[Congressional Record Volume 172, Number 119 (Tuesday, July 21, 2026)]
[House]
[Page H4687]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        36th ANNIVERSARY OF ADA

  (Mr. Hoyer of Maryland was recognized to address the House for 5 
minutes.)
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, one of the proudest moments of my time in 
public service was sponsoring the Americans with Disabilities Act and 
seeing it through to enactment.
  I was honored to work closely with House and Senate colleagues, 
leaders like Bob Dole, Tom Harkin, Tony Coelho, Steve Bartlett, Orrin 
Hatch, and Ted Kennedy, just to name a few. We passed it on a 
bipartisan basis, and it was signed into law by President George Bush 
in 1990.
  This month, we celebrate the 36th anniversary of the ADA. In those 36 
years, that law has made a transformative difference for millions of 
Americans. It did so not only for physical access to public and private 
spaces of public accommodations but also in ensuring reasonable 
accommodations in workplaces and nondiscrimination in every facet of 
American life.
  We have seen it strengthened through legislation like the ADA 
Amendments Act of 2008 and through the courts with decisions like 
Olmstead v. L.C. in 1999.
  That decision concerned the ADA's nondiscrimination rule and applied 
it to the forced segregation of disabled people away from their 
communities, a historic tragedy in centuries past.
  The Olmstead ruling affirmed that States are required to provide 
disability services in the most integrated setting possible: in 
schools, workplaces, and even individuals' homes.
  Last month, the Department of Justice issued new guidance that the 
ADA does not guarantee--according to them--a right to live and receive 
services in integrated settings. Instead, it reinterprets the 
Olmstead's decision as only prohibiting States from unnecessarily 
institutionalizing those with disabilities without adequate 
justification and that it did not establish a general integration 
mandate.
  Frankly, that is absurd. Olmstead merely affirmed what Congress had 
clearly intended in the ADA. Unlike when we speculate on what our 
Founders' intent was in paraphrasing certain parts of our Constitution, 
when it comes to laws enacted 36 years ago, we can go right to the 
source.
  Let me be absolutely and unambiguously clear, as the House sponsor of 
the ADA: An integration mandate, as outlined correctly in the Olmstead 
ruling, was our intent.
  Senators Dole, Kennedy, and Hatch may no longer be here to state it, 
but I am sure former Senator Harkin and former Representative Coelho, 
Bartlett, and others, who were involved in drafting and enacting the 
law, will affirm the same.
  Among the findings expressly listed in the text of the ADA was that, 
``Society has tended to isolate and segregate individuals with 
disabilities, and, despite some improvements, such forms of 
discrimination against individuals with disabilities continue to be a 
serious and pervasive social problem,'' according to the Olmstead case.
  The Department of Justice is wrong and ought to retract its new 
guidance to States and communities.
  At the same time, we have also seen the Trump administration use 
disability rights as an excuse to undermine ballot access and trample 
on the Help America Vote Act, which I also had the honor of sponsoring.
  The same principle just outlined about Olmstead applies here as well. 
It was never Congress' intent in writing the ADA that accommodating 
people with disabilities should be used as an excuse to limit 
Americans' right to vote, just as it should not be issuing a rule 
penalizing Americans with disabilities for living at home with their 
families and caregivers and slashing Medicaid funding, upon which so 
many in the disability community rely.
  I certainly hope statements like this one--from someone who was 
intimately involved in the writing of the ADA and stated from the 
floor--will serve as a reminder of the legislative intent of the ADA 
and of the Congress: It is truly all about nondiscrimination, public 
accommodation, equal access, and, yes, integration as much as possible 
within communities.
  We cannot turn the clock back to the time before the ADA, when those 
with disabilities were ostracized, isolated, and locked away.
  I am proud of the part I played in changing that. All of us should be 
proud that this institution came through and delivered in both promise 
and practice. Let us continue to do so today.

                          ____________________