June 5, 2025
This DignityMA Study Session reviews the Trump Administration’s coordinated attack on disability rights, through the issuance of executive orders that eliminate legal claims and disability rights, rescind disability regulations, and challenge important disability precedents. Steven discussed strategies to oppose these efforts, particularly in light of the drastic reduction in civil rights enforcement by the Department of Justice.
Presenter: Steven Schwartz, JD, Special Counsel, Center for Public Representation
Steve serves as special counsel, after founding the Center in 1976 and then serving as its executive director for 38 years and litigation director for 13. After graduating from Harvard Law School in 1971, he represented thousands of people with disabilities over the past fifty years. He has testified before Congress on numerous occasions, successfully resolved a number of damage cases for institutionalized individuals with disabilities, and litigated dozens of class action cases that challenge the unnecessary segregation of people with disabilities in psychiatric hospitals, developmental disability institutions, nursing facilities, and juvenile justice settings.
Read or download the slides for The Administration’s Campaign to Erase Disability Rights, Protections and Protectors (pdf).
Video
Download the Legal Landscape chat file (txt).
At the end of the session, Chris Hoeh referenced an article in the Guardian by Naomi Klein: The Rise of End Times Facism