RFK and Measles

In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread.    Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio.

A number of posts discussed Trump's support for the discredited notion.

 Another leading anti-vaxxer is presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.  He has repeatedly compared vaccine mandates to the Holocaust.  Rolling Stone and Salon retracted an RFK article linking vaccines to autism.  He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.

He is now Trump's secretary of HHS.

Jonathan Allen, Julie Tsirkin and Laura Strickler at NBC:

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a longtime critic of well-established vaccines, said Wednesday that his department is tracking an outbreak of measles that has infected more than 100 people and killed a child in Texas. But he played down the consequence of the resurgence — 25 years after the disease was declared to be eliminated in the U.S.

"We're following the measles epidemic every day," Kennedy said during President Donald Trump's first Cabinet meeting since being sworn in Jan. 20. “Incidentally, there have been four measles outbreaks this year in this country. ... So it’s not unusual. We have measles outbreaks every year.”

But the death of an unvaccinated school-age child in West Texas, confirmed by a state health official this week, is the first fatality in the U.S. since 2015.

Kennedy has been scarce at HHS headquarters, has not visited a number of HHS agencies and has not sent all-staff emails to the department's workforce, according to one department official. Notably, this person said, Kennedy has not done anything to address the measles outbreak.

“It’s almost like he’s still in campaign-mode rather than realizing he’s head of a large agency and workforce," the HHS official said.

An HHS spokesperson did not immediately return a request for comment.

Medicaid Cuts

The Politics of Autism includes an extensive discussion of insurance and Medicaid services for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Home and Community-Based Services (HCBS) are particularly important.

Lisa Poteat at The Carolina Journal:

The US House Budget Committee recently proposed, on Page 30 of their budget resolution, a per capita cap for Medicaid for each state. These caps would most likely not get North Carolina the funding needed for all Medicaid recipients and programs.

Medicaid is key to people with IDD living productive lives in the community of their choice. A loss of funding to this program would not only upend the lives of people with IDD and their families, but it would also harm North Carolina’s economy.

If a person with IDD loses access to supports and services due to cuts in the Medicaid program, some of the ripple effects include:

Employment: Many people with IDD are employed. A loss of funds could close supported-employment programs. It could also mean funding isn’t available to pay for the DSPs. If a DSP is not able to help, parent(s) may have to quit their jobs to stay home full time to take care of their child. All these scenarios result in a negative compounding effect in economic losses.

Increase to NC Innovations Waiver waitlist: North Carolina already limits HCBS due to constraints on available funding, with 18,771 people with IDD are currently on a waitlist to receive Medicaid-funded HCBS.

State budget: State legislators would have to look at making up for the loss in federal funds.

Shutdown of rural hospitals: Many people with IDD living in rural parts of North Carolina need access to rural hospitals for emergency care. Medicaid funding enables rural hospitals and other critical health care infrastructure to stay open and provide care.

Community based organizations: Organizations providing HCBS may have to furlough staff due to cuts in HCBS funding.

Loss of independence: Without supports in place, people with IDD may be forced to move into an institution and out of their community.

The Texas Measles Outbreak

In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread.    Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio.

A number of posts discussed Trump's support for the discredited notion.

Devi Shastri at AP:

The measles outbreak in rural West Texas has grown to 124 cases across nine counties, the state health department said Tuesday, and 18 people are hospitalized.

The outbreak is largely spreading in the Mennonite community in an area where small towns are separated by vast stretches of oil rig-dotted open land but connected due to people traveling between towns for work, church, grocery shopping and other day-to-day errands.

Brownfield Mayor Eric Horton, a Republican, said he believes in the safety of the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine because it has been used for so many years and has stopped measles from spreading in the U.S.

... 

State health officials have said this outbreak is Texas’ largest in nearly 30 years. Cases have been concentrated in a “close-knit, undervaccinated” Mennonite community, health department spokeswoman Lara Anton has said — especially among families who attend small private religious schools or are homeschooled.

...

The MMR vaccine is safe and highly effective in preventing measles infection and severe cases of the disease.

The first shot is recommended for children between 12 and 15 months old and the second between 4 and 6 years old. The vaccine series is required for kids before entering kindergarten in public schools nationwide.

