More than 100 disability organizations have come out against the SCOTUS nomination of Judge Kavanaugh.
Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) at Time:
Judge Kavanaugh has shown us what he believes about disabled Americans. In Tarlow v. D.C., he ruled that those with mental disabilities shouldn’t have the right to make medical decisions about their own bodies. In Baloch v. Kempthorne, he declared that businesses’ profits are more important than our health. And in Johnson v. Interstate Management Company, he decided that it’s okay for employers to discriminate against us, too.ASAN has more detail:
Judge Kavanaugh has ruled that people with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities do not have any right to a say in our own health care. In Doe ex rel. Tarlow v. D.C., Judge Kavanaugh ruled against two women who had been forced to have abortions and one woman who was forced to have eye surgery. The D.C. agency that serves people with developmental disabilities had consented to all three procedures without discussing them with the women. Judge Kavanaugh wrote that because the women lacked “capacity” to make their own medical decisions independently, they had no right even to be consulted. This decision dramatically delayed the women’s ability to obtain compensation for the harm they suffered.
The United States has a long history of eugenic policies that hurt people with disabilities. People with disabilities, especially people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, have been forced to have sterilizations and abortions, and our children have been taken away from us. These policies often are based on the assumption that people with disabilities should not have a say in our own health care. Judge Kavanaugh’s decision in Doe is an echo of these devastating policies, and his nomination threatens our right to parent, make our own reproductive and other health care decisions, and control our own lives and bodies.
