- White House asks Congress to Eliminate Head Start Funding. The current budget draft eliminates funding for Head Start, which provides early education, meals, and health screenings for pre-k kids. The elimination of Head Start was a stated goal of Project 2025.
Head Start outcomes are extremely successful, showing benefits for children in early literacy, social-emotional skills, health and dental improvements, early intervention for disabilities, and a >90% decrease in the need for family separation and foster care.
Many preschools–which include both public and private programs–who receive the funding were already struggling due to earlier federal freezes and staffing cuts. - US Citizen arrested on ICE hold, while White House flouts SCOTUS rulings and wants expansion of camps for “homegrowns.” Trump met with the President of El Salvador, and the two congratulated themselves on the imprisonment of asylum seekers and legal US residents. Trump remarked that US citizen “homegrown” prisoners would be next.
Despite various judicial rulings, including a unanimous SCOTUS ruling that the administration should facilitate the return of Kilmar Abrego-Garcia, the White House has continued to organize more deportations and posted on X that Garcia will “never return.”
A US-born man was also imprisoned yesterday in Florida due to an ICE hold, even though he presented an authentic US birth certificate. He has since been released.
If the Executive branch does not accept the rulings of the judicial branch, rule of law ceases to exist in the US, paving the way for any and all “undesirables” to be sent to illegal detainment camps. - RFK spouts misinformation and hatred about autistic people. Autistic and disabled organizers, alongside parents and teachers of autistic children were alarmed at RFK Jr’s hateful comments on autism and his department’s plan to find the “environmental causes” of autism by September. His quote: “Autism destroys families, and more importantly, it destroys our greatest resource, which is our children. These are children who should not be suffering like this, These are kids who will never pay taxes, they’ll never hold a job, they’ll never play baseball, they’ll never write a poem, they’ll never go out on a date. Many of them will never use a toilet unassisted…. We have to recognize we are doing this to our children, and we need to put an end to it.”
- (RFK Cont’d) Current studies show that nearly 80% of autism can be attributed to genetic factors. Recent increases in diagnosis and visibility are due to the reclassification of autism as a spectrum disorder, better screening, diagnostic, and support tools, and in-community living over institutionalization.
RFK’s remarks rang false for many autistic people and their families who live full and meaningful lives (including autistic adults who pay taxes).
Even in the case of high support needs individuals, no human’s value should be calculated by their monetary input into society. This is a direct regurgitation of eugenic rhetoric used throughout history to forcibly sterilize and murder disabled people, notably the Germans’ labeling of “useless eaters” as “drain” on society in the lead-up to murdering 300,000+ disabled people. - HHS fallout reveals loss of Advisory Committee on Heritable Diseases in Newborns and Children (ACHDNC). The latest HHS cuts include ACHDNC, which helped identify which genetic screenings should be available for newborns and children, and standardize the process across all states.
Without federal guidance and funding, states may or may not provide screenings, meaning that there will be delays and missed opportunities for early intervention in children with those conditions. Many of the conditions are rare, so families might not even know what to look for or ask their doctors about.
The move is at odds with RFK’s professed desire to ameliorate “children’s suffering” in his remarks on autism. - More HHS fallout. In addition to departments and programs noted in previous weeks, others continue to be endangered by the vast staffing cuts enacted across the department.
The FDA announced yesterday their plan to remove their food safety inspection programs due staffing constraints. The risk of foodborne illness hurts everyone, but can be deadly for children, the elderly, the chronically ill, immunocompromised, and pregnant people. Certain foodborne illness, like listeria, also cause stillbirth.
Due to the $11 billion in CDC funding cuts, many long-COVID education and research projects at the state-level have been forced to make drastic cuts or close completely. Researchers believe approximately 6 in 100 people develop a post-covid medical condition. - HHS issues “clarification” regarding gender dysphoria in Section 504’s Final Rule. RFK Jr. issued a clarification this week, noting that the mention of gender dysphoria in the preamble of Final Rule is not actually an enforceable part of Section 504, as opponents of the suit have pointed out since the initial filing of Texas v. Becerra.
However, precedent has been established for gender dysphoria being a protected condition under the ADA via other recent court decisions like Williams v. Kincaid.
It’s unclear what this statement regarding Final Rule will mean for Texas v. Becerra, which remains ongoing. - Texas v. Becerra lawsuit continues. Attorneys General continue to use transphobic rhetoric to attack Final Rule and Section 504, despite recent statements from HHS.
Participants continue to say they do not want to dismantle disabled people’s rights, but have not revoked the original filing, which explicitly asks for 504 to be declared unconstitutional (p 37-42).
504 protects disabled people’s rights in all spaces that receive federal funding, but could have major implications in conjunction with rescinding of ADA guidance, and the uncertain future of DoEd. The next update is due in the coming days. - Local: Utah’s SB199 violates the ADA, due process. Late last month the Governor of Utah signed SB199, setting up a separate guardianship process for adults with “severe” disabilities.
Guardianship protocol already exists in UT, but the new set-up allows people to circumvent due process if a doctor declares a person’s disability “severe.”
