News
Peter Torres Fremlin

Never go back

Reversal in the United States, the link between disability and trans struggles, and the latest news from 29 countries
A photo of wheelchair-users protesting in a US government committee room, while two members of the USCP police intervene beside them. At the centre of the picture are three women, two of them Black and one white. They all look emotional and angry, and are shouting and raising their arms in the air, holding hand-made signs which read "Save Medicaid", "Hands Off Our Medicaid" and "People over Profit, Care Over Greed!". One of the policemen has his hands on one of the protestors' wheelchairs, as if he is trying to remove her from the room.
“Hands off our Medicaid.” Protestors interrupt US Congress committee discussions of a budget that would see millions losing essential health care. Washington DC, May 13th, 2025. Photo by Jemal Countess/Getty Images.

Dear Debriefers,

We're back to the latest in disability news.

Disability rights are being undone in the United States, but the campaigns that secured them can show how to hold on.

We see the themes of bodily autonomy that link disability and trans struggles, and the latest lessons from climate change.

All this and more in a tour of the latest developments in international disability rights, a sinister use of artificial intelligence, and a disabled politician underestimated to her opponent's peril.

Explore the full guide with 115 hand-picked links: curated across 29 countries or 37 subjects. This edition picks up from the update in April.

Help it continue

Disability Debrief is fundraising to bring you the stories you won't read anywhere else.

Thanks for generous new contributions from Áine, Annika, Cath, Elizabeth, Gaelynn, Mariela and Samantha.

Here's why Heather, an academic in Canada, supports the Debrief:

“I really love and respect your work. Doing my small part to try to help it continue.”

This edition is by Peter Torres Fremlin, editor of Disability Debrief and from the UK.

“Never go back”

The Trump administration's attacks on federal government continues to dismantle or threaten supports relied upon by disabled people.

Among the largest threats is the proposed budget that would lead to over 10 million people losing Medicaid coverage – essential healthcare for people who can't afford an alternative. A large part of this will be done with paperwork, using new administrative burdens to reduce the numbers of people who make claims. (A classic tactic in undermining any type of government support.)

Outside of healthcare, federal workers are losing their jobs, social security administration is in chaos, supports in education are being stopped, and cuts in federal grants are cutting short emerging careers. DOGE's havoc on the federal government is underlaid with ableism and other threats for disabled people.

What strikes me in several of these articles is that these services for disabled people were secured in the past decades. This means that the lessons of campaigning are very much in living memory. History offers a “possible playbook” to challenge cuts in health, and those at risk of losing education supports also know what it took to win them.

At the start of this month, hundreds gathered to celebrate the fifty year anniversary of the closure of Willowbrook State School. This New York facility was the biggest state-run institution for people with mental disabilities in the US, with awful conditions and dubious medical practices. Someone in the audience commemorating its closure shouted “never go back”.

Push disabled people out of sight

Another historical view on disability in the United States comes from Alex Green, who studies the mass institutionalisation of disabled people, and warns how even in the past few years there has been a return to practices of segregation.

Green points out how ideas about the place of disabled people go right to the heart of American values and the American dream:

“The simple fact is that disability [is] at odds with our ideas about the American dream, about the idea that you work hard and then you succeed, and you get your rewards, because many of us cannot work in the conventional ways that nondisabled people can, and faced with a group of people who don’t fit with the vision of that myth, non-disabled Americans have ruthlessly taken every opportunity over the last century and beyond to try to push disabled people back out of sight, because we don’t fit with common notions of efficiency or cosmetic beauty or other things we value most in society today.”

“We too defy definition”

In the UK and New Zealand, disability activists are writing about the connections between disability and trans rights. In New Zealand, Henrietta Bollinger says that the “policing of trans bodies should be a red flag for all of us”:

“As disabled people we are painfully familiar with our bodies and ways of being over-scrutinised, over-medicalised, unimagined and excluded. We too defy definition.”

In the UK, Anna Landre points to how disabled bodies “defy and disprove biological markers of sex”:

‘Every definition of “biological sex” I’ve seen leaves out plenty of cisgender women as well as trans ones. This is especially true for disabled women, who know far too well what it is to fall outside society’s definition of womanhood: biological, social, or otherwise.’

And, along similar lines, Disability Rights UK explores how Trans and Disability Justice are linked struggles:

“When we start to question who deserves access to bodily autonomy and who doesn’t, it becomes a deathly game. A game Disabled people never win.”

