Disability Rights Advocates Fight to Preserve Protections

Cody and Kaleigh Brendle grew up near the Jersey Shore, going out on their grandfather’s boat on weekends, learning to swim and riding bikes together. The siblings, both blind, are part of what advocates call the “ADA generation” — people who came of age under the safeguards of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. Cody, 27, was born in 1999, the same year the Supreme Court handed down the Olmstead decision, which reinforced the ADA’s integration mandate requiring that people with disabilities get to learn, live, and work in their communities rather than in institutions.

Now, that integration mandate — and an entire system of community-based disability services that more than 8 million Americans rely on — is being challenged from multiple directions.

A Shift in Federal Policy

In June, the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel issued a legal opinion arguing that “Congress has not imposed an integration mandate on states.” The memo, written by Lanora Pettit, principal deputy assistant attorney general, states that the Olmstead decision “held only that a state cannot institutionalize such patients without justification” and that “what counts as adequate justification remains an open question.”

In July, the DOJ published a Federal Register notice stating that its longstanding Olmstead guidance is not legally enforceable and that it will no longer rely on that guidance when enforcing Title II of the ADA. Following the release of the memo, HHS took down its webpage on Olmstead and community living.

“I can’t really overstate how significant this change in position is,” said Alison Barkoff, a health law and policy professor at George Washington University who worked on Olmstead enforcement in the Justice Department during the Obama administration. “It is now the position of the United States government that people with disabilities don’t have a right to be part of their communities.”

The Legal Challenge

Adding to the pressure, a federal lawsuit brought by several Republican-led states — Texas, Alaska, Florida, Louisiana, Missouri, and Montana — is working its way through the courts. The plaintiffs in Texas v. Kennedy argue that the federal government cannot require states to provide disability services in the community rather than in institutions. Three states — Indiana, Kansas, and South Dakota — have withdrawn from the lawsuit.

Jennifer Mathis, a disability rights lawyer at the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, cautions that the memo does not change the law. “It’s important to understand that [this memo] is not the law, that the Justice Department can’t change the law,” she said. “Congress makes laws, not agencies.”

Medicaid Cuts Add Pressure

On top of the legal threats, Congress cut roughly $1 trillion from Medicaid in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed into law in July 2025. The Congressional Budget Office estimates the bill will slash federal Medicaid spending by $1.02 trillion by 2034, potentially leaving as many as 10.5 million people without coverage. States were already trimming community-based services, and advocates worry the cuts could add pressure to pare back such services even more.

Mathis called cuts to community-based programs shortsighted and a “great irony” because it costs states and the federal government far less than institutional care. “If you cut community services in this era where budgets are tighter than they have ever been, that will mean expanding institutional care,” she said.

The ADA Generation’s Personal Stakes

For Kaleigh Brendle, 23, who is starting law school at UC Berkeley, the integration mandate has shaped her life in countless ways. “The integration mandate is why I’m here at all and why I get to go to law school,” she said. “Because laws are great, but laws have to have systems in place that make sure they’re enforced. Now the DOJ has essentially said, ‘We’re not gonna do that anymore.’ And that matters quite a bit.”

Her brother Cody, who is blind and has autism, participates in a community-based program called Next Steps in Brick, New Jersey. Through the program, he practices life skills like grocery shopping and money management, exercises at a local gym, and does job training at Jersey Mike’s Subs — where “bopping lettuce” is his favorite task. “You have to take the whole head of lettuce and bang it down a couple times to loosen the core,” he explained.

Before Cody joined Next Steps, his family said he was struggling after leaving high school at 21. “He was just lost,” said Heather Brendle, Cody’s mom. “He wasn’t the vibrant Cody that he used to be.”

Congressional Response

Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) introduced a resolution on June 25 calling for the DOJ to rescind the memo. “I am not going to let this administration move us back to a time when people were ripped out of their communities, ripped out of their homes against their wills, and forced into institutions,” Duckworth said. “This is taking us back to a time when there were forced lobotomies in this country. We just cannot let that happen.”

Bipartisan legislation — the Latonya Reeves Freedom Act — was introduced in both the House and Senate on June 23 to establish requirements related to long-term services and supports and access to services in integrated settings. The National Fragile X Foundation noted that the legislation is at an early stage and has been referred to committee.

A Broader Pattern

The DOJ memo appears to be part of a broader effort that began in July 2025, when President Trump issued an executive order intended to make it easier for state and local governments to police homelessness, arguing for involuntary institutionalization. The administration has also announced it would move federal administration of special education programs out of the Department of Education and into HHS, raising fears of a rollback of enforcement of longstanding civil rights protections.

What’s Next

For the Brendle family, planning for the future is increasingly difficult. Cody is on a yearslong waiting list for a Medicaid waiver that could give him access to housing one day if his parents are no longer able to support him. “What’s five years from now? What’s 10 years from now?” said Jim Brendle, Cody and Kaleigh’s dad. “What’s here when we’re not here?”

Kaleigh, who founded a disability rights organization called Judy’s League named for the legendary activist Judy Heumann, remains resolute about her career path. “I also want to be a mom and raise children in a world that has these protections in place,” she said. “I don’t want them to grow up in a future where they have less rights than I do.”

“It feels like what I’m about to do is more needed than it has been in a long time.”