Some disabled people benefit from guardianship arrangements, but all people have a right to due process, and the categorization of “severe” is vague.
The ACLU is currently attempting to block the bill as a violation of one’s right to due process and the ADA. - Do not comply in advance (good news). Due to pending legal action over McMahon’s DoEd issued directive to withhold funding from schools pending receipt of their anti-DEI loyalty pledge, a judge ordered that schools do not need to sign any certifications until at least April 24, after the legality of the pledge is assessed. Previously, the directive required school leadership to sign within 10 days.
So far VT, MA, CT, NY DE, PA, MI, WI, IL, MN, CO, UT, OR, WA, CA, officials have declined to sign, while other states have declared their intent to sign or are still in review. See the full map here.
Category: Medicine
Information about medical rights.
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Week 13 Updates
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Week 12 Update
- House passes budget framework, paving the way for deep social cuts. The House passed the budget framework that paves the way for Trump’s desired budget, including trillions in tax cuts for rich people, increased defense spending, increased spending autonomy for the President, weakening social security, and an estimated $880 billion in cuts to Medicaid.
The House and Senate must now work to turn their resolutions into actual legislative text, which will reveal the minute breakdown of their spending plan and cuts. This is typically a months-long process. - Markets roil as Trump plays with global tariffs, threatens more. Trump issued tariffs on multiple countries in a questionably legal process this week, promptly tanking the global market. He paused some of the tariffs for 90 days due to instability, but kept a tax at over 100% on goods from China, who also levied their own tariffs. (Update: as of noon on 4/12, Trump also paused tariffs on electronics like smartphones and computers.)
Tariff costs are passed down to the buyer, meaning further hikes in a market where food and basics prices are already soaring. This will be a hardship for all Americans, but especially those already struggling with food insecurity, and/or those on a fixed income.
Trump also announced tariffs on pharmaceutical imports to be implemented “shortly,” with no details yet on which medications will be affected. Medical device and equipment prices are already expected to rise due to current tariffs. - HHS fallout reveals more disability-centric programs lost. Massive cuts at the CDC’s National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities last week left advocates reeling. Now the cuts are coming clear:
EHDI programming for universal newborn hearing screenings has been eliminated. States have received some funding in 2025, but may not receive the rest.
The CDC partnership with the Special Olympics has also been eliminated. Trump and DeVos first tried to defund the program in 2017. (4/12, clarifying note: The Special Olympics funding and oversight primarily came from OSERS in the Dept of Ed, but those employees were also laid off in earlier an earlier RIF).
A department dedicated to sickle cell research is gone.
The team for national data collection on adults with cognitive disabilities is gone, just before a key report about the rise in cognitive disability in young people was to be released. Some say it’s being blocked so RFK can bury evidence contradicting his own team’s theories about “autism’s origins,” which he’s promised to “reveal” by September. - White House Press Secretary says the administration is seeking a “legal” pathway for deporting US citizens. White House press secretary Leavitt mentioned this week that the administration was looking into whether there is a legal pathway to deport US citizens. (There’s not!)
Leavitt said the move would only be exercised on “criminals” who commit “heinous” crimes. However, that the DOJ has already been stripping students of their visas for protests and other thought crimes, and 75% of the immigrants who were illegally deported to El Salvador have no criminal record suggest they will continue to use their power for show against anyone they want.
Legal scholars and historians fear the move will be used to strip the citizenship and/or detain anyone “undesirable,” a frightening a echo from 1930s Germany’s stripping of citizenship from Jewish people and others, the 1940s US internment of Japanese people, and other war crimes. - House passes “Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act” (SAVE Act). The proposed law, which will require people to present proof of citizenship in-person in order to register to vote, passed the House this week, including votes from for Democratic representatives.
One major concern is that women who changed their name due to marriage won’t be able to use their birth certificates for proof of citizenship, since their surnames no longer match. An amendment was suggested to remedy this, but it was denied.
People with any name different than what’s issued on their birth certificate will need a passport to register, and everyone will need to present this proof in-person. 50% of Americans have no passport.
SAVE would place undue hardship and expense, and restrict the right to vote of the elderly, disabled, women and trans folks, those living rurally and more.
The bill is likely to be voted down in the Senate, but it is still worth calling about. - DOGE accesses Social Security database, falsely begins declaring some recipients “dead” to stop payments. DOGE has shown their inability to understand basic information stored within the SSA’s database over the past months, in part because it is written in an archaic coding language. Previously DOGE said they would rewrite the code, but that is a long-term project.
In the interim, DOGE has declared some people dead as a way of removing them from the payment system. This has largely attacked immigrants, but some US citizens were also placed into the “death master file.”
Beyond stopping social security payments, falsely declaring someone dead will have massive implications on their ability to move through the world, may cut access to their credit cards and more. SSA employees who tried to stop DOGE were ejected from the building. - Texas v. Becerra lawsuit continues. Attorneys General continue to use transphobic rhetoric to attack Final Rule and Section 504.
Participants continue to say they do not want to dismantle disabled people’s rights, but have not revoked the original filing, which explicitly asks for 504 to be declared unconstitutional (p 37-42).
