Katy DeBriere is a Senior Attorney at the National Health Law Program. For more than 15 years, she has represented Medicaid beneficiaries and individuals with disabilities through impact litigation and systemic advocacy.

Before joining NHeLP, Katy was the Legal Director for the Florida Health Justice Project (FHJP), where she led cases including Harrell v. Poppell, which resulted in the reinstatement of over 30,000 erroneously terminated individuals to Florida Medicaid, and Meza v. Weida, which secured Medicaid coverage of incontinence supplies for adult enrollees. Prior to her time at FHJP, Katy directed a medical-legal partnership at Jacksonville Area Legal Aid and represented hundreds of individuals in administrative fair hearings to safeguard their Medicaid, SNAP, and Social Security benefits.

She began her legal career as an Equal Justice Works fellow focused on the rights of persons with developmental disabilities in the criminal justice system, a project inspired by her parents’ work in institutional settings in Kansas and Florida. During that fellowship, Katy litigated J.R. v. Hansen which resulted in the Eleventh Circuit declaring Florida’s involuntary commitment scheme for people with developmental disabilities unconstitutional. While Katy loves Medicaid-related work, the case she counts as her most fulfilling is D.L. v Bateman where she successfully represented two minor children seeking visitation with their incarcerated mother.

Katy received a B.S. with honors from Florida State University and a J.D. with honors from the University of Florida-Levin College of Law.