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Nature of Suit Code: 899
Nature of Suit: Other Statutes - Administrative Procedure Act/Review or Appeal of Agency Decision
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued September 22, 2015 Decided January 19, 2016

No. 14-5042

DOUGLAS B. HURON AND UNITED STATES SOCIETY FOR 

AUGMENTATIVE AND ALTERNATIVE COMMUNICATION,

APPELLANTS

v.

BETH F. COBERT, IN HER OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS ACTING 

DIRECTOR OF THE UNITED STATES OFFICE OF PERSONNEL 

MANAGEMENT AND OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT,

APPELLEES

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:13-cv-00211)

Eric S. Fleming, Student Counsel, argued the cause for 

Appellants. On the briefs were Tillman J. Breckenridge, Tara 

A. Brennan, Lewis A. Golinker, and Patricia E. Roberts. 

Douglas Hallward-Driemeier, Joy J. Lui, James R. 

Myers, Emerson A. Siegle, Joshua E. Goldstein, and Gregory 

R. Nevins were on the brief for amicus curiae Lambda Legal 

Defense and Education Fund, Inc., in support of Appellants. 

Jennifer C. Pizer entered an appearance.

USCA Case #14-5042 Document #1594112 Filed: 01/19/2016 Page 1 of 11
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Peter C. Pfaffenroth, Assistant U.S. Attorney, argued the 

cause for Appellees. On the brief were Ronald C. Machen 

Jr., U.S. Attorney at the time the brief was filed, and R. Craig 

Lawrence and Jeremy S. Simon, Assistant U.S. Attorneys.

Before: HENDERSON, MILLETT, and WILKINS, Circuit 

Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge MILLETT.

MILLETT, Circuit Judge: Speech-generating devices

assist individuals with severe communication impairments by 

“speaking” typed messages out loud. Appellants Douglas B. 

Huron and the United States Society for Augmentative and 

Alternative Communication (the “Society”) filed this action 

against the Office of Personnel Management (“OPM”) and its 

Director challenging the agency’s approval of health benefits 

plans for federal employees that exclude or limit insurance

coverage of speech-generating devices. 

Because Huron and the Society forfeited twice over the

claims on which they predicate standing, we affirm the district 

court’s dismissal of the complaint for lack of jurisdiction.

I

Statutory Background

In 1959, Congress enacted the Federal Employee Health 

Benefits Act (“Act”), Pub. L. No. 86-382, 73 Stat. 708 

(codified as amended at 5 U.S.C. §§ 8901–8914), to provide a 

subsidized health benefits program for federal employees. 

Under the Act, OPM is charged with administering the 

Federal Employee Health Benefits Program (“Federal 

Program”) and “may contract for or approve” health benefits 

plans offered to federal employees by private insurance 

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carriers for renewable one-year terms. 5 U.S.C. §§ 8903–

8903a. 

Each health benefits plan contract must “contain a 

detailed statement of benefits offered and shall include such 

maximums, limitations, exclusions, and other definitions of 

benefits as [OPM] considers necessary or desirable.” 5 

U.S.C. § 8902(d). Plan rates must “reasonably and equitably 

reflect the cost of the benefits provided” and should be set in a 

manner “consistent with the lowest schedule of basic rates 

generally charged for new group health benefit plans issued to 

large employers.” Id. § 8902(i). OPM may renegotiate rates 

each year “based on past experience and benefit adjustments,” 

but any rate adjustments must be consistent with insurance 

industry practice. Id. During a four-week “open season” each 

year, employees may transfer plans or cancel their enrollment 

in the Federal Program. Id. § 8905(g); 5 C.F.R. § 890.301(f) 

(2013).

Factual and Procedural History

In reviewing the district court’s dismissal of the 

complaint, we accept as true Huron’s and the Society’s wellpleaded factual allegations, and grant them the benefit of all 

inferences that can reasonably be drawn from those facts. 

See, e.g., Arpaio v. Obama, 797 F.3d 11, 19 (D.C. Cir. 2015). 

The Society is “a membership organization dedicated to 

supporting the needs and desires of people who use

augmentative and alternative communication.” Appellants’ 

Br. ii. Its members include individuals with severe 

communication impairments and their family members, 

speech-language pathologists, educators, and manufacturers 

of augmentative and alternative communication devices, 

including speech-generating devices. The Society aims to 

influence public policy by “advocating for the broadest scope 

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of coverage for speech-generating devices by all funding 

programs and sources.” Id. 