504 protects disabled people’s rights in all spaces that receive federal funding, but could have major implications in conjunction with rescinding of ADA guidance, and the uncertain future of DoEd. The next update is due in the coming days. - Do not comply in advance (good news). Due to pending legal action over McMahon’s DoEd issued directive to withhold funding from schools pending receipt of their anti-DEI loyalty pledge, a judge ordered that schools do not need to sign any certifications until at least April 24, after the legality of the pledge is assessed.
Previously, the directive required school leadership to sign within 10 days.
So far NY, MA, PA, MI, WI, IL, MN, CO, OR, and WA officials have declined to sign, while other states have declared their intent to sign or are still in review. (full map of states’ declared intent)
Action:
Share this info. Disability is often lost in mainstream coverage.
Call your Representative and tell them to intervene on behalf of the Dept of Education, SSA and HHS regarding illegal layoffs.
Call your Senator and tell them to vote NO on SAVE and any budget cuts to Medicaid.
Contact your school board and state’s education officials, and tell them not to comply with McMahon’s baseless anti-DEI directive.
If your state is involved, contact your Attorney General and ask them to withdraw from Texas v. Beccera. Tell them you stand in solidarity with disabled people, and trans folks.
Consider how to move toward creative acts of mutual aid, local protest and growing awareness, including offline materials. Make flyers! Warn your neighbors in the presence of ICE. If able, donate or volunteer with your local food pantry or library.
- House passes budget framework, paving the way for deep social cuts. The House passed the budget framework that paves the way for Trump’s desired budget, including trillions in tax cuts for rich people, increased defense spending, increased spending autonomy for the President, weakening social security, and an estimated $880 billion in cuts to Medicaid.
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Week 11 Update
- More HHS layoffs gut public health and research. HHS fired an additional 10,000 workers this week, shuttering entire departments, ending grants and cutting spending by an additional third across the board.
The closures will impact every American’s safety from infectious disease, foodborne illness, worker safety, HIV, STI and TB programs, maternal health, and vast amounts of research.
Disabled-specific closures include the Administration for Community Living, the CDC’s Office of Health Equity, cuts to HRSA, and several subdivisions of the National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities.
For the full list of HHS departments cut, see this running list. - Economy in freefall as Trump and DOGE slash safety nets. On Wednesday, all Low Income Heat and Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) staff were fired. The program helps struggling families with utility bills. Many food banks also reported not receiving expected deliveries of food due to more cuts from the USDA, in addition to the $1 billion in cuts previously announced, though the funding had already been allocated.
This comes as the stock market freefalls in the wake of Trump’s latest tariff plan, prices continue to rise, the GOP targets Medicaid, dismantles public education and libraries, and as DOGE attacks social security as a “ponzi scheme” and threatens to crash the system by recoding the database. - Deaf students and researchers lose programs, funding, especially in STEM. Cuts at the NIH this week obliterated programming for deaf people in STEM at the undergrad, graduate, and post doc levels. The RISE and BRIDGE programs out of NTID were impacted, as well as individuals’ postdoc funding.
Gallaudet’s Center for Black Deaf Studies is imperiled by the termination of it’s founder Dr. Joseph Hill’s NEH grant.
The University of Minnesota also shut down their deaf studies program this week, midsemester with no warning– the reason is unclear.
Removing deaf (or culturally-competent) professionals will have a variety of educational and employment impacts, and will allow ableism to run unchecked through deaf-related research. - Kidnapped Rümeysa Öztürk suffers asthma attacks in ICE detention, ICE withholds medication. Öztürk, a Turkish PhD student and former Fulbright Scholar, was taken off the street by plainclothes officers in March, likely for having co-written an op-ed in her school newspaper that criticized the school’s response to Gaza-related protests.
Öztürk was being illegally detained in Louisiana, where she suffered several asthma attacks and was denied her medication, one of many dangerous conditions for the chronically ill, disabled, and everyone, inside these prisons. In a hearing Thursday, a judge blocked the DOJ’s attempt to deport Öztürk, and moved her petition to be heard in VT (instead of LA).Öztürk has not been charged with a crime. - DoEd threatens to revoke funding from schools who don’t sign an Anti-DEI loyalty pledge. DoEd issued a letter to state education leaders across the country, threatening to withhold funding unless schools eliminate anything that could be construed as “DEI” programming. The letter asked administrators to sign a document promising their adherence to anti-DEI guidance within 10 days.
The directive throws confusion on the administration’s attempts and promises to dismantle DoEd. It’s unclear who will enforce the directive or distribute the funding, which DoEd’s acting assistant Civil Rights secretary called a “privilege,” but is actually taxpayers’ money.
Disabled and multiply marginalized students, particularly those in rural and low income districts, will suffer most from a loss of Title 1 and other funding. - Texas v Becerra lawsuit continues. Attorneys General continue to use transphobic rhetoric to attack Final Rule and Section 504. Participants continue to say they do not want to dismantle disabled people’s rights, but have not revoked the original filing, which explicitly asks for 504 to be declared unconstitutional (p 37-42).
