5/15/18 – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – ACTION HAPPENING NOW
For More Information:
Mike Oxford: (785) 224-3865
Jerry Costley: (801) 347-0370
Marilee Adamski-Smith: (715) 204-4152
Who: National ADAPT
What: ADAPT Demands the freedom of Disabled Americans
Where: Heritage Foundation; 214 Massachusetts Ave NE, Washington DC
When: Tuesday, May 15, 2018
ADAPT to Heritage: DIA needed to Build an America where freedom, opportunity, prosperity, and civil society flourish
05/15/18 Washington, D.C. – National disability rights organization ADAPT is at the Heritage Foundation today demanding they publicly acknowledge that the Federal Government is denying Americans with disabilities their fundamental and constitutional rights to life, liberty and due process by forcing them into nursing facilities and other institutions; and issue a statement that Heritage supports the Disability Integration Act, bipartisan/bicameral legislation that strengthens the ADA’s integration mandate and ensures no disabled individual is denied their constitutional right to liberty by requiring people with disabilities be offered a community-based alternative to institutional placement that allows them to lead an independent life.
ADAPT thinks the conservative think tank’s mission of Building an America where freedom, opportunity, prosperity, and civil society flourish fits perfectly with the bill that would secure disabled Americans’ freedom, by protecting their right to live in the community.
“Despite the promise of freedom from government interference, disabled Americans are routinely forced into nursing facilities and institutions where we are stripped off our personal liberties and robbed of years of our lives.” said ADAPT organizer Mike Oxford.
“The Federal Government, in the form of its outdated Medicaid system which guarantees and favors institutionalization over home care, has systematically violated our rights to life and liberty that are guaranteed in the Constitution. The Heritage Foundation, and the modern conservative movement, have a long history of supporting the rights of individuals against government interference. We call on conservatives – fiscal, political and social – to acknowledge that Americans with disabilities are, first and foremost, Americans entitled to the freedoms and liberties guaranteed to them as Americans.”
“The Heritage foundation cannot honor its mission if it does not endorse DIA and promote the freedom of disabled Americans” said organizer Stephanie Woodward. “Without DIA their claims to promote individual freedom and American values ring hollow. They must endorse DIA!”
For decades ADAPT has worked to secure for disabled Americans the same rights and liberties enjoyed by their non-disabled neighbors. Learn more about ADAPT’s history and activities at www.adapt.org , on social media with the National ADAPT Facebook and Twitter pages. Also, under the hashtag #ADAPTandRESIST.
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