On April 30, 2013, a for-profit company filed this lawsuit in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services under the First Amendment, Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the Administrative Procedure Act . The plaintiff, represented by the American Freedom Law Center, asked the court for an exception to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) mandate requiring employers to provide health insurance coverage of contraception. Specifically, the plaintiff claimed that providing insurance coverage of contraception would violate the religious beliefs of the corporation's owner.

On May 24, 2013, the plaintiff filed an unopposed motion for a preliminary injunction. The same day, Judge Ellen S. Huvelle entered the preliminary injunction, which directed the defendant not to enforce the ACA insurance mandate regarding contraception against the plaintiff until 30 days after the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled in Gilardi v. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services , which involved similar legal issues and the same defendant as this case. Gilardi was held while the Supreme Court decided Burwell v. Hobby Lobby. On June 30, 2014, the court held in Hobby Lobby that the HHS regulations imposing the contraceptive mandate violate RFRA, when applied to closely-held for-profit corporations.

On October 24, 2014, Judge Huvelle held that based on the Supreme Court's ruling in Hobby Lobby, the plaintiffs were entitled to a permanent injunction against enforcement of the version of the contraceptive mandate in place on June 30, 2014. Judge Huvelle did not extend the ruling to future versions of the mandate, and directed the parties to come to an agreement on attorney's fees and costs. On January 13, 2015, the district court cancelled the last status conference in this case.

Mallory Jones - 11/07/2013
Kate Craddock - 07/31/2016


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