​This article employs an original empirical analysis to contribute to scientific understandings of the relationship between social characteristics and perceptions of discrimination in health care encounters within and across racial categories in the U.S. Analysis focuses on a diverse sample of 43,020 adults aged 18 to 85 drawn from the 2005 California Health Interview Survey (CHIS). Members of racial minorities were more likely to report perceptions of discrimination, and while the effect was somewhat mitigated by introducing patient and health-care system factors into our models, the race effects remained both statistically significant and of substantial magnitude (particularly for African Americans and Native Americans). Poor self-reported health and communication difficulties in the clinical encounter were associated with increased perceptions of discrimination across all groups. Further, among non-whites, increased education was associated with increased perceptions of discrimination net of other factors.