504 protects disabled people’s rights in all spaces that receive federal funding, but could have major implications in conjunction with rescinding of ADA guidance, and the uncertain future of DoEd. The next update is due in the coming days. - Early Hearing detection and intervention programs impacted by CDC cuts. Federal EHDI programming gave funding and resources to states to conduct universal newborn hearing screenings, and support deaf and hard-of-hearing babies and their families. Full impacts are still unclear, but these workers were housed at the CDC’s NCBDDD, which saw massive cuts this week. Maternal and Infant Health divisions elsewhere in HHS also saw cuts that may impact EHDI funding.
Without universal hearing screenings for early detection, d/hh children will be at higher risk for language deprivation syndrome–when incomplete access to a first language before approx. age 5, causes pervasive social, emotional, educational and cognitive damage. - Local: Several school districts are announcing the removal of special ed programs and students. Without an OSEP director and with the DoEd civil rights division slashed, it’s unclear if there is any recourse for families.
Two districts who made headlines are the South Range Local District, OH, who told 7th and 8th graders with IEPs not to return next year due to “staffing issues,” and Dysart Unified Schools, who notified families they were shuttering their high school students’ special ed program, making plans to send them to a different school without family consultation.
This trend is likely to continue without DoEd to enforce IDEA, the law that guarantees disabled children’s rights to K-12 education. - Do not comply in advance (good news). Immediately after McMahon’s DoEd issued the directive to withhold funding from schools pending receipt of their anti-DEI loyalty pledge, the New York state Dept. of Education replied forcefully declaring that they would not comply, citing a lack of legal standing for the move.
The Mayor of Chicago also threatened that the city would sue the if funding is withheld. Other cities and towns are likely to follow.
Take Action:
Share this info. Disability is often lost in mainstream coverage.
Call your Representative and tell them to intervene on behalf of the Dept of Education and HHS regarding illegal layoffs.
Contact your school board and state’s education officials, and tell them not to comply with McMahon’s baseless anti-DEI directive.
If your state is involved, contact your Attorney General and ask them to withdraw from Texas v. Beccera. Tell them you stand in solidarity with disabled people, and trans folks.
Attend one of the nationwide protests today, Saturday, 5 April if able. Wear a mask!
Consider how to move toward creative acts of mutual aid, local protest and growing awareness, including offline materials. Make flyers! Warn your neighbors in the presence of ICE. If able, donate or volunteer with your local food pantry or library.
- More HHS layoffs gut public health and research. HHS fired an additional 10,000 workers this week, shuttering entire departments, ending grants and cutting spending by an additional third across the board.
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Week 10 Update
- The Department of Health and Human Services laid off 10,000 employees. HHS underwent sweeping layoffs this week, with whole sub-agencies and departments shuttered and grants cut.
This comes as the administration continues to say that special education oversight and services will be moved to HHS. Now the department not only has no educational expertise, but is also stretched thin.
Programs for HIV and infectious disease prevention were abruptly eliminated on Thursday. More clarity on the fallout from layoffs and specific departments lost is expected through the weekend. - RFK Jr. begins shutdown of the Administration for Community Living (ACL). On Thursday, HHS began restructuring in the wake of the layoffs, including a move to close the ACL. The ACL supports disabled and elderly people’s right to live and work in-community. It helps ensure programming access is efficient so disabled people can be more independent and financially stable.
Without the ACL, advocates are concerned about economic impacts, an increase in homelessness, and a move back toward forced institutionalization. - RFK Jr. taps antivaxxer to lead study about link between autism and vaccines, forces FDA’s Peter Mark’s resignation. RFK Jr. announced a large-scale federal study into the already-debunked theory linking vaccines and autism. He forced the resignation of top FDA vaccine scientist Peter Mark, and has selected noted antivaxxer David Geier to lead the project.
Geier has published numerous false papers on vaccines and autism with his father, Mark Geier, based on research they conduct in their basement.
RFK Jr. himself frequently profits from antivax rhetoric, and has spoken disparagingly of autistic people a “threat” to the American way of life. Geier is not a doctor. He has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Maryland. - Deaf community sees tough losses in technology and educational funding. Gallaudet University lost a multi-million dollar grant for deaf technology under the HHS reorganization, while an NIH cut axed an undergraduate STEM program for deaf students out of NTID. (Per internal sources; specific numbers and grant titles pending secondary confirmation.)
Minnesota’s Deaf Community Support Center was also forced to close its doors after a federal COVID-19 related grant was cut.
The Liaison who oversees and advocates for funding for NTID, Gallaudet, and other special institutions, was fired in the DoED layoffs, despite that position being mandated by the 1986 law The Education of the Deaf Act. These remain a small sample of what is likely to come from HHS and DoED layoff fallout. - DOGE plans to rewrite Social Security database, threatening delayed payments. In an ongoing effort to prove as yet nonexistent fraud, DOGE has decided to re-program the SSA’s database into an updated programming language.
COBOL, the current language of the database, is legitimately old. However, safely recoding a project of this scale would take years, and DOGE has set a 9-month timeline. Experts are concerned this will put the integrity of the database at risk, and could cause delayed or lost payments, or total collapse.