Huron, an attorney and resident of the District of 

Columbia, is a member of the Society. He relies on a speechgenerating device known as a “DynaWrite” to communicate 

orally with his family, friends, colleagues, and clients. The 

DynaWrite resembles a small laptop, and when Huron types a 

phrase or sentence on its keyboard and presses a button, the 

device “speaks” aloud what he has entered. 

After several years, Huron’s DynaWrite stopped 

functioning, leaving him in need of a replacement device. 

Huron had obtained his original DynaWrite, which ordinarily

costs approximately $5,000, through an insurance plan 

offered by a private sector employer. In 2009, Huron chose to 

switch to his wife’s insurance policy, a Federal Program plan 

sponsored by the Government Employees Health Association 

(“GEHA”). Huron made that decision even though the 

GEHA plan expressly excluded speech-generating devices 

from coverage. Huron also receives benefits from Medicare, 

which will reimburse him for 80% of the cost of the new 

speech-generating device. 

Although Huron’s GEHA plan does not cover speechgenerating devices, several other Federal Program plans do, to 

varying degrees. Since 2008, OPM has encouraged, but not 

required, plan sponsors to cover speech-generating devices as 

durable medical equipment in the plans offered to federal 

employees. More specifically, in its 2008 “call letter,” OPM

asked plan sponsors to indicate the extent to which they 

would offer such coverage going forward.

1 In its 2010 call 

 1 OPM distributes an annual “call letter” to plan sponsors in which 

it solicits benefit and rate proposals for the coming year. The 

letters identify OPM’s “key initiatives” and encourage, but do not 

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letter, OPM “again encourag[ed] plans to consider proposals 

for enhanced coverage for durable medical equipment, 

including * * * speech generating devices, * * * and to 

increase the dollar amounts for these benefits.” J.A. 42.

In response, several nationwide and local plan sponsors

in the Federal Program began covering speech-generating 

devices, though not always to the same extent as other durable 

medical equipment. Huron and the Society allege that, 

outside of the Federal Program, all other federal governmentsponsored health benefits programs, including state Medicaid

programs, Medicare, Tricare, and the Veteran’s 

Administration, offer some coverage for speech-generating 

devices when medically necessary. They further allege that 

private-sector plans—including those from a majority of 

insurers that also participate in the Federal Program—

routinely cover the devices to the same extent as other durable 

medical equipment. 

In February 2013, Huron and the Society filed a onecount complaint against OPM and its Director in the United 

States District Court for the District of Columbia. They

alleged that OPM had “not negotiated with [Federal Program] 

plan sponsors over [speech-generating device] coverage,”

Complaint 18, in violation of its obligations under the Act, 

and that those “acts and omissions regarding [speechgenerating device] coverage,” id. at 22, were arbitrary, 

capricious, an abuse of discretion and contrary to law, in 

violation of the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. 

§ 706.2

 The complaint requested declaratory and injunctive 

 

require, providers to include in their proposals coverage for those

identified items.

2 Specifically, the complaint alleged that OPM and its Director 

failed to: (i) conduct a complete factual investigation of coverage 

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relief, including an order that OPM “direct all [Federal 

Program] sponsors to cover [speech-generating devices] to the 

same extent and scope as other covered [durable medical 

equipment], unless they produce a factual or actuarial 

justification to support lesser coverage[.]” Complaint 3.

OPM and its Director moved to dismiss the complaint

under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) for lack of 

jurisdiction, and under Rule 12(b)(6) for failure to state a 

claim. The district court dismissed the complaint for lack of 

jurisdiction. The court found that Huron had suffered an 

injury-in-fact when he was unable to obtain a replacement 

device through his GEHA plan. But the court held that Huron 

lacked standing because he failed to establish that his injury 

either (i) was caused by conduct attributable to OPM, since

Huron could have selected another plan that would cover a 

new device, or (ii) was likely to be redressed, because a 

favorable ruling from the court would not result in GEHA 

covering his speech-generating device. The district court also 

concluded that, because the Society’s associational standing is 

wholly dependent on Huron’s, the Society lacked standing as 

well. 

