Friday, April 19, 2013

Unusual Fall-Out and Comments Follow Food Company's Challenge To ACA Mandate

As previously reported, last month Eden Foods, a natural and organic food company, filed what seemed to be a clone of the numerous lawsuits by Christian-owned companies challenging the Affordable Care Act contraceptive coverage mandate. However, yesterday Salon reported on the far-from-typical subsequent developments. First, Salon reports a "massive backlash among [Eden's] liberal customer base."  Much of the opposition appeared as comments on Eden's Facebook page.  Second, in an earlier Salon interview Eden CEO Michael Potter cast substantial doubt on whether his objections were really religion-based.  Potter said:
I don’t care if the federal government is telling me to buy my employees Jack Daniel’s or birth control. What gives them the right to tell me that I have to do that? That’s my issue, that’s what I object to, and that’s the beginning and end of the story.