Kirkland & Ellis and ACLU Secure Preliminary Injunction Blocking Michigan Domestic Partner Health Care Ban

Kirkland & Ellis LLP, the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Michigan achieved an important victory when a federal judge in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan granted a preliminary injunction barring the State of Michigan from enforcing P.A. 297, which prohibits public employers from extending medical and other benefits to same-sex families. The ACLU and Kirkland filed the lawsuit in February 2012 on behalf of five gay and lesbian public employees, as well as their long-term domestic partners, who either lost their health insurance or would have lost their insurance as a result of the law. Litigation partners Donna Welch, Amy Crawford and Bradley Weidenhammer, intellectual property associate Scott Lerner, and litigation associates Debra Lefler and Russell King lead the Kirkland team representing the employees pro bono.