AIDS Healthcare Foundation v. California Department of Health Care Services

INTRODUCTION

Plaintiff AIDS Healthcare Foundation (“AHF”) is a California non-profit organization headquartered in Los Angeles County which serves as the world’s largest provider of health care services to people living with HIV and/or AIDS.1 Compl. ¶ 8. Defendant Department of Health Care Services (“DHCS”) is the state governmental agency that oversees California’s federal Medicaid program (“Medi-Cal”). Id. ¶ 11. Defendant Michelle Baass is the Department’s Director. Id.2 This case concerns whether DHCS and Baass violated the constitutional rights of the AIDS Healthcare Foundation by declining to extend AHF’s contract with DHCS on the basis of a letter that AHF sent to enrollees in its healthcare plan. The issue before the Court is whether AHF has adequately alleged its constitutional claims. The Court assumes for purposes of this motion that everything AHF has alleged in its Complaint is true. As a result of this Court’s Order, the question of whether everything AHF has alleged is actually true will be answered at a later stage of the litigation. In short, AHF’s claims that Director Baass violated AHF’s…