Democrats Finally Make a Serious Pitch to Disabled Voters
In the run-up to the primaries, most Democrats—especially Bernie Sanders—are finally appealing to the disability community

On the Friday before Iowans caucus and the primaries officially get underway, Bernie Sanders released the most ambitious disability plan ever put together by an American presidential candidate.
This follows ambitious plans released by Elizabeth Warren and Julian Castro, and substantial—though less ambitious—plans by others, including Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar, and Kamala Harris. Klobuchar’s and Harris’ plans were among those less well-received by disability activists.
Joe Biden is the only major Democratic candidate for president who has not released his own disability plan.
Sanders’ disability moon shot represents a major turn-around from his 2016 candidacy. Disability advocacy has never cleanly tracked traditional right-left politics. In 2016, though Hillary Clinton was the more moderate candidate of the two, her disability positions were on the whole more articulated and far-reaching than those of Sanders, who tended to follow her lead.
It’s not only Sanders who has changed. The Democrats as a whole are in a different place than four years ago.
“It’s been really great to see a virtuous cycle this campaign with candidates essentially competing to have the best disability plan,” Julia Bascom, a disability advocate, commented on Twitter. “Things no one would commit to six months ago are now standard.”
The Democrats are generally moving toward positions that de-emphasize institutionalization and segregation. Instead, they emphasize independence, autonomy, and community inclusion for disabled people.
As Ari Ne’eman, an Obama appointee who has advised both the Warren and Sanders campaigns on disability, told me in an interview, “the best disability policies and plans are about bringing disabled people into the community and keeping them there. That is the overarching goal of the disability community.”
For my family, as for so many others, the very shape of our lives rides on this election.
My middle son, Edmund, was born in 2009 with multiple intensive congenital disabilities. If he’d been born just a few decades before, he would unquestionably have been shunted into an institution. Even in 2009, institutionalization was recommended as a good option for our family.
Edmund lives at home and goes to school, thanks to the advocacy and activism of disability community leaders that changed laws and norms. Such progress often happened with bipartisan support. The landmark disability rights legislation, the Americans with Disabilities Act, was signed into law by a Republican president, George H. W. Bush.
Since Edmund’s birth—especially over the last four years—the political ground has shifted dramatically underneath our family. Disability has become a more partisan issue.
“Disability rights was a bipartisan effort historically, but the Trump administration has broken new ground in awfulness,” Ne’eman observed. “Norms that have long been accepted as bipartisan, such as community inclusion and inclusive education, are coming under attack.”
He added: “Disability advocates used to play a relatively small role in electoral politics. Due in part to a growing radicalization in the Republican party, disability advocates are now playing a much larger role, including and especially in primaries.”
If something like Sanders’ plan had been enacted in 2009, my family would not have spent years on a waiting list for services such as respite care and financial help with medical equipment and building accommodations. We might have moved to that red state when my husband got an attractive job offer. Under the Sanders plan, Edmund’s educational needs would be funded in any state.
I gave up on an academic career path due to my caregiving responsibilities. Under Sanders’ plan, I would have had access to caregiving assistance to continue that career, or I could have been compensated for my caregiving labor.
Think about the potential economic benefits—not only of a hiring boom in home care workers, but some current caregivers suddenly freed to enter the workforce or start businesses.
If Sanders’ plan were enacted now, Edmund could, as he should, attend the same school as his brothers, and not be bused to a school exclusive to disabled kids. I could rest assured that, even as an adult, even after my death, he will always participate in the life of his community.
Zooming out to other people and families, the Sanders plan would also make it illegal to pay disabled workers less than minimum wage. It would prioritize community-based mental health care to prevent mentally ill people from getting mired in the criminal justice system.
There would be no more asset and income restrictions on receiving services—which would also mean that disabled people could get married without penalty. SSI payments would rise to 125 percent of poverty level.
Sanders repeatedly provides for disabled people to be in positions of power over disability policy-making. This is especially important in the case of disability because disability advocacy can get commandeered by family members and caregivers of disabled people. Family members of disabled people tend to prioritize safety over autonomy. They often prize curing or preventing disability over accommodating it.
Sanders’ autism policy is an example of what happens when it is disabled advocates, rather than their family members, who are the primary architects of plans. It shifts funding in autism research more toward services for adults, and ensures that autistic adults have greater control over planning and execution of policies that affect their lives.
Sanders’ plan has elements in common with those of the other Democrats, especially Warren’s plan, though hers is less detailed. Both Sanders’ and Warren’s plans offer a greater emphasis on community inclusion than the other proposals.
With all the Democrats’ plans—on any topic—it can be hard to see what laws would actually be enacted, especially if a Democrat were elected president and the Senate remained in GOP hands. Sanders offers a list of executive actions he could take that would greatly influence disability policy regardless of the makeup of Congress.
As we head into the 2020s, the ramifications of the increasing partisan lean of disability rights remain unclear. We are entrenched more than ever in our respective partisan divides. Yet we can’t afford to let disability rights become the province of one party. One in five Americans has a disability, and a person or family of any party could suddenly and unexpectedly experience disability.
What if the differences made by a given disability policy in a voter’s life could be as stark as they would be in mine? What if a voter who was used to a standard of inclusion or education was threatened with losing it?
I’ve never been much of a Sanders fan, yet I suddenly discover that today I’ve written a paean to him. It’s a persuasive issue to so many of us.
“What’s unique about disability is that it is one of the few issues that crosses over the electorate as a whole. It’s one of the few things that can get candidates voters that would not generally be seen as within their camp,” Ne’eman said.
It’s at least conceivable that a Democratic candidate’s disability policy could reach otherwise unreachable voters. And, with the notable exception of Biden, Democrats are leaning in hard to try to persuade them.

