This Autism Acceptance Month has had a busy start. The government is making lots of choices that can hurt disabled people. We want to make sure everyone knows what’s going on, and how to fight back.
Robert F Kennedy Jr. (RFK for short) talked about autism in a meeting last Thursday. RFK is the head of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). HHS in the part of government in charge of autism services and research. RFK said the government would work to find out what causes autism, and get rid of autism.
It is impossible to get rid of or “cure” autism. But RFK thinks vaccines might cause autism. So RFK chose people to lead a study to find out if vaccines cause autism. The person he chose to lead the study did experiments on autistic children in the past. The study leader doesn’t do research the right way. RFK and the study leader might lie and fake results to “prove” that vaccines cause autism. This would be very dangerous for autistic people.
The White House also put out a statement for “Autism Awareness Day”. This statement did not do a good job telling people about autism. The statement did not talk at all about autistic adults. Instead, it focused on children and parents of autistic people.
The statement also tries to get people worried about more people having autism. The statement says more and more people got diagnosed with autism in the last 50 years. The statement wants people to think that something is causing more people to get autism. But this is not true. In the last 50 years, autism diagnosis has gotten better. That means more people know that they are autistic. More people also have healthcare. That means more people can afford to go to a doctor for a diagnosis.
The statement also says that the White House is working to make life better for autistic people. This is not true. Here are some ways the government shows they don’t care about helping autistic people:
- The government is cutting money for autism research and other programs that help autistic people. The government blamed people with disabilities for a plane crash. The government also said people with disabilities should go back to living in institutions.
- The government is trying to break apart the Department of Education. The Department of Education makes sure disabled students’ rights are protected. The head of the Department of Education is Linda McMahon. Linda McMahon got interviewed before she became the head of the Department. During the interview, someone asked her about the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). IDEA is a law that gives students with disabilities rights at school. During the interview, Linda McMahon didn’t know what IDEA was. Then, the government cut 1,300 jobs from the Department of Education. This shows that the government was not thinking about students with disabilities.
- The government is breaking apart the Administration of Community Living (ACL). ACL helps make sure the government follows the Home- and Community-Based Services (HCBS) Settings Rule. This rule helps people with disabilities live in our own homes instead of institutions. It helps us get the kinds of services we need. The rule makes sure places that say they give HCBS are not actually institutions. The ACL also helps manage the Centers for Independent Living and State Councils on Developmental Disabilities. These groups run all kinds of life-saving services for many disabled people. ACL was made to help make HCBS work as well as possible for disabled people. ACL helps make running HCBS take less time and cost less money. Breaking ACL apart will hurt disabled people and cost the government more money.
All of these things are a big problem for autistic people, and all disabled people. But one of the biggest problems in the government right now is the budget resolution. The budget resolution is a plan for how much money the government needs to cut or add to the federal budget. The federal budget tells the government how much money it can spend. That means the federal budget says how much money the government can spend on services like Medicaid. Remember, Medicaid helps many disabled people get health care and services. Medicaid runs HCBS programs.
The Senate and House both voted to pass the budget resolution.The budget resolution says the government has to spend a lot less money. To spend a lot less money, the government has to cut Medicaid.
This is a big problem. Medicaid is important to our community. It lets many of us get out of bed, eat, and go to work or school. Medicaid already does not have enough money to help everyone who needs it. Many people are still on waiting lists to get Medicaid. Having less money will make the problem even worse.
To learn more about the budget resolution and Medicaid, check out our full plain language guide about Medicaid in the budget here. We also made a short video about Medicaid and the budget resolution, which you can watch here. We can still take action to stop cuts to Medicaid!
Last week, we also got the terrible news that police shot Victor Perez. Victor was a 17 year old nonspeaking autistic person with intellectual disabilities and cerebral palsy. Victor was shot nine times in the leg by the police. Victor died over the weekend because he was shot by the police.
Some people think training police about autism would stop things like what happened to Victor. But training about autism does not fix the way police training works. Police training spends months teaching officers to use force to solve problems.
ASAN says that police violence needs to stop. We need the community to watch over police, and make sure police take responsibility for their actions. ASAN also thinks police should not have qualified immunity. Qualified immunity lets police get away with hurting people. It makes it harder for people hurt by police to sue for their rights.
Here are some actions you can take this week:
- Call your Senator and Representatives. Tell them to ask their committee to protect Medicaid.
You can use our script when you call:
- “Hi, my name is [your name]. I am a constituent of [Representative or Senator] [their last name]. I am calling today to ask the [Representative/Senator] to tell their committee to protect Medicaid from cuts and harmful changes for anyone currently receiving services. Please tell them that I do not want cuts to Medicaid. Any cuts will cause [your state] to cut services. I also do not want changes that add more rules to who can get Medicaid, like work requirements or more frequent disability verification. Thank you.”
You can also tell your Representative more about why Medicaid matters to you.
You can find out who your Representative is and how to call them here.
If you need help knowing what to expect during your call, check out this resource. If you can’t make phone calls due to a disability, you can use our proxy caller system!
- You can also schedule an in-person meeting with your Representative. You can tell them how much Medicaid means to you. Try to set up a meeting for between April 11 through April 27. This is when your Representatives will be back in your state. You can also look for town halls, protests, or other actions during this time.
- April 17th is the Medicaid Day of Action. There might be events going on near you.
- Use this email tool to message your Representative and Senators. Tell them to fight back against changes to the Department of Education and IDEA.