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The ACLU-NJ was a leading source, along with the Medical Society of the New Jersey and AIDS activist groups, of objections that led to cancellation of proposed regulations that would have permitted group health insurers to test for the HIV virus as a basis for exclusion from insurance coverage. Former Insurance Commissioner Drew Karpinski made the proposal just before he left office in mid-October under conflict-of-interest charges. The ACLU argued against the regulation in a joint letter submitted by Professor John V. Jacobi of Seton Hall Law School and Legal Director Marsha Wenk. After receipt of this and many other communications, almost all negative, the new insurance commissioner, Elizabeth Randall, withdrew the proposal as one of her first official actions. The ACLU emphasized that the proposed policy would actually codify discrimination against people with HIV or AIDS. It would permit testing for HIV even though an insurer does not test for other comparably expensive illnesses. Thus, aside from leaving a large portion of our citizenry without coverage, the proposed rule would have violated the Americans with Disabilities Act, and lulled employers into committing violations themselves. We also argued that the proposed rule failed to adequately protect the confidentiality of the test results.