Not a Crime to be Disabled: The Criminalization of Disability in America

July marks the thirty-second anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, or ADA, as it’s better known—the landmark civil rights law that promised equal opportunity and economic security for Americans with disabilities. As we’ve talked about a lot on this show over the years, as important as it is to celebrate how far we’ve come in the decades since the ADA became part of the fabric of American life, every time we hit the month of July, it’s even more important to acknowledge how far will still have to go to achieve the as-yet unfulfilled promises of the ADA.  And that’s why this July, Off-Kilter is once again spending all month long having conversations with leaders from across the disability community. To continue that series of conversations, this week we’re taking a deep dive into the criminalization of disability in America—and how we got to a place where people behind bars in prisons and jails are three to four times more likely to have a disability than the general population. And to unpack the intersection of criminal justice and disability justice, Rebecca sat down with a panel of incredible leaders from two organizations working at this nexus: Access Living, a longtime leader in the disability rights and justice space that works to build a world free from barriers and discrimination for all disabled people, and Activating Change, a new organization that recently spun off from the Vera Institute of Justice to center people with disabilities in reforming and reenvisioning the nation’s criminal justice system.  This week’s guests are: Candace Coleman, racial justice organizer at Access Living; Nancy Smith, executive director of Activating Change; Olga Trujillo, Director of Leadership Development, Visibility and Collective Healing at Activating Change; and Keith Jones, President and CEO of SoulTouchin’ Experience and a consultant who works closely with Activating Change. Editor’s note: The Century Foundation is thrilled to have Access Living and Activating Change as members of the Disability Economic Justice Collaborative, which you can learn more about at dejc.org.  For more: Here’s a report Rebecca wrote a while back at the Center for American Progress offering an overview of the mass warehousing of disabled people behind bars, including most of the stats the panel mentions throughout this episode Check out Access Living’s 2019 report on how to stem the flow of disabled people into U.S. jails through pretrial diversion and other tools: “A Cross-Disability Perspective on Reducing Jail Incarceration”; as well as their 2022 “Voices of Reentry” panel series Learn more about Activating Change—which recently spun off from the Vera Institute of Justice—and how to get involved with their work to center disabled people in the movement to end mass incarceration and criminalization  Check out Olga Trujillo's work on deconstructing the stigma of dissociative identity disorder And here’s more from Keith Jones about his work, and why building stronger communities requires a commitment from heart and soul