The REV UP Forum was held on April 27 in Boston, and hosted by the Disability Law Center.  The Election Assistance Commission heard testimony from our state and local voting officials, as well as testimony from the Disability Community.  In the afternoon, we held a working session of REV UP.

First, the Election Assistance Commission is very interested in understanding the issues of voting for people with disabilities.  Everyone agreed that our state and local officials have worked hard to improve voter access at every level, and have had some major successes (State voters website for example).  And everyone agreed that there is still work to do…  with more training for local officials being high on the list, along with universal access innovation.

Submitted testimony is available on the EAC Public Hearing page.  Voting independently is everyone’s right, but it continues to be a struggle at many polling places.

Second, we heard some great ideas from Ted Jackson (CA Foundation for Independent Living Centers) who has a lot of experience in GOTV campaigns for the LGBTQ community and the Disability community.

While we did not have time to definitively set out a strategy, we hope everyone is on the same page and agrees that as a group, we can increase the number of people with disabilities who vote, and that people with disabilities can become a factor in local, state and national decisions.

Rev Up! Forum

Join us for an Election Assistance Commission Public Meeting followed by a REV UP Strategy Meeting.

2016 is a national election year. The goal of this meeting is the creation of a strategy on how to get people with disabilities registered to vote, educated on the candidates and issues, and to the polls on Election Day, November 8, 2016.

Anyone who is interested is welcome to attend. but you must RSVP.

When:
Wednesday, April 27
Where:
Suffolk Law School
Sargeant Hall Function Room, First Floor
120 Tremont Street
Boston
MAP
Agenda:

• 10 a.m. – 12: Election Assistance Commission will hold their commission meeting in Boston and focus on disability voting issues.
• 12 – 1: Lunch provided
• 1 p.m. – 3:30:  REV-UP MA Strategy

RSVP required: 
Amanda Gasparonis at agasparonis@dlc-ma.org.or (617) 723-8455 X 123.
Or register online http://www.dlc-ma.org/_conf/register.asp.
  You must let Amanda know if you need any accommodations.

Washington Post, March 15, 2016

A while back, someone at a conference told me that intellectually disabled people with guardians could not vote. I believed it and stuffed away thoughts about taking my severely autistic son, Nat, to get registered. It was one more stinging “no” in his life. I should be used to it by now, but I’m not.

Recently, however, I noticed the Twitter hashtag #CripTheVote, which is a rallying call to political candidates to take note of this huge constituency. As a disability rights advocate, I retweeted dutifully. The shadow of sadness for Nat never quite cleared, though, and one day I found myself angry about it: Why couldn’t Nat vote? Who was to say that he couldn’t make such decisions for himself?…read the rest…

A new feature of the State Voter pages is the Find My Voter Registration Status page.  With a name, birth date and zip code, the system will return complete registration details, including whether an ID will be required, your party enrollment, and your polling location, as well as your elected officials.

The page is intended for personal use only.

Charlie Carr’s Blog from February 22, 2016

As people with disabilities we have an opportunity change the outcome of the upcoming presidential election. Regardless of your party affiliation or candidate of choice, the fact is that collectively, we have strength as a voting bloc. There are approximately 33.7 million Americans with disabilities of voting age and are about 20 percentage points less likely than those without disabilities to vote, and 10 points less likely to be registered to vote.

Quite a bit of this is due to inaccessibility in polling places. Of those voting in the past 10 years about 8% of people with disabilities encountered such problems compared to less than 2% of people without disabilities. But also, much like the general public, there is significant apathy and a disconnect with the political process and those running for office.

That said, we can’t sit this one out! At stake are issues like healthcare, education, climate change, the economy and employment, reproductive rights and on and on. Each of these issues resonates with our community and each is under attack.