 

for speech-generating devices; (ii) negotiate with plan sponsors 

over coverage of speech-generating devices; (iii) require plan 

sponsors to justify exclusions and limitations pertaining to the 

coverage of speech-generating devices; (iv) ensure that federal 

employees have the same access to speech-generating devices as 

private-sector employees do; (v) ensure that federal employees 

receive the best coverage at the lowest cost; and (vi) ensure that 

plan coverage is consistent with changes in medical knowledge or 

standards of practice. 

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II

Analysis

We review the district court’s dismissal of a case for lack 

of standing de novo. See Information Handling Servs., Inc. v. 

Defense Automated Printing Servs., 338 F.3d 1024, 1029 

(D.C. Cir. 2003). In evaluating standing at this early stage of 

the litigation, we assume that the complaint states a valid 

legal claim. Id. 

To establish standing, Huron and the Society must 

demonstrate that (1) they suffered an “injury-in-fact” that is 

“concrete and particularized” and “actual or imminent, not 

conjectural or hypothetical”; (2) the injury is “fairly traceable 

to the challenged action of the defendant, and not the result of 

the independent action of some third party”; and (3) it is 

“likely, as opposed to merely speculative, that the injury will 

be redressed by a favorable decision.” Lujan v. Defenders of 

Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560–561 (1992) (alterations, citations, 

and internal quotation marks omitted). Huron and the Society 

bear the burden of establishing each of those elements of 

standing. Id. Because the parties agree that the Society’s 

claim to associational standing is entirely derivative of 

Huron’s individual injury, see Hunt v. Washington State 

Apple Advertising Comm’n, 432 U.S. 333, 342–343 (1977), 

we focus on Huron’s alleged standing.

Before the district court, Huron repeatedly alleged that 

his injury-in-fact was the financial harm he suffered because 

he was unable to obtain satisfactory coverage for a 

replacement speech-generating device through his Federal 

Program plan. See Plaintiffs’ Mem. of Law in Opposition to 

Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss the Complaint (“Pl. Opp.”), 

Huron v. Berry, No. 1:13-cv-00211-ABJ (D.D.C. filed July 

31, 2013), ECF No. 15, at 19 (“[Huron] therefore cannot 

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obtain a[] [speech-generating device] though his [Federal 

Program] plan,” which caused him “injury in fact.”); id.

(purchasing a new device out-of-pocket “would have required 

Mr. Huron to incur monetary costs, which is obviously a form 

of injury-in-fact”); id. at 20 (borrowing a device “was the best 

available option for him to deal with an injury in fact he had 

already suffered—GEHA’s non-coverage”); id. (“Thus, noncoverage of the [speech-generating device] has impacted Mr. 

Huron in a ‘personal and individual way.’”) (quoting 

Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. at 560 n.1); id. at 22 (“OPM’s 

approvals and determinations currently in force cause him 

monetary injury in fact * * *.”). The district court therefore

conducted its analysis of Huron’s standing based upon that 

asserted injury-in-fact.

3

On appeal, however, Huron has advanced an entirely

different theory of injury and standing not previously 

presented, and has expressly abandoned any argument that he 

suffered a traditional financial injury-in-fact. See Oral Arg.

Tr. 7–8 (Q: “You’re not asserting non-procedural traditional 

Article III injury anymore?” A: “That’s correct, Your 

Honor.” * * * Q: “You’ve completely abandoned that as the 

theory for jurisdiction?” A: “I believe that we have. Yes, 

Your Honor.”). Huron, indeed, makes no meaningful 

challenge to the district court’s findings of both a lack of 

causation and redressability for the previously asserted 

financial injury. 

Instead, Huron recasts his injury-in-fact as a procedural

one caused by OPM’s alleged failure to negotiate vigorously 

 3 DynaVox Mayer-Johnson, the manufacturer of the DynaWrite, 

agreed to lend Huron a replacement speech-generating device 

pending the resolution of this case. Huron must return the device at 

the close of litigation. 

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enough to obtain his desired level of coverage for speechgenerating devices by all Federal Program insurers. 

A procedural injury occurs when a governmental action 

is undertaken without following a required procedure, and 

that procedure both is “designed to protect some threatened 

concrete interest” of the plaintiff and, if not followed, “will 

cause a distinct risk to a particularized interest of the 

plaintiff.” Florida Audubon Soc’y v. Bentsen, 94 F.3d 658, 

664 (D.C. Cir. 2014) (en banc). Under Huron’s new 

approach, he claims to have “suffered both procedural and 

particularized injuries when OPM approved his health 

benefits plan without abiding by the statutorily required 

procedure” that the agency negotiate for plans comparable to 

private sector plans with respect to their coverage of speechgenerating devices. Appellants’ Br. 25. That failure 

purportedly “tainted the plan selection process from the 

outset, and forced Huron to make a ‘coerced choice’ from a 

number of statutorily inadequate options.” Id. at 31.