Simultaneously DOGE cuts have closed 47 field offices, as well as phone verification options, forcing the elderly and disabled to travel long distances to acquire benefits. - Texas vs. Becerra lawsuit continues. Attorneys General continue to use transphobic rhetoric to attack Final Rule and Section 504. Participants continue to say they do not want to dismantle disabled people’s rights, but have not revoked the original filing, which explicitly asks for 504 to be declared unconstitutional (p 37-42).
504 protects disabled people’s rights in all spaces that receive federal funding, but could have major implications in conjunction with rescinding of ADA guidance, and the uncertain future of DoEd. The next update is due in April. - Executive Order, “Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections.” On Tuesday Trump issued an illegal executive order aimed at sweeping election reform, including: mail-in voting restrictions, requiring a REAL ID or passport to prove citizenship to vote, and the Homeland Security and DOGE creation and “review” of a list of registered voters.
The law clearly says that states have the power to oversee and regulate their own elections, so this executive order will be difficult to enforce. However, we may see conservative states comply in advance. Limiting mail-in access or requiring in-person registration would infringe on disabled and elderly people’s ability to vote. - Illegally fired DoED employees pack up; Senate sees new bill to abolish department. DoED employees laid off in a massive gutting of the department two weeks ago returned to pack their things on Friday. Many of those firings were illegal, as certain positions within DoED are mandated by educational law. People lined the sidewalks to cheer the former employees in a “clap-out” event as they left.
21 States are currently suing to have DoEd employees return to work. A timeline of the suit is unclear, as is whether the current administration will follow a judge’s orders.
Rand Paul (KY) introduced a new bill, S 1148, to eliminate the department on Wednesday. - Reminder: Our liberation is intertwined. It’s difficult to keep up with the pace of the news, but important to keep sight of the fact that all marginalized people’s rights are intertwined.
Just as the Section 504 lawsuit sets precedent for the destruction of other civil rights clauses, so too does the arrest and deportation of immigrants without due process affect disabled people’s, and everyone’s, rights to a functioning judicial system with the power to roll back illegal overreaches, and an overall government that adheres to the Constitution. Solidarity is our only way through.
Action:
Share this info. Disability is often lost in mainstream coverage.Call your Representative and tell them to intervene on behalf of the Dept of Education, the ADA, the Administration for Community Living (ACL) and other HHS programs.
Make sure your vaccines are up to date, especially if you may have received an inactive virus version of the MMR vaccine from 1963-67.
If your state is involved, contact your Attorney General and ask them to withdraw from Texas v. Beccera. Tell them you stand in solidarity with disabled people, and trans folks.
Deaf folks and allies–contact the Gallaudet and NTID Boards of Trustees and urge them to be proactive about the futures of these universities.
Consider how to move toward creative acts of growing awareness, including offline materials, local protest and mutual aid.
- The Department of Health and Human Services laid off 10,000 employees. HHS underwent sweeping layoffs this week, with whole sub-agencies and departments shuttered and grants cut.
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Breaking: Department of Justice Begins Rollback of ADA
Yesterday the Department of Justice began removing guidance related to the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), the law that protects disabled people’s rights to access and accommodations in public.
While the law itself remains on the books, the definition of legal “access” is developed by guidance from the US Access Board. The Board, comprised of at least half disabled people, is supposed to meet annually, but their meeting was cancelled in January. Now the law is being hollowed out by the DOJ.The DOJ is using a January Executive Order aimed at “lowering the cost of living” as the justification for the rollback.
That accommodating disabled people is too expensive is age-old rhetoric favored by eugenicists and Nazis, and has been used to justify segregation, institutionalization, neglect, forced sterilization, and murder of disabled people here and abroad.So far, 11 guidance documents have been removed, with protections ranging from self-service gas stations, customer communication, hotel accessibility, general public-facing businesses, and several pandemic-era additions. (Links are to archived content; pages have since been removed.)
This is an ongoing story.
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Week 8 Update
- Hundreds of Illegal Layoffs at the Department of Education. DoED laid off over 1300 employees Tuesday night, nearly half the department. Secretary McMahon made a statement that layoffs would not affect special ed, nor any legally-mandated positions, but that was a lie.
Layoffs were conducted without review via a generic, “Dear colleague” letter, including eliminating workers in mandated positions that are not allowed to be vacant by law. Many workers who were supposed to continue on until the end of the month or longer cannot consistently access their emails and computers due to DOGE control.
The layoffs spanned a variety of departments, cutting large swaths of the Office of Civil Rights (OCR).The Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS) was also impacted.
The entire office providing funding for Gallaudet, NTID, the American Printing House for the Blind, Helen Keller National Center, and other special institutions has been laid off.
There is also currently no director at the head of OSEP, the office overseeing IDEA. McMahon sparked anger in an interview after the layoffs, in which she revealed she did not know what “IDEA” stands for. - Regional DoEd Offices Shuttered. In addition to the layoffs, seven regional Department of Education offices have also been closed down: Cleveland, Boston, New York, Dallas, San Francisco, Chicago, Philadelphia.
