect to hear from mitt romney, the republican presidential candidate, i'm guessing in about 20 or 25 minutes or so. mitt romney will be speaking, giving us his reaction to this historic decision by the u.s. supreme court, upholding the affordable care act as it's called. the president's health care reform law. from atlanta, let's head out to california, to stockton, california, right now. casey wian is getting reaction out there. what are folks out there saying to you, casey? >> that's right, wolf. we are at xhukchuck's diner in stockton, california. health care a big issue in this community. the city is in the process of filing for bankruptcy. some of the city retirees are standing to lose their health care benefits, having to pay a lot of money out of pocket. with me are a group of telethon industry retirees. they're not under that bankruptcy situation. but they have some very strong opinions about the supreme court decision this morning. don, what did you think about it? >> i'm shocked by it all. >> why are you shocked? >> number one, we shouldn't have had the thing in the first place. that bill was passed in a locked room with just democrats voting on it. even pelosi said we didn't have time to read it. and they passed it. >> next to him is another former telephone industry worker. you've got a little different feeling about this. >> i agree with the decision. i mean, i think it's a good thing for everybody to be covered with health insurance. >> are you worried about the costs? a lot of people are very worried about the costs. >> yeah. but they tax you for everything else. might as well have everyone covered and be taxed, too. >> a lot of questions still remain about this legislation and how it's going to be implemented. you were telling me a little bit earlier, sir, that you're not really sure how this is going to work and how it's going to happen. >> i don't know who knows what the heck's going on. like everybody's saying, nobody's read the bill. i kind of agree, i'm worrying how it's going to impact me. is at&t still going to cover me. if they do cover me, am i going to have to declare my little health insurance as income and pay taxes on it. these are all unanswered questions. and i've never been in favor of it. it really broke my heart to see what the outcome was. >> one of the other issues that's being raised this morning is how this might impact the presidential election. do any of you have any thoughts whether this decision might change the way you vote come november? >> well, i think that the way this situation is, i think it will change the way obama will be elected. because the thing is, the way the economy is today, how can people afford to pay for their insurance when a lot of them are so out of a job. and they're just barely making it today. and i just can't see how they -- >> it's just helping the president's election. >> my concern is, it's just going to take time to prove itself out. i don't know how it's really going to work out. but i just hope it is for the best. i mean, because a lot of people, they need health insurance, but the thing is, how are they going to pay for all this. that's what i want to know. you know, what the -- if the economy was better, i would be strictly for it. you know, but the way it is,