Meanwhile, in India, Abishek Anicca writes about the complex interplay between disability and masculinity:

“The disabled man, online and offline, is always in a conundrum. On one hand, they want to belong, and in this quest, they try to put themselves out in the world. [...] On the other hand, they are always under threat from the able-bodied gaze.”

Lessons on climate change

This past month also saw many updates on disability and climate crisis.

First-person stories come from Uganda, with a video feature from Disability Justice Project on a livestock farmer offering lessons to those around him. And from Bangladesh on disability on the front line of climate change.

There is also new material on how organisations can approach tackling disability and climate change. There's a guide for funders investing, further guidance on inclusive climate finance, and insights from civil society. And in Jordan some disabled people are finding opportunities in green employment.

Disability rights, data (and democracy?)

Developments in disability rights...

  • Kenya has passed a new disability law expanding the definition of disability and mandating more accessibility and protections against discrimination.
  • The UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has made recommendations on how selected countries can improve; Canada was told to modify its law on assisted dying.

Two important new references:

Meanwhile the International Disability Alliance (IDA) held elections to leadership of a reformed General Assembly and Board. Nawaf Kabbara is now President of the General Assembly and Fernando Riaño has come in as President of the Board. (The IDA CEO is also a man).

If you have questions you'd like me to put to IDA's leadership about this election, or anything else, let me know.

“We are with you, but are you with us?”

Controlling the money. Scader Louis writes from Malawi on how funding can either “sustain or strangle activism”:

“As a disability activist, let me be clear, when funders retain control, they are forcing us to justify our strategies to people who may have no direct experience of our realities. Instead of trusting our lived experience and expertise, we’re made to fit into predefined boxes.”

“We are with you – but are you with us?” Face Equality International argues that people with disfigurements be seen as disabled people under disability rights law. They make this argument both because of the impairments and social barriers:

“Disfigurements do sometimes impact function; a cleft lip and palate, for example, can make it harder to speak, eat and breathe as well affecting appearance. But some disfigurements impact what someone looks like without affecting how their body works. This could be the case for someone with many visible but benign skin tumours caused by neurofibromatosis type 1. We believe that, by recognising the disabling power of different social barriers – including attitudes about facial differences – we are stronger together, while still leaving room to acknowledge the many diverse experiences within the disability rights movement.”

Past, present, future

“The world’s oldest surviving organisation of people with disabilities is a trade union”. Also taking a historical view is this piece from Joe Buckley on links between disability and labour movements dating back to the 19th century, and sharing Sightsavers' efforts to promote employment internationally today. I wonder if this is in fact the oldest surviving disability-led organisation though, as I guess some Deaf and Blind organisations go pretty far back.

Repressed in the present. In the country of Georgia, the disability community says that people with disabilities are “disproportionately affected by government repression” in the current protests. (See previously).

Perverted by the future. A disturbing social media trend sees artificial intelligence being used to make videos where features associated with Down Syndrome are super-imposed onto women in sexualised videos, driving viewers to OnlyFans accounts. Initial reporting a while back from 404 media (paywalled).

France for Australia

I definitely don't want to end on that note, so here's some nicer news, about a disabled politician in Australia in their recent federal election.

Labor's Ali France won her campaign, unseating the leader of the opposition, Peter Dutton. France was initially “underestimated and pitied” when she returned to her work after having a leg amputated. France said this about the assistive devices she now uses:

"My first best friend is my prosthetic leg and my second is my wheelchair."

In case you missed them, catch-up on recent Debriefs:

All best for your travels in disability news,

Peter

Outro

Further reading. All the links from these curated editions go into the Debrief library, which now has over 6,200 links from over 160 countries. See below for contents from this month's update.

Let your friends know. Sharing the newsletter is how people find it!

Connect. Get in touch, and find Disability Debrief on Linkedin.

Help us do more. Make a one-off or recurring financial contribution to the Debrief.

Recent News

This update has 115 curated links from 29 countries and regions, organized across 37 subjects.

You can explore it organized by subject or by country.

Subjects

Countries

Acknowledgements

The photograph is by Jemal Countess/Getty Images for Protect Our Care.

Thanks to Celestine Fraser for photo research and other support.

And many thanks to everyone who shares links, news and reports – and the readers and organisations whose support makes this work possible.

Popular tags

News Feature