Among many impacts, this will further delay already long wait times for students and families dealing with discrimination complaints. - DOGE Continues to infiltrate Social Security Administration (SSA). The DOGE team continues to grow at SSA, in what journalists believe to be the largest presence at any agency. Musk and friends have alleged “mass fraud” at the agency, but have not produced any evidence of the claim.
DOGE is currently considering cancelling benefits for nearly 200,000 people who receive social security benefits without a SSN; however the majority of those are disabled children whose benefits are redirected to a “designated payee” in their parent or guardian. - DOGE takes aim at the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Under Musk, DOGE targeted HUD for layoffs of around half of the department, which oversees housing vouchers, rental assistance, public housing and a variety of anti-homelessness initiatives, including rebuild grants for communities after disaster.
HUD also oversees fair housing laws and fields discrimination complaints.
At least 50% of the US’s unhoused population is disabled. - Senate Finance Committee holds hearing for Dr. Mehmet Oz. TV personality “Doctor Oz” was tapped to be Administrator of the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services, and began his hearing Friday.
He is poised to oversee Medicaid, Medicare, and administrative duties related to the Affordable Care Act as Republicans vow to make deep cuts to the former two programs. Oz sidestepped questions about whether he would protect Medicaid from cuts during Friday’s hearing. - Senate passes a Continuing Resolution for the GOP’s budget bill. Republicans, with the help of 10 Democrats, voted to pass a continuing resolution that avoids a government shutdown until September.
A coalition of anti-Trump organizers, including the federal workers union, had rallied to encourage Democrats to vote NO, in an effort to bring Republicans to the negotiating table and include language to reign in DOGE’s unfettered slashing of federal programs and employment. Instead, a small group of Democrats helped push the bill through.
Now that Democrats have ceded their leverage it will be difficult to stop further implementation of Project 2025 or DOGE cuts, beyond lawsuits after the fact. - Texas vs. Beccera lawsuit continues. Attorneys General continue to use transphobic rhetoric to attack Final Rule and Section 504.
Participants continue to say they do not want to dismantle disabled people’s rights, but have not revoked the original filing, which explicitly asks for 504 to be declared unconstitutional (p 37-42).
504 protects disabled people’s rights in all spaces that receive federal funding, but could have major implications for those needing interpreters in hospitals in light of the new English EO.
The next update is due in April. - Good News… 21 Attorneys General have banded together to sue the administration regarding the illegal firings of Department of Education employees. This comes alongside previously established suits and union actions already in-play for other firings and freezings across the federal workforce.
A judge also ordered Thursday that probationary employees across multiple agencies who were laid off should be reinstated.
Action Items:
Share this info. Disability is often lost in mainstream coverage.- Call your Representative and tell them to intervene on behalf of the Dept. of Education.
- Call the Senate Finance Committee members and tell them to vote NO on Dr. Oz.
- Protest University of Texas at Austin’s hosting of the upcoming racist and eugenicist conference.
- Make sure your vaccines are up to date, especially if you may have received an inactive virus version of the MMR vaccine from 1963-67, which was ineffective
- If your state is involved, contact your Attorney General and ask them to withdraw from Texas v. Beccera. Tell them you stand in solidarity with disabled people, and trans folks.
- Consider how you can pivot to creative and local acts of resistance now that elected officials have ceded negotiating power. Here are some ideas.
- Hundreds of Illegal Layoffs at the Department of Education. DoED laid off over 1300 employees Tuesday night, nearly half the department. Secretary McMahon made a statement that layoffs would not affect special ed, nor any legally-mandated positions, but that was a lie.
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Call Scripts for 13 March Regarding Budget Resolution and Illegal DoED Layoffs
Script for Calling Your Senator (*Time Sensitive*–they must vote by Friday, 314)
Find your Senator’s phone number hereHello Senator [last name],
My Name is [full name] and I’m a constituent calling from zip code [your zip code] to ask you to vote NO on the budget bill until there are firm guardrails in place that take financial control from DOGE and return it to Congress, as stipulated by the Constitution.
The executive overreach of freezing Congressionally-approved spending and firing federal workers is illegal and dangerous.
I understand concerns about the impacts of a temporary government shutdown, but the government is not currently functioning by the rule of law. Giving Republicans free reign to gut Medicaid and SNAP will harm even more Americans. Please use this moment of leverage to stand with the American people and the Constitution, and vote NO unless enforceable protections are implemented. Thank you.
Script for Calling Your House Representative
Click to find your Representative
Hello Representative [last name],
My Name is [full name] and I’m a constituent calling from zip code [your zip code] to ask you to stop the Trump administration from harming students and families by dismantling the Department of Education. By closing key offices and conducting illegal layoffs, Trump and DOGE are trying to bypass Congress to gut the department.[Personal statement here] Ex: In particular, I’m a [parent / student / teacher / community member], concerned about about the impact that these cuts will have on students with disabilities, including funding and oversight for programs like [IDEA, 504, Gallaudet, American Printing House for the Blind, Helen Keller National Center, Special Olympics. If applicable, restate importance of program to you or your family.]
This is an overreach by the executive branch. Please act to protect the students and the federal workers who serve them. Thank you.
