One year after the troubled launch of healthcare.gov, the country is waiting to see if the federal government can handle this year's influx of applicants when open enrollment for 2015 begins Saturday.

In New Jersey, this means it's a second year for the Christie Administration's mixed-approach experiment. The Republican governor signed off on expanding Medicaid in the state, but steadfastly opposed the establishment of a state-run marketplace, leaving New Jersey's insurance exchange in the hands of the feds.

Despite Christie's hands-off approach, the rate of those uninsured in NJ has been cut in half and premium costs are down. But it's not all good news. There's a massive backlog of Medicaid applicants, since the state's Medicaid expansion wasn't accompanied by an increase in resources to process those applicants. Plus, insurers are passing more of the cost of care onto consumers, leading to mounting debt among the chronically ill and those with serious conditions.

And Latino enrollment continues to lag behind the rest of the general population. Latinos make up 33 percent of the state's uninsured, yet represented just 7 percent of those who signed up last year.

The federal government says the application process will be streamlined in 2015, which may lead to increased enrollment in New Jersey and elsewhere.

But New Jersey Public Radio reporter Kai Wright said a new court case challenging the law may make the government's work moot.

"The big unknown is the Supreme Court, [which] will decide whether or nor the tax credits are legal," said Wright. "Eight out of 10 people who signed up have tax credits. If they throw that part of it out, they're basically throwing out the law....It certainly has insurers scared."

This series is produced with support from The Healthcare Foundation of New Jersey.