The beleaguered CARD Clinic has closed its doors due to the federal government shutdown.

CARD Clinic Executive Director Tracy McNew made the announcement Wednesday.

“Unless they come to some sort of agreement this week we’ll be closed until the federal government resumes normal operations,” McNew said. 

The government shutdown began Oct. 1 after lawmakers failed to resolve a budget deadlock, halting some federal operations and putting approximately 750,000 employees on unpaid leave.

The clinic is funded by a $3 million grant from the federal government. The most recent grant began Sept. 1, 2024. 

CARD officials said if patients are experiencing an emergency they should contact their primary care physicians or go to the nearest emergency room.

For other questions, patients are asked to call 406-293-9274. Leave a voicemail and someone will return the call as soon as possible.

CARD has received previous iterations of this grant, made possible through the Environmental Health Hazards provision of the Affordable Care Act, since 2011.

CARD has been sued numerous times over the last few years. It lost a 2023 case against railroad giant BNSF when a jury found the Center for Asbestos Related Disease submitted 337 false claims to the federal government. Federal judge Dana Christensen ordered a $6 million judgment against the clinic. 

BNSF’s involvement relates to asbestos-contaminated vermiculite in the rail yard that a 2024 federal jury said was a considerable factor in the negligent deaths of former Libby residents Thomas Wells and Joyce Walder. Both Wells and Walder lived near the railyard and were both diagnosed with mesothelioma and died in 2020. Those cases are currently under appeal.

In September 2024, CARD lost an appeal to a federal jury’s $6 million judgment in June 2023. CARD filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in August 2023, allowing it to continue operations. But the United States intervened in the bankruptcy proceeding and determined that the judgment should not be paid, so the bankruptcy was settled and dismissed in spring 2024.

Most of the claims at issue in the trial concerned the submission of EHH forms to Medicare, which certified that patients had been diagnosed with an asbestos-related disease and were eligible for coverage under an Affordable Care Act provision created to respond to Libby’s environmental health threat. 

According to CARD Executive Director Tracy McNew, prior to trial, Judge Christensen made a legal ruling that any claim based only on an imaging read by an outside “B-reader” radiologist was invalid, making it likely that those certifications constituted a bulk of the 337 claims.

Then the clinic’s original location on East Third Street was closed on Wednesday, May 7, when the Lincoln County Sheriff's Office served a Writ of Execution on the Center for Asbestos Related Disease, Inc. to satisfy the judgment against the clinic.

CARD is also the target of a local lawsuit filed Oct. 10, 2024, in Lincoln County District Court. It alleges medical malpractice, wrongful death and claims of disabling Lincoln County residents by prescribing them opioid pain killers following the misdiagnosis of health issues. 

The civil suit, still pending, alleges medical malpractice against Dr. Charles Brad Black and the clinic, including McNew. The court filing also argues the facility knew or should have known both men didn’t satisfy diagnostic requirements for asbestos-related disease and should not have been giving opioid pain medications in the manner prescribed by the clinic's providers.  

Just last month, CARD was sued in federal court by its insurance carrier. General Star Indemnity Company, a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway, which also owns BNSF Railway, filed an amended suit Sept. 29 against the clinic and associated individuals, including Dr. Karen Lee Morrissette, Executive Director Tracy McNew, Physician Assistant Miles Miller, Michelle Boltz, R.N. and Board of Directors President Leroy Thom.

The suit alleges CARD officials misrepresented its application for a medical malpractice insurance policy that went into effect at the beginning of 2025. General Star said CARD officials indicated on the application that they were not aware of any acts, errors, omissions, facts or circumstances that may result in a claim or suit.

The insurance company, with its main office in Stamford, Connecticut, alleges that CARD misrepresented its application when it failed to disclose that it had been liable for the fraudulent misdiagnosis of hundreds of patients. 

General Star also wants to recover money that has been paid or may be paid on CARD’s or its employees’ behalf in connection with the underlying malpractice claims.

Those may include claims filed in Lincoln County District Court involving David Wickwire, Brenda M. Auge and several others. Wickwire filed his complaint Aug. 6, 2025, against CARD. The remainder filed their respective suits Sept. 18, 2025, against the clinic and its representatives. They claim to be CARD patients or representatives of decedents who were patients at the clinic.

They are all represented by attorney Adam Duerk of Missoula firm McFarland Molloy Lacny and Duerk as well as Libby attorney Amy N. Guth. Duerk represented BNSF in its suit against CARD.