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Week 7 Updates
- Linda McMahon confirmed, prepares to gut DoED. The Senate confirmed Linda McMahon to her post as Secretary of the Department of Education. Almost immediately she sent out an email to all employees titled, “Our Department’s Final Mission” detailing her desire to emphasize patriotism and vocational skills in American education, while simultaneously dismantling federal oversight. Trump was due to sign an EO aimed at gutting the dept on Thursday, but delayed due to unpopularity. (Keep it up!)
- Musk calls people who receive government assistance the “parasite class.” Musk posted on X referring to people who receive Social Security or government assistance as the “parasite class.” The comment comes as DOGE seeks to gut the Social Security Administration and the GOP sets its sights on Medicaid funding.
Dehumanizing rhetoric, especially referring to people as animals, is Stage 4 in the Ten Stages of Genocide. In the lead up to the Rwandan genocide, the Tutsis were called “cockroaches”; in Germany, Nazis called Jews “vermin,” disabled people “useless eaters,” and more. - Executive Order “Designating English as the Official Language of the US”. The EO declares English the US’s official language and revokes the Clinton EO, “Improving Access to Services for Persons with Limited English Proficiency,” Individual agencies can now choose whether they want to provide materials in other languages.
The changes may have dangerous impacts for those needing medical and legal interpreters, as well as educational impacts for English language learners. Section 504 and the still ADA protect the right to ASL interpreters, but procuring funding may be more complicated, (and the 504 lawsuit even more consequential). - DOGE Takes Aim at Social Security Administration. Workers inside the Social Security Administration (SSA) said DOGE have been controlling their computer access for weeks, including internet access to outside news websites. A new plan aims to cut 12% of the workforce, or about 7,000 people, though more are expected to be driven out by stressors. The SSA workforce was already stretched thin, operating at a 50-year low.
Musk called social security a “Ponzi scheme” and alleged massive fraud. However, American workers pay into Social Security to receive their retirement benefits, and there is no evidence of widespread fraud. 70 million retired and disabled Americans depend on Social Security benefits. They layoffs may cause payment delays and make it harder to access SSA offices, helplines, and more. - More Attacks on Veterans Affairs, Employment. The Department of Veterans Affairs announced a major overhaul this week, with a goal to lay off approximately 80,000 workers. The plan is sure to disrupt veterans’ healthcare, hospitals, mental health services, and other benefits, as well as lay off many veterans in the process–the federal government is also the number one employer of disabled veterans across many agencies.
In discussing the potential layoffs, Alina Habbas, one of the President’s lawyers, said, that those veterans affected may not be “fit to have a job at this moment.” - RFK Jr. waffles on vaccines as US Sees 2nd measles death. RFK Jr. Released an Op-Ed on Fox News that appeared to encourage people to get vaccinated against the measles as the outbreak surged in Texas and cases appeared on the east coast. Others say RFK’s views are unchanged, and his mention of “therapeutic treatments” in addition to vaccines is a dog-whistle to antivax followers.
Under Kennedy, the CDC announced a new large-scale study into vaccines and autism on Friday. The topic has already been thoroughly studied, with no link found. Increased rates of autism in children are attributed to better screenings. - Eugenics and “Race Science” conference to convene in Texas. The 2nd annual “Natal Conference” will take place at University of Texas at Austin’s AT&T Conference Center on March 27-28th. “Natalism” is philosophy that believes in the importance of childbearing for social (or religious) reasons, and thus advocates for a high birthrate.
Eugenics and “race science” are strains of pseudoscience founded in the belief that humanity can be “improved” through selective breeding. Typically, these ideas are used to reinforce racist stereotypes and ableism. Various far-right and neofascist influencers are slated to speak. Musk has also been invited. - Texas v. Beccera lawsuit continues. Attorneys General continue to use transphobic rhetoric to attack Final Rule and Section 504. Participants continue to say they do not want to dismantle disabled people’s rights, but have not revoked the original filing, which explicitly asks for 504 to be declared unconstitutional (p 37-42).
504 protects disabled people’s rights in all spaces that receive federal funding, but could have major implications for those needing interpreters in hospitals in light of the new English EO. The next update is due in April.
Action Items
Share this info. Disability is often lost in mainstream coverage.- Call your Rep. and tell them NO cuts to Medicaid/SNAP and Veterans’ care, and YES to the Dept. of Education Protection Act.
- Call your Rep. and Senators and remind them that Social Security is *our* money, not Musk’s.
- Protest U of T’s hosting of the upcoming racist and eugenicist conference.
- Call the 10 Dems who voted with GOP to censure Black disabled Rep. Al Green on their cowardice.
- Make sure your vaccines are up to date, especially if you may have received an inactive virus version of the MMR vaccine from 1963-67, which was found to be ineffective.
- If your state is involved, contact your Attorney General and ask them to withdraw from Texas v. Beccera. Tell them you stand in solidarity with disabled people, and trans folks.
