1. United States
2. Iowa
3. Letter

Re: Urging your opposition to the DOJ Office of Legal Counsel opinion of June 19, 2026, reinterpreting Olmstead v. L.C. and the disability “integration mandate” I am a constituent writing to ask you to take a public stand against a legal opinion issued by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) on June 19, 2026. The opinion reinterprets the landmark 1999 Supreme Court decision Olmstead v. L.C. and claims that federal law does not require states to provide community-based services to people with disabilities. This is not an abstract legal debate. It threatens the home- and community-based supports that millions of disabled Americans, older adults, and their families depend on to live in their own homes rather than in institutions. I want to be direct about why this letter is necessary. The DOJ states that this opinion is not intended to enable cuts to services. I do not find that assurance credible, and I do not believe my fellow constituents should either. We have repeatedly been promised that Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security would be protected, and those programs have been cut anyway. A statement of intent from an agency carries no binding force. What matters is what this opinion permits — and what it permits is dangerous. What this opinion would allow For more than 25 years, the integration mandate recognized in Olmstead has been one of the strongest legal protections preventing the unnecessary institutionalization of people with disabilities. By recharacterizing that mandate as something states are not legally required to honor, the OLC opinion would: 1.     Signal that the federal government will step back from enforcing the right to community living, leaving people with disabilities to defend that right through private lawsuits, state by state, case by case. 2.     Give states fiscal and legal cover to cut optional Medicaid home- and community-based services (HCBS) — the in-home caregiving, nursing, and supported-living services that are not federally mandated and are historically the first on the chopping block when budgets tighten. 3.     Push people who could live at home into far more expensive institutional settings — a result that is both more costly to taxpayers and devastating to the autonomy, families, and communities of disabled people. 4.     Align the federal government with state plaintiffs in pending litigation (Texas v. Kennedy) that seeks to dismantle the integration mandate outright. Why this is a prelude, not an isolated act This opinion did not appear in a vacuum. It lands directly on top of the largest Medicaid rollback in U.S. history. According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act will cut more than one trillion dollars in federal Medicaid and CHIP spending through 2034, with the deepest reductions structured to take effect after the 2026 elections. States are already proposing cuts to in-home disability care to absorb the loss. The sequence is what should concern every legislator: first the funding is cut, then the legal duty that would have forced states to preserve community services is quietly removed. The money disappears, and the obligation that protected disabled people disappears with it. That is why this memo must be opposed now, before it becomes the legal foundation for stripping away essential supports. This alarm is shared across the disability community I am not alone in this assessment. Leading disability rights and civil rights organizations have condemned the opinion: 5.     The ACLU called the opinion wrong on the law and affirmed that the right to live in the community is foundational to disability rights. 6.     The Arc of the United States warned that it puts essential support at risk for millions and would force states into impossible choices that could strip people of the services they need to live with dignity and independence. 7.     The American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD) described it as an attempt to turn back the clock roughly 30 years on disability integration, raising the specter of a return to the warehousing of disabled people in institutions like the notorious Willowbrook. 8.     The American Network of Community Options and Resources (ANCOR), which represents disability service providers nationwide, has long warned that because HCBS is not federally required, it is the first service states scale back when Medicaid funding falls. 9.     The Autistic Self Advocacy Network and ADAPT have likewise warned that reduced enforcement and funding will push disabled people onto longer waiting lists and into institutions. 10.  Legal experts, including former DOJ Olmstead enforcement officials and the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, stress that an agency opinion is not the law — Congress makes the law — which is precisely why congressional voices like yours matter here. What I am asking you to do I respectfully ask you to: 11.  Publicly call on the Attorney General and the Department of Justice to rescind the June 19, 2026 OLC opinion and to reaffirm the federal government’s longstanding commitment to enforcing the integration mandate. 12.  Use your oversight authority to demand that DOJ and the Civil Rights Division explain whether they intend to halt Olmstead enforcement, and to put their answer on the record. 13.  Press CMS and HHS to protect Medicaid home- and community-based services funding and to reject any state plan that would shift people from community care into institutional settings. 14.  Support and co-sponsor legislation that codifies the integration mandate and the right to community-based services directly into federal statute, so that it cannot be erased by a change in agency interpretation. 15.  Oppose any further cuts to Medicaid, and the implementation of cuts that endanger HCBS, that would make institutionalization the default for people who can and want to live in their communities. 16.  Make a clear public statement that you stand with disabled constituents and against any effort to roll back their right to live in the community. In closing The right of disabled people to live in their own homes and communities was hard-won, and it has been affirmed by the Supreme Court, by Congress, and by decades of bipartisan enforcement — including during the first Trump administration. It should not be unwound by a single agency memo timed to coincide with the deepest Medicaid cuts in our nation’s history. I am asking you to use the full weight of your office to oppose it. Thank you for your attention to this urgent matter. I would welcome a written response describing the actions you intend to take, and I am glad to share my own story or speak with your staff. Respectfully,