 From NBC's Pete Williams 
 
 The Supreme Court has rejected a request from the state of Virginia to take up a challenge to the Obama health care law on a fast track. The justices turned down a request by Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, a leading opponent of the law, to resolve questions about its constitutionality quickly. Instead, judicial review of President Barack Obama's signature legislation will continue in federal appeals courts. Several cases are pending, including challenges to the law from Virginia, Florida, and 25 other states. Cuccinelli filed suit on behalf of Virginia, while 26 states joined in a separate lawsuit in Florida claiming that Congress exceeded its authority in requiring citizens to buy health insurance or pay a penalty starting in 2014. Two Republican appointees, in Florida and Virginia, have declared it unconstitutional in whole or in part. Three other judges, also in Virginia and in Michigan and Washington, DC, have found the law constitutional. The Michigan case will be heard by the 6th Circuit on June 1st, and the case from Florida, with the challenges from over half the states, will be argued before the 11th Circuit appeals court on June 8th. (Some conservative groups were calling on Elena Kagan to bow out, claiming she was involved in some early calls when she was solicitor general about who in her office should handle the issue.)
– The Supreme Court has denied Virginia’s request to fast-track the state’s case against the health care law, MSNBC reports. Virginia’s attorney general had sought to take the case—which calls the law’s requirement that almost all Americans purchase health care unconstitutional—straight to the high court, a legal move that's hardly ever allowed. The decision means that the Virginia case, one of several against the law, will keep progressing through US appeals courts. AG Ken Cuccinelli said he asked for speedy review to end "crippling and costly uncertainty" about the law. The matter is likely to reach the Supreme Court by early summer 2012, reports the AP. MSNBC notes that when it does, all nine justices are set to hear it, despite efforts by conservative groups to remove Elena Kagan from the mix. The groups held that she should recuse herself because she’d been involved in the matter as solicitor general. She apparently took part in the court's order today, as there was no announcement that any justice sat out.