Further, perhaps most important, is that the next president will most likely make key appointments to the Supreme Court. Three of the court’s nine justices will be in their 80s and one or two have hinted that they plan to step down soon. The Democrats have the most to lose because if a Republican assumes office, they will have a much easier time moving nominations through the Senate which is controlled by Republicans. President Obama, on the other hand, will face a bruising brawl with whomever he nominates to replace Justice Scalia.

Future justices could potentially face cases on everything from campaign-finance, affirmative-action, abortion and voting rights. In an age of Intersectionality, especially from youth with disabilities, these are our issues too. Issues of social justice that affect everyone.

The upcoming presidential election in November may result in one of the most important presidencies in recent history. Throughout the country there is a growing number of organizations that are aggressively involved in voting registration for people with disabilities such as Texas ADAPT and Massachusetts REV UP because of the importance of our vote and our collective power as a voting bloc to make sure that our issues get addressed.

If you are not registered to vote, register immediately and all of us owe it to ourselves and all those who came before us in the struggle for disability rights to exercise our power. It has come at a tremendous cost.

The New York Times reported on the Massachusetts primary results from March 1.  Did you vote?  Are these results in line with your views?

The graphic is very interesting – you can look at the results from each town.  Unlike other states, in the towns where Trump lost, Kasich won.  Results varied widely from town to town in both Republican and Democratic races.

Statewide, Clinton beat Sanders by only 17,068 votes out of 1,190,500.  Could the voters with disabilities who did not vote have changed the outcome?  Arguably – yes.   (Note: we are not supporting one over the other – simply saying that every vote counts, and that we believe the disability vote could be a game changer.)  Register, Get Educated and VOTE!

The American Association of People with Disabilities announced the launching of the national REV UP America – Make the Disability Vote Count Campaign.

Click Here to read about the national efforts.

How the disability voting bloc could swing the 2016 election

Published Monday, February 15 in The Guardian, this article describes exactly what REV Up knows – disability voters are under-represented!

From Disability Policy Consortium:
“Washington, Jan. 30 – RespectAbility has released the first-ever #PwDsVote 2016 Campaign Scorecard for people with disabilities (PwDs).

“Fully one-out-of-five voters have a disability, and 52 percent of likely voters have a loved one with a disability. There are 56 million Americans with disabilities, and we have the ability to determine who wins or loses elections,” RespectAbility President Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi said. “In the early voting states there are 357,730 people with a disability in Iowa, 166,258 PwDs in New Hampshire, 680,038 PwDs in South Carolina and 357,035 PwDs in Nevada. Our community will play a major role in the outcome of this election, and it is vital for us to know where the candidates stand on our issues.”

The scorecard asked all of the presidential candidates on both sides of the aisle to comment on 16 disability questions. Candidates earned points if they had a plan on an issue regardless of the substance of that plan. Former Sec. of State Hillary Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders tied with a 100 percent score and former Gov. Jeb Bush resoundingly led the Republican field with a 94 percent score. While there are three candidates with extremely high scores, they have dramatically different ideas about how to deal with the issues. It’s extremely important to read to their full answers so that you can understand their important differences. Issues in the detailed scorecard include employment, stigma, education, safety, transportation, housing, healthcare, foreign affairs and other issues. Several of the candidates did not yet take the time to fill out the scorecard, signaling their lack of initial commitment to the issues and causing them to score zero percent. Dr. Ben Carson and Gov. Chris Christie filled out parts of the scorecard. All of the candidates are invited to complete the scorecard in the days ahead in order to improve their scores and connect with voters with disabilities.

RespectAbility will release a New Hampshire scorecard before that pivotal primary. The scorecard is being distributed to more than 50,000 people who care about disability issues, more than ten thousand of whom live in the early primary states and the heads of more than 100 national disability organizations, many of whom will share with their own lists. RespectAbility also is placing online ads sharing the scorecard.”

Visit our table at the The Arc of Massachusetts and the Massachusetts Developmental Disabilities Council Legislative Reception in the Great Hall at the State House.
Wednesday, March 9 at 10:30 a.m.