Huron’s decision to roll out an entirely new argument for 

standing for the first time on appeal, coupled with his failure 

to challenge the district court’s ruling that he lacked 

traditional injury-in-fact standing, dooms his case. “It is well 

settled that issues and legal theories not asserted at the District 

Court level ordinarily will not be heard on appeal.” District 

of Columbia v. Air Florida, Inc., 750 F.2d 1077, 1084 (D.C. 

Cir. 1984); see also Singleton v. Wulff, 428 U.S. 106, 120 

(1976) (“It is the general rule * * * that a federal appellate 

court does not consider an issue not passed upon below.”). 

That rule applies to standing, as much as to merits, arguments,

because it is not the province of an appellate court to 

“hypothesize or speculate about the existence of an injury 

[Plaintiff] did not assert” to the district court. Kawa 

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Orthodontics, LLP v. Secretary, U.S. Dep’t of the Treasury, 

773 F.3d 243, 246 (11th Cir. 2014).

4

 

Any arguments Huron or the Society might have made 

for “traditional” standing, and might have made in response to 

the causation and redressability failings identified by the 

district court, are entirely missing from their briefs and were 

expressly abandoned at oral argument. Accordingly, that 

claim to standing is likewise forfeited. Oral Arg. Tr. 7–8; see

also Williams v. Romarm, SA, 756 F.3d 777, 782–783 (D.C. 

Cir. 2014) (questions not presented and argued in briefs are 

forfeited). 

To be sure, this court has the discretion, in “exceptional 

circumstances, where injustice might otherwise result,” to 

“consider questions of law that were neither raised below nor 

passed upon by the District Court.” Air Florida, Inc., 750 

F.2d at 1085. But Huron makes no argument that this case 

presents such an exceptional circumstance, and we find no

reason to conclude that it does either. 

Huron and the Society do not deny those rules of 

procedure exist. Instead, they insist that they have 

 4 See also, e.g., Pluet v. Frasier, 355 F.3d 381, 384–385 & n.2 (5th

Cir. 2004) (refusing to “disturb the district court’s judgment” based 

on plaintiff’s new standing argument because it was “an entirely 

new legal theory raised for the first time on appeal and is 

accordingly waived”); In re Hen House Interstate, Inc., 177 F.3d 

719, 724 (7th Cir. 1999) (declining to consider alternative statutory 

basis for standing raised for the first time on appeal); Common 

Cause of Pennsylvania v. Pennsylvania ̧ 558 F.3d 249, 263 (3d Cir. 

2009) (“A litigant generally cannot create standing through new 

allegations asserted on appeal.”). Cf. Adarand Constructors, Inc. v. 

Mineta, 534 U.S. 103, 109–110 (2001) (declining to consider 

plaintiff’s belated arguments and evidence regarding standing that 

had “never been presented to any lower court”).

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“consistently” argued procedural standing, Appellants’ Br. 39, 

and that the district court simply “disregarded [Huron’s] 

procedural injury,” id. at 13; see also id. at 25 (“The district 

court, however, failed to recognize that Huron also suffered a 

procedural injury.”); id. at 37 (“The district court did not 

examine redressability under the lens of a procedural standing 

analysis, so its justifications for dismissing Huron’s 

Complaint for lack of redressability are misplaced.”). 

That argument is inaccurate and unfair to the district 

court. Huron and the Society never identified a procedural 

injury or raised procedural standing before the district court, 

and instead argued vigorously for “traditional” standing until 

their briefing on appeal. In fact, Huron and the Society 

explicitly disavowed any argument for procedural standing in 

their opposition to dismissal in district court, contending that 

allegations in the complaint of statutory shortcomings by the 

agency “simply summarize how OPM’s substantive 

determinations may be explained in a procedural context and 

are not intended as stand-alone remediable allegations of 

statutory violations.” Pl. Opp. 13 n.9 (emphasis added). 

III

Conclusion

Huron’s and the Society’s appellate about-face on the 

nature of Huron’s claimed injury leaves them no viable basis 

on which to establish standing. We accordingly affirm the 

judgment of the district court.

So ordered.

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