Why was a leading disability organization denied access to the RNC?

Days before the start of the Republican National Convention (RNC), independent journalist Pablo Manriquez dropped a scoop on X , the platform formerly known as Twitter: The American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD), one of the largest and most prominent nonpartisan disability rights organizations in the United States, had been denied observer passes to the convention.

AAPD posted a response on their own social media accounts, decrying the decision.

“Disabled people belong in any space where decisions are made. There are more than 38 million eligible voters with disabilities in the United States, who possess a wide variety of beliefs,” the statement said.

The move shocked many inside and outside the disability community, but others weren’t so surprised. In recent years, questions have risen about the strength of bipartisanship in disability advocacy, especially after the overturn of Roe v. Wade. The reason for AAPD’s omission appears to be one of mundane logistics, but the organization’s inability to attend the convention this year still points to an increasingly complex dynamic between disability advocacy and the American political right.

The American Association of People with Disabilities has a long history of bipartisan involvement. Bob Dole, a former Senate majority leader and staunch Republican from Kansas, was one of the group’s cofounders. That same bipartisanship was instrumental in the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act under President George H.W. Bush.

“We need bipartisan collaboration to get things done, particularly in the legislative branch. One of the reasons there has been a lack of progress on further transformative legislation for disabled people is a result of lack of bipartisan collaboration in Congress,” Maria Town, president of AAPD, told The 19th yesterday.

AAPD normally has a presence at the Republican National Convention, according to past presidents of the organization, so the rejection appears unusual.

Mark Perriello served as the president of AAPD from 2011 to 2015, and attended the 2012 RNC on behalf of the organization.

He described attending the convention as “a no brainer.”

“It was just another opportunity to do advocacy work and get our message out there with Republican leaders in our country,” he said.

But that didn’t happen this year. Melissa Ortiz, who served as commissioner of the Administration on Disabilities under former President Donald Trump and remains active in conservative policy circles, said AAPD’s denial of passes wasn’t about politics. It was about conference logistics. AAPD asked for tabling space two months ago, but by then, tabling space and observer passes had run out months before.

“I have no less than five friends with mobility impairments who are at the convention this week, three of whom have service dogs, and there are several veterans there with service dogs. And It’s not some conspiracy to keep people with disabilities out. It’s a lack of planning on the part of the folks at AAPD,” she said.

The 19th was able to independently confirm when AAPD made their request to the RNC. Rachel Reisner, an RNC spokesperson, confirmed that the issue is one of capacity, but did not answer specific questions about when passes ran out.

“The 2024 Republican National Convention team worked hand-in-glove with a local ADA organization and crafted a thorough plan to make the Convention accessible to everyone. An overwhelming number of groups applied for tickets to attend and due to capacity limitations the RNC unfortunately had to deny thousands of guest ticket requests,” she told The 19th in a written statement.

Helena Berger. president of AAPD from 2015 to 2019, said the organization had a presence at the Republican National Convention in 2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016. The group did not send representatives to any conventions in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Berger also emphasized the importance of cooperation across the political spectrum in making sure disabled voices are heard in policy making. “I’ve always felt AAPD is really fair when providing criticism or accolades for either party. And I think we’ve been respected for that. We have a history of being impeccably nonpartisan,” Berger said.

But some disabled conservatives, including Ortiz, do feel that AAPD has strayed from that nonpartisan history in recent years.

“The conversation needs to be had about AAPD being bipartisan, because they’ve significantly strayed from that,” Ortiz told The 19th. She feels AAPD has not done enough to court Republican support.

In addition to her work in the Trump administration, Ortiz was the first female board member of the Conservative Caucus, one of the oldest American conservative organizations. She recently launched Capability Consulting, which aims to provide disability policy development and accessibility solutions to conservative groups. She has spina bifida and is a cancer survivor.

Ortiz said she has multiple friends with disabilities at the RNC in Milwaukee and shared multiple pictures of service animals at the convention, including Lambeau , an English labrador retriever who has been a hit on social media. Lambeau’s handler is Terrence Wall, a Wisconsin delegate.

“It’s very entitled to think that you can just snap your finger and go, ‘OK, give me a slot.’ It’s the same thing with the Democratic National Convention. You can’t just decide two to three months before the convention that you want to have an event or a table at the convention. It doesn’t matter who you know, if the space is sold, the space is sold,” Ortiz said.

