Why aren't more Americans mobilizing around disability? In the last presidential election, according to our best numbers, 46 percent of all disabled Americans and a slightly greater percentage of their families supported Donald Trump for president. This pattern held true even though Trump has espoused policies that have been harmful to people with disabilities. One possible explanation, according to many leaders in the disability rights world, is that, while the disability community has its own network of non-partisan non-profits and independent activists, the larger world of well-funded progressive think tanks has been slow to recognize that disability matters as a matter of policy and basic human rights. The Center for American Progress, one of the best-known liberal think tanks in Washington, D.C., aims to change that.
On July 26th, the 28th anniversary of the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), CAP launched a major new project: the Disability Justice Initiative. The organization's plan is to include disability expertise in all internal conversations and projects, while modeling the necessity and utility of such inclusion to other groups that work in progressive spaces. The thinking behind the Disability Justice Initiative is that we can't address core progressive issues—poverty, health care, the environment, and more—without recognizing the specific vulnerabilities that disabled people face, and the contributions that disabled people can make. What's more, disability isn't a niche issue; there are over 57 million Americans with disabilities. Too often, though, disability remains an afterthought, even in progressive policymaking. The CAP itself, in its former proposals around health care, didn't really address the disability-related gaps in the Affordable Care Act. Its leadership now says that such an initiative has been too long in coming, and that they want progressives across the board to do better.
[For more on this story by DAVID M. PERRY, go to https://psmag.com/social-justi...y-justice-initiative]
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