Note: AAPD is nonpartisan and does not support or oppose any candidate for office. We do urge individuals with disabilities and their allies to thoroughly research the candidates who will be on their ballot and consider which candidates demonstrate a commitment to prioritizing issues that are important to people with disabilities.
As Americans begin to vote, AAPD is providing information about some of those key disability issues, and relevant policy changes in those issue areas since the last presidential election.
For the past several months, voters across the country have been hearing about “Project 2025” and its agenda to reconstruct public policy, affecting everything from housing to healthcare to civil rights and, in many cases, rescinding longstanding laws and regulations protecting marginalized and vulnerable communities.
Project 2025 is a policy blueprint spanning over 900 pages released by the Heritage Foundation, a prominent non-partisan, non-profit think tank in Washington, D.C., meant to guide the agenda of the next conservative president, should one be elected.
Project 2025, if enacted, poses threats to the health, well-being, and fundamental civil rights of people with disabilities and other marginalized groups, including women, LGBTQIA+-identifying individuals, people who can get pregnant, and immigrants.
This blog provides a brief overview of how the Project 2025 policy proposals could impact the disability and other marginalized communities:
Medicaid and Home- and Community-Based Services
Many people with disabilities rely on Medicaid to receive home—and community-based services (HCBS) that allow them to live independently. Project 2025 seeks to turn Medicaid into a block grant program or per-capita funding scheme, which would lead to massive funding cuts by limiting Medicaid funding to a formula that does not consider the specific needs of Medicaid recipients. In 2017, disability advocates fought passionately and successfully against turning Medicaid into a block grant program because of the devastating consequences such a change could have on people with disabilities and our families.
Additionally, Project 2025 proposes limiting HCBS “to serve the most vulnerable and truly needy and eliminate middle-income to upper-income Medicaid recipients” (468) and incorporate work requirements and time limits when receiving Medicaid. This would severely limit the number of Medicaid recipients, many of whom are people with disabilities and who rely on Medicaid and HCBS to live their lives safely, healthily, and independently.
Furthermore, Project 2025 recommends rolling back caps on prescription drug costs, repeal a law capping insulin at $35 a month for Medicare recipients, and eliminate prohibitions against insurance companies discriminating against individuals with pre-existing conditions.
Nondiscrimination Protection
Project 2025 also advocates for the elimination of many nondiscrimination provisions that protect disabled people, people who are pregnant, and those who identify as LGBTQIA+.
Specifically, Project 2025 promotes the removal of regulations such as “disparate impact.” “Disparate impact” discrimination is usually not intentional but occurs because of systemic and institutional biases. Project 2025 would eliminate the ability of individuals to seek legal redress for disparate impact and prohibit the government from supporting individuals seeking such relief. This is especially significant for disabled people, as even unintentional discrimination can cause significant harm to disabled people, and structural ableism is baked into many parts of American life. Legal action is not just about justice or righting wrongs – it is one of the main tools through which people with disabilities can highlight the ableism within institutions and make an attempt at improvement, hopefully paving a better path in the future for other disabled people.
Project 2025 calls for the dismantling of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives that have been instrumental in helping American institutions address centuries of systemic biases and discrimination and would eliminate the ability of businesses and other institutions to use DEI initiatives to improve outcomes and provide safe, comfortable environments for all.
The proposal recommends eliminating legal protections for people who are pregnant and transgender individuals by allowing government agencies, healthcare facilities, employers, K-12 schools, and institutions of higher education to discriminate against people based on their pregnancy status or gender identity under the guise of “conscience rights” and “religious liberty” while retaining their right to receive federal funding.
Project 2025 proposes reinforcing a patriarchal, heteronormative vision of family arrangements (p. 451), prioritizing straight, married couples with children and a “working father” as the “ideal” family unit and excluding families with LGBTQIA+-identifying individuals from protections in federal housing policy, child-placement and adoption, and other federal programs. Many disabled people, straight and LGBTQIA alike, cannot get married because of policies that penalize marriage in the receipt of public benefits, like Supplemental Security Income and Medicaid.
The policy blueprint also seeks to restrict the definition of sex to “biological sex as determined at birth,” thereby denying the existence of transgender and nonbinary individuals. Research has shown transgender people are more likely to be disabled at every stage of life, and such restrictive provisions would harm the disability community as well.
Reproductive Rights
Project 2025 aims to nearly eliminate access to reproductive healthcare, including abortion care, by removing access to mifepristone (medication abortion) and the use of telehealth for abortion, both of which are more accessible for people with disabilities. Disabled people get pregnant at the same rate as nondisabled people but are 11 times more likely to die in childbirth.
Furthermore, Project 2025 suggests the federal government recognize “fetal personhood,” giving legal status to fetuses from the moment of conception. Laws that recognize fetal personhood frequently force physicians to make medical decisions not to provide lifesaving care, putting a pregnant person’s life at significantly increased risk
Project 2025 would also jeopardize access to birth control, emergency contraception (Plan B), and fertility treatments such as in-vitro fertilization (IVF). Access to all of these healthcare treatments is vital for everyone, but especially disabled people who may need medication birth control to regulate their hormones or prevent pregnancy that could endanger their health. Disabled women are more likely to experience infertility and utilize reproductive technologies, like IVF, to have children.
Education
Project 2025 supports the elimination of the US Department of Education and critical oversight agencies that ensure school districts comply with protections and regulations for students with disabilities, including Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Disabled students already have a hard time thriving and being sufficiently supported in school, and there is already a lack of funding for these programs. Without the regulations and oversight provided by the Department of Education, students with disabilities would be completely abandoned and unprotected.
The proposals include provisions that would block grant federal education funding and supercharge the growth of unregulated charter schools and voucher programs that allow students to attend private schools that do not have to abide by federal or state nondiscrimination protections with public funds. Private schools do not have to follow Section 504 or the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Conclusion
The proposals in Project 2025 threaten to roll back decades of necessary federal protections for disadvantaged communities and prioritize an exclusionary vision of America – one that discounts or even actively jeopardizes the lives of those who are disabled, non-male, LGBTQIA+, Black, brown, or indigenous persons of color, and multiply marginalized members of these communities.
Further Reading
This is not an exhaustive list of Project 2025’s policy proposals. We’ve compiled additional overviews from several of our partner organizations. Each of the organizations who have prepared the below resources are nonpartisan, independent organizations with strong editorial standards and rigorous fact-checking and research processes.
Helpful information about Project 2025’s potential impact on the disability community can be found in these reports written by:
- The Consortium for Constituents with Disabilities (CCD), of which AAPD is a member: Read CCD’s report here
- Read this analysis from the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund (DREDF)
- The Center for American Progress (CAP)’s Disability Justice Initiative’s report can be found here
Make a Plan to Vote
Have you voted yet? Be sure to check out AAPD’s state guides for information on accessible voting, and make a plan to vote on or before November 5, 2024.