Democrats are marking the 34th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act by coming out swinging at Donald Trump, after his nephew claimed in a new memoir that the former president once suggested people with disabilities “should die.”
“It’s hard to describe the pain that millions of Americans with disabilities feel in response to Donald Trump’s recently reported comments against people with disabilities,” Senator Tammy Duckworth, who lost both legs in the Iraq War, said in a shared statement. by the Democratic National Committee on Friday.
“But we know this is not new for him – he mocks journalists with physical disabilities, dismisses traumatic brain injuries as ‘not serious,’ tries to reduce support for disabled veterans and so on. Any human being who suggests that disabled people’ must die’ basically unworthy of service.
Duckworth’s slam came after the former president’s nephew, Fred Trump III, revealed shocking details of a private conversation the pair had after a meeting about disabled patients and their families at the White House at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Those people … The shape, all the costs, maybe people like that should die,” Trump said in the Oval Office, according to the memoirs of Fred Trump III, All in the Family: The Trumps and How It Works.
Democrats also sought to link Trump’s words on disability to Project 2025, the conservative Heritage Foundation’s blueprint for the second Trump administration. Trump sought to get rid of the program, even though many administration officials helped write it.
It marks 34 years since former President George HW Bush, a Republican, signed the Americans with Disabilities Act into law, thanks to bipartisan collaboration in Congress.
In recent years, there has been less agreement between parties on disability rights. The DNC release stated that Trump has faced multiple lawsuits during his presidency claiming that his properties are not ADA compliant and also noted efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, which would cut funding for Medicaid, which many disabled people rely on to receive care at home. – his house.
The Republican National Committee’s “research” account on X also took heat for mocking Vice President Kamala Harris in 2022 for describing what she wears, a common practice to help the blind or the grieving. The Republican National Committee did not issue a statement commemorating the law.
Democrats also noted how Project 2025 proposed eliminating the Department of Education, which enforces accommodations for students with disabilities under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.
Despite the eroding bipartisan consensus, some areas of agreement remain on the issue. Many states with Republican governors have banned the practice of paying the disabled below the minimum wage, as have Democratic governors.
In addition, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, the new candidate for the Republican nomination for president, recently signed legislation to allow assisted decision making as an alternative to guardianship to allow people with disabilities to still control their finances. Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom of California signed similar legislation.
Harris is the first Democratic presidential candidate in the 2020 contest to release a disability policy.
“On the 34th anniversary of the ADA, we are reminded how far we have come but how much work remains, and we will not back down,” Duckworth sad. “The disability community cannot endure another four years of Trump.”