Health Insurers Appeal ‘Too High’ $185 Million Quinn Emanuel Fee

Health insurers are appealing a $185 million fee for Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan for work obtaining more than $3.7 billion in federal payments for the companies.

The insurers from Kaiser Foundation Health Plan and UnitedHealthcare Insurance Company Inc. had objected to the fee and suggested the law firm should receive around $9 million. The 35 insurers lost their argument at a lower court last month and filed a notice of appeal Oct. 1.

The fees represent 5% of the amount lawyers recovered for health insurers that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled were due billions after the federal government failed to live up to a promise in an Obamacare program known as “risk corridors.”

The Affordable Care Act’s “risk corridor” section required the government to pay health insurers for selling plans to people who previously would have been denied coverage or charged more, the Supreme Court said in April 2020 decision.

A federal judge, Kathryn Davis of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, last month granted Quinn Emanuel its full fee request, noting the parties had agreed to a 5% contingent fee at the outset.

The work the law firm did on insurers’ behalf pioneered a legal theory that the Supreme Court agreed with and that led to a total of more than $12 billion in payments, the judge said.

Moe Keshavarzi, a Sheppard Mullin partner who represents the health insurers, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The group of insurers had argued in the lower court that the lawyers’ fees would amount to more than $18,000 an hour, which they said was “simply too high.” The insurers will later file new arguments in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

Following the approval of the fee request last month, Quinn Emanuel partner Steve Swedlow said the firm was “proud of the $4 billion in value we created for class members” and noted the firm believed its fee request was “reasonable.”

Most of the health insurers filing the appeal are divisions of Kaiser Foundation and UnitedHealthcare.

The case is Health Republic Insurance Company v. USA, Fed. Cl., 16 00259, 10/1/21.