California Employer Dropping Health Insurance for Domestic Partners

For the past year I've been insured through my partner's work because we're in a domestic partnership in California. They're forcing everyone to switch from Kaiser to Blue Shield California (allegedly there are other options but we're struggling to figure out what they are). None of the offered plans include domestic partners. Their reasoning is wanting a uniform plan for all employees across the US, which is also why they're removing HMOs. They have offices in a handful of states, mostly California, Texas, and Massachusetts. The main headquarters is in Germany, and the California office my partner works at is listed as the US headquarters; the CEO's office is in that building.

As far as I can tell, employers cannot specifically exclude the domestic partners of employees living in California, regardless of where the company is based. The exception bring self-insured plans. We've just been informed of this and the enrollment period is in less than three weeks and only open for two weeks. How it this legal and what are our next steps?

Edit to include: My partner has had a full-insured plan for the almost seven years they've been at the company.

submitted by /u/SpiritedDisaster
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