An in-depth conversation with Theresa Sweeny, co-founder of the National Disability and Home Care Rights Coalition, about emerging threats to disability rights and home- and community-based services (HCBS) in the United States. Sweeny explains that the coalition formed to unite disabled people, families, and organizations across diagnoses, waiver systems, and states in defense of civil rights protections rooted in the ADA, Olmsted, Section 504, HCBS, privacy, due process, caregiver rights, and equal dignity, amid growing fractures within disability communities and state-level erosion of these protections. The discussion centers on a Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel memorandum stating that Section 504 and the ADA do not impose a general integration mandate on states, thereby allowing states the potential of not meeting the provision of HCBS needed by persons of disabilities to live in the community and increasing the risk of institutionalization. Sweeny highlights the Latanya Reeves Freedom Act as a critical federal civil rights proposal that would create an enforceable statutory right to community living and stronger protections for people needing long-term services and supports, and urges listeners to contact their federal legislators to support and co-sponsor the bill. The episode also examines how narratives of “fraud, waste, and abuse” in Medicaid are used to foment public hostility towards marginalized communities despite the program’s role as a vital social safety net from birth to death for people who cannot otherwise obtain or afford health insurance. The episode concludes with a call for broad, unified advocacy, including engagement with the coalition’s unity statement and related resources, to defend the right of disabled people to live, work, and participate in their communities rather than being forced into institutions. Today’s Call to Action: National Disability & Home Care Rights Coalition, in coordination with the Ohio Disability & Home Care Rights Coalition, has developed a National Unity Statement to protect community living, home and community-based services, Olmstead, Section 504, and the Disability Civil Rights. The following petition represents “ 50 states. One fight. Protect Community Living” Here is your link to endorse https://forms.gle/vMJ7uzA2Uadvv2VK9 Resources ARC US , ARC TN, and Family Voices (National) are some of the organizations that have issued statements in response to the DOJ Opinion. Bruce Darling from ADAPT blog as what this opinion could mean for the disability community https://cdrnys.org/blog/uncategorized/the-olc-memo-olmstead-and-the-latonya-reeves-freedom-act/