The Democratic National Convention will, however, be giving AAPD table space, although they have not yet hammered out the details of a satellite event to the convention. Despite also receiving a late request, the DNC said it felt that including AAPD was a priority.

“From the very beginning of our planning, we’ve set out to make this year’s Democratic National Convention the most accessible and inclusive in history. The people and organizations represented at our convention will be a direct reflection of those values and the broad, diverse Biden-Harris coalition,” said Emily Soong, press secretary of the Democratic National Convention.

The 19th took a closer look at what happened, as well as how disabled conservatives feel in this particular political moment. Sources close to the Republican Party, the disability advocacy community, and those who have straddled the lines between the two spoke about the changing landscape.

Some disabled conservatives do feel alienated from AAPD and the mainline disability rights movement over policy. Specifically, they object to AAPD’s decision to take a stance on abortion in the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade in 2022. One disabled conservative working in disability rights spaces agreed to be interviewed on condition of anonymity because he is concerned about the potential repercussions to his career.

“AAPD has made certain strategic choices politically to affiliate with the left, including on areas where there’s a lot of internal disagreement with the disability community and areas where there’s questionable relevance to the disability community.” He pointed to abortion rights as an example.

In the most recent polling conducted by Data for Progress in April of this year, 55 percent of disabled respondents said that they think abortion should be legal in all or most cases – a number that is largely similar to that of non-disabled people. It is a majority but as he pointed out, a slim one.

“It is choosing, in a very prominent way, to say goodbye to [disabled people who oppose abortion] and pick up other folks,” he said.

It isn’t just that he sees the adoption of pro-abortion rights as immoral. He also sees it as unstrategic and does not feel there is reciprocity between movements. For example, he is skeptical that reproductive health care provider Planned Parenthood will adopt disability movement rhetoric about conditions in nursing homes.

Other disabled conservatives are more positive about AAPD. Rachel Barkley is the new director of Able Americans , a program that is possibly the first think tank project explicitly dedicated to conservative disability policy. It’s housed within the National Center for Public Policy Research, a conservative think tank on the advisory board for Project 2025 , the policy blueprint created by the conservative Heritage Foundation that lays out a vision for Trump’s second White House term if he’s reelected. The founder of the National Center for Public Policy Research, David Ridenour, has a personal relationship with disability that sparked his interest in the topic: His son is on the autism spectrum.

Ridenour, Barley said, “looked around and noticed that at center-right think tanks, nobody is looking at these issues, nobody is providing solutions. Nobody is taking this on. And it’s time someone did.”

Barkley is newly disabled – she developed a spinal cord tumor four years ago that left her paralyzed from the shoulders down. However, she has a long history of working on disability policy.

Prior to working for Able Americans, Barkley worked on Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers’ staff. McMorris Rodgers, a Republican representing Washington’s 5th District, has been a longtime supporter of some disability rights priorities, like the abolition of subminimum wage for people with disabilities and the establishment of ABLE accounts , which allow some people with disabilities to save more money without losing access to long-term care. McMorris Rodgers has a personal connection to the issue. One of her sons, Cole, has Down syndrome.

Barkley is proud of her work with McMorris Rodgers but never expected to shift from working on disability policy to living it.

“I went from being an outsider looking at a disability policy and learning it to experiencing the effects of it every day,” Barkley said.

Barkley is committed to working across ideological divides, and learned the importance of doing so through her time on Capitol Hill.

“If we want to accomplish anything, especially in Congress, it’s got to be bipartisan. I don’t think it behooves the success of helping people with disabilities through policy to pigeonhole us in one party or the other. Even if we don’t agree on everything, like if we’re on different sides of the abortion debate, that shouldn’t stop us from coming to the same table on travel policy or on fixing the Medicaid benefits cliff ,” Barkley said.

Barkley looks forward to potentially working with AAPD and other disability organizations again in her new role.

“‘You have this stance on abortion, so we’re not going to work with you on the 99 other things that need to be fixed for people with disabilities,’ – I don’t think that idea serves people with disabilities. We need to all be able to come together on the things we do agree about and you know, make a change in this either the next administration or in Congress,” Barkley said.