- Linda McMahon confirmed, prepares to gut DoED. The Senate confirmed Linda McMahon to her post as Secretary of the Department of Education. Almost immediately she sent out an email to all employees titled, “Our Department’s Final Mission” detailing her desire to emphasize patriotism and vocational skills in American education, while simultaneously dismantling federal oversight. Trump was due to sign an EO aimed at gutting the dept on Thursday, but delayed due to unpopularity. (Keep it up!)
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What’s the Deal with the Section 504 Lawsuit?
ID: ASL interpreted version of DREDF Texas vs. Beccera, courtesy DREDF.org
Section 504 is a civil rights statute that says any entity that gets money from the federal government (funding, grants, etc.) cannot discriminate on the basis of disability. It is part of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 law. This protection impacts education, healthcare, immigration services, child services, emergency services, clinical research, private companies who get federal grants, and all federal agencies and buildings.Many people are most familiar with Section 504 through the use of 504 Plans to support disabled students at school. 504 Plans provide accommodations in public school settings like ASL interpreters, closed captions, ramps, preferential seating, extra time on tests, quiet testing environments, access to braille, audiobooks, FM systems, speech-to-text and AAC devices, and more.
Section 504 is a kind of statute known as a “spending clause.” There are also other civil rights spending clauses that protect people from discrimination on the basis of race and sex.
In 2024, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued some updated guidance on Section 504. These are called the “Final Rule.” The pandemic revealed extreme inequities in healthcare remain–like hospitals denying lifesaving care on the basis of disability–so the Final Rule clarified who must follow 504, and what it means in the time of the internet. The Final Rule says 504 protection covers include all doctors and healthcare offices that accept Medicaid or Medicare, and their medical equipment, telehealth and websites. It also impacts programs for child services and independent living.
What is Texas vs. Becerra?
Texas vs. Becerra is a lawsuit with two main parts. One part asks the judge to strike down the Final Rule. The other part asks the judge to declare Section 504 as a whole unconstitutional and stope its enforcement.
Isn’t There Something to Do with Trans Folks in the Suit?
Sort of! The TLDR is that biased Attorneys Generals are using transphobia as a cover to get others to join in on their ableism. Jump down to the last section on this page to read more about the misconceptions.
What Would Happen if These States Win?
If the states succeed in striking down the Final Rule, disabled people’s enumerated protections under 504 will be taken back to what they were fifty years ago, without accounting for the internet, mobile devices, pandemic healthcare and more. Disabled people’s rights to live independently in-community would be impacted.
If the states succeed in having the entirety of Section 504 declared unconstitutional, all protections will be lost, including in education.
504 and the ADA, as well as other protective spending clauses, are linked in the way they’re enforced, so striking down 504 could endanger the enforcement mechanisms of the ADA as well.
This would also be a dangerous legal precedent for other spending clauses, like anti-race and sex based discrimination. It could set the stage for those protections to be declared unconstitutional, too.
Take Action: What Can We Do?
Seventeen states are currently signed on to Texas vs. Beccera.
Image of the US with involved states in pink. MT, UT, SD, NE, KS, TX, AK, LA, AR, MO, IN, AL, GA, FL, SC,WV. Image courtesy DREDF,org If you live in one of the 17 states signed onto this case, contact your Attorney General today. Let them know attacking the Final Rule and Section 504 is not ok, and ask them to drop out of the lawsuit. Here are scripts you can use while contacting your AG.
If you don’t live in one of these states, you can still contact your Attorney General. Progressive AGs can watch this litigation, file an amicus brief and more.
Here is contact information for all 50 Attorneys General
What if my Attorney General Tells me the Case is Inactive, or Doesn’t Really Attack Section 504?
Push back on misinformation and disinformation!
“This is a case about gender dysphoria.” The preamble to the Final Rule document mentions the ongoing legal inquiry into whether gender dysphoria can be classified a disability. There are currently several other court cases examining this question, and courts are split on it. The original 504 statute does not protect folks with gender dysphoria, and though Final Rule discussions mention the ongoing question in the courts, it makes no enforceable determination, or policy guidance within the text of Final Rule itself. This is political spin used to rally conservatives to the suit. However, it is important to note that there are trans disabled folks, and that the disability community stands with all LGBTQ+ folks. You can read HHS’s Final Rule document here.
“This case only takes issue with a small part of the Rule.” The suit has multiple parts. One part attacks the Final Rule, and one part explicitly asks the judge to declare all of Section 504 unconstitutional. Point your AG to page 37 of the complaint, under the heading “Count 3: Section 504 is Unconstitutional.” The full text of the complaint is here.
“The case is inactive.” The case is not inactive. The case has been paused until February 25th, 2025 in the wake of the new administrative transition. The DOJ and other involved parties are required to provide a status update on that day.
Screenshot of pg 37 of the complaint with the header “Count 3: Section 504 is Unconstitutional” Need to fact-check something else? Disability Rights and Education Defense Fund has a great FAQ document here, as well as many other resources about this and other attacks on their site: www.dredf.org
Spread the Word!The media isn’t reporting much on this case. Download our flyer and share it, especially offline. Disability affects people of every race, class, age, sex, gender, national origin, political affiliation and religion. People who aren’t spending much time on social media also need this info, and we are all stronger together.