Kaiser Permanente Black Health Clinic Violates Anti-Discrimination Law, Civil Rights Complaint Alleges

The Kaiser Permanente health care system is violating civil rights laws by discriminating against prospective patients based on race through its Center for Black Health and Wellness, according to a new civil rights complaint from a medical watchdog group.

The complaint, filed by Do No Harm to the Office for Civil Rights division of Health and Human Services, claims that the branding around Kaiser’s primary health care center for black patients located in Portland, Oregon creates the perception that care is reserved exclusively for black people, even if patients of all races are technically welcome.

Kaiser created the center “to improve the health of our Black members, elevate their care experience, continue to build trust, create culturally responsive care, and best practices that can be shared across our organization and the health care community,” the Kaiser website reads.

Because Kaiser is a private health care company that receives federal funding, the group is bound by various anti-discrimination provisions, including Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. By creating a black-centered health care facility, the group is discriminating against patients of all other races, creating an unwelcome environment for other patients, according to the complaint.

“Kaiser’s Black Health and Wellness Center uses racial segregation to address purported health disparities. The methods are illegal, immoral, and unfounded. A business cannot advertise an offering aimed at a specific racial group and legitimately claim it does not discriminate,” Kurt Miceli, chief medical officer at Do No Harm, told National Review in a statement. Anti-discrimination laws and basic medical ethics require physicians to treat patients as individuals; race-based care violates these principles.”

Kaiser insists that the center welcomes patients of all races and ethnicities, despite the public-facing emphasis on black patients.

“The Center for Black Health and Wellness is open to all Kaiser Permanente members and
welcomes and regularly treats patients of every race and ethnicity,” Kaiser told National Review
in a statement. “It was established in response to research showing that Black Americans face
higher rates of chronic conditions, lower screening rates, and worse maternal and infant health
outcomes. The center provides preventative and culturally informed care to help address these
disparities while serving anyone with similar health risks.”

Photos of the health center included in Do No Harm’s complaint show a frosted door with the sign “Center for Black Health and Wellness” outside the door, along with photos from inside the practice. The wall is painted with a large mural of black people, to the exclusion of any other race or ethnicity.

“It is self-evident that a sign or designation specifying that a service is for a particular
racial group is intended to be instructive and creates the impression that the business is less
willing or unwilling to serve or welcome people outside of that racial group, (even if the business might claim it doesn’t actually exclude them),” the complaint reads. “For example, a sign indicating a service for “whites” would communicate, at a minimum, a discriminatory preference for whites and preferentially encourages whites to seek the service while deterring racial minorities.”

The center opened at the beginning of 2025, and “is led by a team of clinicians with experience in providing exceptional culturally responsive care to Black patients and their families,” the website reads. “We here at Kaiser Permanente Northwest recognize that studies show Black patients have better health outcomes when they have Black clinician(s) and care teams that are highly experienced in providing culturally responsive care.”

Further, according to an article published on Kaiser’s website, data has shown that if a patient has a physician who looks like them, said patient will experience better health outcomes. For example, “Black patients have better health outcomes when they have Black clinician(s) and care teams,” the article reads.

The practice, called racial concordance, holds that seeing a doctor who shares one’s racial background leads to improved health outcomes. Do No Harm previously published a report debunking racial concordance, citing Manhattan Institute research that completely undermined data that suggested the practice is effective.

Kaiser’s emphasis on the importance of racial concordance also suggests they practice racial discrimination in hiring to ensure the clinic’s doctors share the race of their patients, the complaint suggests.

Kaiser says it is committed to a racially inclusive and diverse health care environment, yet ostensibly seems to syphon off time and resources to specific groups of people.

“Kaiser Permanente apparently hopes to return to the type of racial discrimination and segregation this country hasn’t seen in some 70 years,” the complaint reads. “The organization’s own descriptions and underlying intentions for operating its Center for Black Health and Wellness run afoul of federal anti-discrimination laws.”

Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, for example, stipulates that recipients of federal funding must not provide services to one group but not another, segregate people based on receipt of certain benefits, discriminate via methods of administration, or rest actions in any sort of racial discrimination.

The center also asserts that “Black Americans are less healthy than their white counterparts. Disparities include higher rates of chronic conditions, shorter life expectancy, higher maternal mortality, and lower screening rates for cancer and heart disease,” characterizing the health center as a commitment to “reduce racial disparities in these health outcomes.”

Currently, the center focuses on primary care services, but plans to expand to more specialized care in the future. In general, Kaiser health care centers are located across the country, in states such as California, Georgia, Hawaii, Virginia, Oregon, and Washington.

“The goal of the Center for Black Health and Wellness is to enhance and expand the care of our Black patients, not limit it,” the website reads.