Before the vaccine was introduced in 1963, the U.S. saw some 3 million to 4 million cases per year. Now, it’s usually fewer than 200 in a normal year.

There is no link between the vaccine and autism, despite a now-discredited study and health disinformation.

Musk and the R-Word

In The Politics of Autism, I write about the everyday struggles facing autistic people and their families -- including casual prejudice against disabled people.  

Trump has a long history of using the r-word, and Lordy, there are tapes.

Elon Musk has said that he is autistic, so it is odd that he would the word, a term that bigots throw against autistic people.

David Oliver at USA Today:

Elon Musk has the ear of one of the most powerful people in the world – President Donald Trump – making him one of the most powerful people in the world, too. He's been given unfettered access to adjust the federal government's budget and headcount

So what's he doing posting a slur multiple times targeting the disabled community on social media?

Musk – who boasts nearly 220 million followers on X, the social media platform he owns – has repeatedly used the "R" word to describe people with whom he disagrees. In the last week alone, he's included it in at least three tweets. The use of this language has sparked criticism from people with disabilities and their advocates, who were beginning to see a world where such terms were deemed unacceptable. USA TODAY has reached out to Musk for comment.

Trump v. People with Disabilities

 In The Politics of Autism, I discuss the issue's role in campaign politics.   In the 2016 campaign, a number of posts discussed Trump's bad record on disability issues more generally.   As his words and actions have shown, he despises Americans with disabilities.   

April Rubin and  Maya Goldman at Axios:

People with disabilities say President Trump's DEI purge is eroding health care, education and legal protections they've only won in recent decades.

Why it matters: The Trump administration has taken actions that undermine accessibility measures — critical for leveling the playing field for people with disabilities — as part of its efforts targeting diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts."It's very clear that there is an orchestrated attack by conservatives to dismantle the rights of people with disabilities," said Shawn Murinko, a Washington resident who has cerebral palsy.

State of play: Trump last month ordered an end to all federal programs that mandate or invoke accessibility, alongside diversity, equity and inclusion.The Department of Justice said it will penalize programs that promote accessibility.

Trump has pledged to close the Department of Education, which enforces protections for students with disabilities in school.

Meanwhile, Food and Drug Administration officials said the word "disabled" was banned from external communications, though the White House later claimed that was an error.

Cuts to National Institutes of Health funding also threaten existing and future disability research.

The federal government is one of the largest employers for people with disabilities, but return-to-office mandates could force some out of their jobs.

Rachel Zamzow at The Transmitter:

For Cara Pugliese, the email came at 4:54 p.m. on Saturday, 15 February. According to a Facebook post that Pugliese published on 18 February, her employer, the U.S. National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), wrote that she was “not fit for continued employment because your ability, knowledge, and skills do not fit the Agency’s current needs, and your performance has not been adequate to justify further employment at the Agency.”

Pugliese was chief of the Autism, Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, and Externalizing Disorders Interventions Research program. Her abrupt termination is “ridiculous,” says Laura Anthony, professor of psychiatry at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, who has mentored and worked with Pugliese since 2013. “She’s such an amazing scientist, and creative and working hard to get interventions out to where kids and families are who need them,” adds Anthony, who has corresponded with Pugliese since receiving the news of her layoff. “She has been a superstar [at the NIMH] as well.”

Pugliese joins what is now reported as 1,165 National Institutes of Health employees cut from the agency since 14 February. The layoffs mostly targeted probationary employees, including Pugliese, who had held her position for 344 days—just 21 days shy of completing her one-year probationary period, according to her 18 February Facebook post, which has been shared more than 26,000 times. (Representatives at the NIMH have not responded to The Transmitter’s email and phone requests for comment.)

Autistic People and First Responders, School Employees, and Healthcare Professionals

In The Politics of Autism, I discuss interactions between first responders and autistic people.  Some jurisdictions allow autistic drivers to ask for a blue envelope to disclose the driver's diagnosis in case of an accident or traffic stop.  Others have ID cards.

Lauren Jones at The Henrico [VA] Citizen:

A bill aimed at enhancing professional development opportunities for school employees and healthcare professionals working with students with autism spectrum disorder passed the Senate and House unanimously.

