Candidate

Promises Made

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton

Employment

• Reinstate Bill Clinton’s executive order that committed the Federal government to hiring 100,000 people with disabilities
• Hire qualified people with disabilities to fill leadership roles in the Administration
• Double the investment in work-enabling technologies by providing low interest loans for purchases
• Provide real-time support for employers so they can make the accommodations necessary for employees to do their jobs
• Conduct a review to determine where disincentives to work still exist in Federal benefit programs and where we can and must do better
• Propose and work to pass $1,000 per worker tax credit to offset work and transportation expenses for disabled workers

Health Care

• Eliminate Medicare eligibility time limit on number of years an individual can work
• Help working individuals with disabilities buy into Medicaid
• Health care plan will cover every American (never deny coverage because of pre-existing conditions or risk factors) and provide affordable choices to those who have no coverage or are dissatisfied with their current coverage
• Health care plan will let you keep your existing coverage if you are satisfied with it
• “No more discrimination.  Period.  Cover everybody.  Cover pre-existing conditions.  No questions asked.”
• Under health care plan, everyone will have access to the same choices members of Congress have now

Long-Term Services and Supports

• Ask the Office of Civil Rights to enforce the Olmstead decision
• Vigorously enforce the Community Choices Act

ADA

• Will sign the ADA Restoration Act into law as President

Senator Chris Dodd

Voting

• Ensure vigorous enforcement of HAVA’s accessibility requirements
• Provide voter verified paper ballots and record and fund new accessibility technologies

Employment

• Encourage public-private partnerships related to recruitment and hiring and retention of people with disabilities
• Ensure the tax code of the USA encourages employers to provide additional accommodations for disabled applicants and employees
• Support efforts to increase development and access to assistive and universally designed technologies in the workforce
• Ensure that the federal government become a model employer of the disabled

ADA

• Strengthen ADA by signing the ADA restoration act into law
• Strengthen the EEOC’s enforcement of the ADA

Transportation

• Increase access to affordable and convenient mass transit systems for disabled people

Technology

• Require that Internet technologies be made fully accessible to people with disabilities

Health Care

• Universal healthcare plan will make affordable, accessible healthcare available to everyone in the U.S.

Education

• Reform No Child Left Behind (NCLB) but not get rid of it
• Make sure that disabled children remain within the framework of NCLB

Congressman Dennis Kucinich

Health Care

• Not-for-profit healthcare system that establishes healthcare for all Americans- no premiums, no co-pays, no deductibles, everyone is covered
• Healthcare system with rapidly expand mental health coverage
• Put mental health treatment on par with any other kind of health treatment

Campaign

• Hire a full-time transcriber on his campaign to provide captions for deaf people

Veterans

• Bring all the troops home to prevent brain injuries among soldiers

Former Senator John Edwards

(as represented by Former Congressman David Bonior)

Education

• Put America on a path toward fully funding the federal share of special education costs
• Propose a breaking-down-barriers initiative to help high school and college students with disabilities find internships and mentors

Veterans

• Upgrade the GI Bill for war veterans
• Restore the training programs for disabled war veterans at the Department of Labor

Transportation

• Invest in accessible mass transit and improve mobility for people with disabilities in rural areas

Employment

• Require 100,000 qualified individuals with disabilities in the federal work force
• Actively recruit people with disabilities and support flexible work hours and telecommuting to make this possible

Housing

• Create one million new section 8 affordable housing vouchers

Health Care

• Universal healthcare plan will cover every American

Former Senator Mike Gravel

< Made no concrete promises regarding disability policy issues >

Senator John McCain

Veterans

• Give care for wounded veterans the highest priority in his administration

Senator Joseph Biden

UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

• Work to sign and ratify the UN CRPD

Housing

• Significantly increase the budget for public and assisted housing
• Increase tax credits for those who provide housing so rents can be lower
• Increase enforcement of fair housing laws
• Provide availability for more construction

Long- Term Services and Supports

• Provide more money to states for enforcement and implementation of Olmstead
• Bring lawsuits out of Department of Justice for more strict enforcement of Olmstead
• Provide more nursing schools
• Pay off nurse education tuitions for those who work in areas of greatest need

Education

• Pay off teacher education tuitions for those who work in areas of greatest need
• Propose legislation for another 100,000 teachers so there will be smaller classes