SB1293 , proposed by Sen. William Stanley, R-Franklin County, directs the Board of Education to provide guidance and optional yearly training for staff who regularly interact with students, helping them communicate with and support those with autism.

Stanley emphasized the need for the bill, noting a lack of training among educators and healthcare professionals when working with autistic students.

Christine Sloan at CBS New York:

New Jersey residents on the autism spectrum can soon apply for a designation on their driver's license or ID to help them with interactions with police.

The notation will appear as the number 5 in the "Restrictions" section of an ID.

They'll also be issued a Motor Vehicle Commission "pink card" describing their diagnosis, which must be carried with the license or ID card.

"So law enforcement, when they interact with them, they know how to treat them with respect and make sure that everyone can be treated safely," New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin said.

The card includes a designation section, with boxes to check such as "autism spectrum," "communication disorder" and "disorder hearing aid." It also has a restriction section, with boxes such as "hearing impaired," "mechanical aid," "prosthetic aid" and more.

 KNXV-TV

On Saturday, cops went to the Greater Phoenix Autism Society to bridge the gap between individuals with autism and local law enforcement.

Emily Iland is an autism advocate who leads similar educational initiatives across the country and helped make the "Be Safe" movie which shows different types of interactions people can have with law enforcement.

"It’s hard for people with autism to relate with the police because of the communication and social difficulties that are part of autism,” Iland said.

Grant Kirwan was a participant in the “Be Safe” program, getting paired up with a cop from Gilbert.

“My journey with autism has been a rollercoaster. I, for example, have struggled with loud noises,” Kirwan said.

OCR

In The Politics of Autism, I discuss the civil rights of people with autism and other disabilities. 

HEATHER HOLLINGSWORTH, COLLIN BINKLEY and ANNIE MA at AP:

As Trump began to reshape the Education Department, investigations and mediations around disability rights issues came to a standstill.

Standing up for children with disabilities has been a primary role of the department’s civil rights office, which enforces protections guaranteed under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. Historically, most complaints to the department have involved disability discrimination — parents saying their disabled child is not receiving accommodations they need to learn, which schools must provide under federal law.

It’s not unusual for new presidential administrations to freeze cases while they adjust priorities, but exceptions typically are made for urgent situations, such as a child’s immediate learning situation. The freeze on pending cases and Trump’s calls to dismantle the department altogether left many parents worrying about the federal government’s commitment to disabled students’ rights.

...

In the fall, DarNisha Hardaway was relieved when an Education Department mediator found her son’s school needed to reevaluate him and provide tutoring. She had filed a complaint with the department after a series of suspensions that she said stemmed from her son being overwhelmed and not getting enough academic help. The 12-year-old has an intellectual disability, autism and epilepsy.

The Education Department, Hardaway said, “made the school system do what they’re supposed to do.”

If the school district broke the mediation agreement, she was told to contact the Office for Civil Rights again. This month, after her son had an outburst in class, his suburban Detroit school told her he would need to learn online for the rest of the year — a ruling Hardaway saw as a violation of his disability accommodations. On Tuesday, an Office for Civil Rights representative told her they could not respond with any substantive information.

Every day she waits, her son learns in front of a computer. “He can’t learn online, and DarNisha is not a teacher,” said Marcie Lipsitt, who is working with the family. “The OCR is just closed for business, and I’m outraged.”

OCR enforces section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, which Trumpist state attorneys general are suing to overturn. 

See my earlier post.

Measles Cases Are Spreading

In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread.    Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio.

A number of posts discussed Trump's support for the discredited notion.

 Another leading anti-vaxxer is presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.  He has repeatedly compared vaccine mandates to the Holocaust.  Rolling Stone and Salon retracted an RFK article linking vaccines to autism.  He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.

He is now Trump's secretary of HHS.

 Donald G. McNeil Jr. at WP:

Given how much Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has done to scare Americans away from vaccines, it seems inevitable that a runaway measles epidemic will ensue. Dozens of cases in rural West Texas might already be the start of one.

As Kennedy takes office as secretary of health and human services, the world’s most transmissible virus is challenging him to an arm-wrestling match, and it’s one that the iron-pumping health advocate cannot win. If he sticks to the nonsense he has spread for the past two decades, children will die — publicly, with their grieving parents interviewed on camera, regretting their decisions not to vaccinate.

On the other hand, if he wants to prevent the deaths, he will have to have to repudiate the skepticism that has made him famous (and wealthy) and vigorously urge Americans to be inoculated.

The signs are not good.

Adam Cancryn, Lauren Gardner and David Lim at Politico:

HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is preparing to remove members of the outside committees that advise the federal government on vaccine approvals and other key public health decisions, according to two people familiar with the planning.

Kennedy plans to replace members who he perceives to have conflicts of interest, as part of a widespread effort to minimize what he’s criticized as undue industry influence over the nation’s health agencies, said one of the people, who were granted anonymity to speak freely. Kennedy has long argued that drugmakers have too much sway over the approval of their products.

The effort is likely to target the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, which plays a key role in setting vaccine policy. Kennedy and his top aides are also scrutinizing a host of other outside panels, including those that advise the Food and Drug Administration.

Kennedy has only just begun evaluating the advisory committees, one of the people cautioned, and has not decided who or how many people will be replaced, or set a firm timeline for the removals.

But should he follow through, the moves would likely generate upheaval within the Department of Health and Human Services and feed concerns across the broader public health establishment that Kennedy could undermine Americans’ trust in vaccines.

...

The fresh scrutiny comes as a meeting scheduled for next week of the CDC’s external vaccine committee was canceled, according to a person familiar with the decision. HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon said the meeting is being “postponed to accommodate public comment in advance of the meeting.”

The federal public comment portal for the meeting — which was set to be open from Feb. 3 through Feb. 17 — was never activated, a contributing factor to the postponement. The public historically has had an opportunity to comment on the meeting agenda and request time to make oral statements.

 

Trump v. Disability Services

In The Politics of Autism, I write about social services, special education and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. 

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, 7.5 million children 3 to 21 years old received services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act in AY 2022-23.

About 980,000 of them were autistic, up from 498,000 in 2012-13.

Eric Garcia at The Independent:

Educators, researchers and employees at the Department of Education say that the Trump administration’s slashing of federal bureaucracies and workforces has significantly weakened special education enforcement and killed programs meant to help students with disabilities.

Last week, Tamara Linkow, the senior director of the American Institutes for Research’s education evaluation studies program, told The Independent that she learned that the federal government canceled funding for Charting my Path for Future Success. The program was meant to help students with disabilities learn about programs to transition to adulthood.

...

“The instructors had just started working with students,” Linkow said. “They were about a month and a half in depending upon the district, working with their students, and they had to stop overnight.”

The program was funded as part of a $45 million grant entitled “Evaluation of Transition Supports for Youth with Disabilities,” which was meant to evaluate the best programs for students with disabilities based on “strengthening students' goal setting, planning, and self-advocacy skills and helping them apply these self-determination skills to their transition objectives,” according to the grant’s website.

“This project was so powerful because it was both getting students access to services, getting school districts access to trained instructors to deliver effective services, and we were going to learn a lot about effective services as well so that we could inform the future of what schools and teachers are doing,” Karrie Shogren, a professor of special education at the University of Kansas, said.

RFK Jr. Makes a Fool of Senator Cassidy

In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread.    Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio.

A number of posts discussed Trump's support for the discredited notion.

 Another leading anti-vaxxer is presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.  He has repeatedly compared vaccine mandates to the Holocaust.  Rolling Stone and Salon retracted an RFK article linking vaccines to autism.  He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.

He is now Trump's secretary of HHS.

Amanda Seitz at AP:

To earn the vote he needed to become the nation’s top health official, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

made a special promise to a U.S. senator: He would not change the nation’s current vaccination schedule.

But on Tuesday, speaking for the first time to thousands of U.S. Health and Human Services agency employees, he vowed to investigate the childhood vaccine schedule that prevents measles, polio and other dangerous diseases.

“Nothing is going to be off limits,” Kennedy said, adding that pesticides, food additives, microplastics, antidepressants and the electromagnetic waves emitted by cellphones and microwaves also would be studied.

Kennedy’s remarks, which circulated on social media, were delivered during a welcome ceremony for the new health secretary at the agency’s headquarters in Washington as a measles outbreak among mostly unvaccinated people raged in West Texas. The event was held after a weekend of mass firings of thousands of HHS employees. More dismissals are expected.

In his comments Tuesday, Kennedy promised that a new “Make America Healthy Again” commission would investigate vaccines, pesticides and antidepressants to see if they have contributed to a rise in chronic illnesses such as diabetes and obesity that have plagued the American public. The commission was formed last week in an executive order by Donald Trump immediately after Kennedy was sworn in as the president’s new health secretary.

That directive said the commission will be made up of cabinet members and other officials from the administration and will develop a strategy around children’s health within the next six months. Kennedy said it will investigate issues, including childhood vaccinations, that “were formally taboo or insufficiently scrutinized.”

While Kennedy did not directly call for changes to the vaccination schedule on Tuesday, his plan to investigate it raises questions about his commitment to Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy, a Louisiana physician who harbored deep misgivings over the health secretary’s anti-vaccine advocacy. Cassidy ultimately voted to send Kennedy’s nomination to the Senate floor after he said Kennedy gave him assurances that he would not alter the federal vaccine schedule.

Trump Wants to Scrap the Department of Education

In The Politics of Autism, I write about social services, special education and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. 

Katy Neas, CEO of The Arc of the United States.,writes at Newsweek:

The Department of Education does far more than provide support to state departments of education. It funds high-quality training for special education teachers, drives innovation in how we educate students with disabilities, supports parents, and enforces disability rights laws. It also ensures that when students with disabilities are not able to access appropriate special education services, families have a way to fight back. In fact, the largest category of complaints filed with the Department of Education are from parents of students with disabilities who believe their children are being denied the education they need and deserve. In many cases, the Department of Education works directly with school districts to resolve these issues and improve services.

What does this work mean for children with disabilities? Consider Whitman, an 11-year-old with autism and apraxia who is nonspeaking and uses an augmentative communication device to communicate. The support he receives through special education has been life-changing—not just for him, but for his entire family. At first, he was placed in a school where all the children had disabilities. He struggled until the school started a program that helped Whitman learn alongside his non-disabled peers. Now, he is not only excelling academically but recently performed in two school musicals—something his family never imagined possible.

Decades ago, the United States decided that having a disability or living in a certain state should not determine whether a child receives a quality education. That promise is now under attack. Dismantling the Department of Education wouldn't just turn back the clock—it would create chaos and deepen inequality. It would mean fewer trained teachers, weaker enforcement of disability rights, and more children slipping through the cracks.

Attack on 504

In The Politics of Autism, I discuss the civil rights of people with autism and other disabilities. 

Anni Layne Rodgers at ADDitude:

Texas v. Becerra is a lawsuit filed by 17 states against the United States government that could effectively end 504 Plans for millions of students across the country.

The lawsuit was filed in late 2024 by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton against the Biden administration, which changed Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act to include gender dysphoria as a protected disability. Notably, the lawsuit also argues that “Section 504 is unconstitutional.” The lawsuit says that “Section 504 is coercive, untethered to the federal interest in disability, and unfairly retroactive” and it asks for “permanent injunctive relief” that would block enforcement of Section 504.

From the complaint:

 238. Because the Act attaches its requirements universally—to all federal spending—it forces an impossible choice on the States, all of which must decide between implementing the Rehabilitation Act and accepting any amount of federal money. When spending “conditions take the form of threats to terminate other significant independent grants,” they “are properly viewed as a means of pressuring the State to accept policy changes.” Sebelius, 547 U.S. at 580. Section 504’s universal scope renders it an unconstitutionally coercive condition on federal spending. 239. Because Section 504 is coercive, untethered to the federal interest in disability, and unfairly retroactive, the Rehabilitation Act is not constitutional under the spending clause. 240. The constitutional violation posed by invalid spending legislation can be remedied by injunctive relief that precludes relevant federal officials from withdrawing funds for incompliance. Sebelius, 567 U.S. at 588.

A.J.T. v. Osseo Area Schools

In The Politics of Autism, I write about social services, special education and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. 

 Julia Metraux at Mother Jones:

Minnesota teenager Ava T. lives with seizures that predominate in the morning, preventing her from attending school safely before noon. When her suburban Minneapolis school district refused to update her individualized education plan—a disability accommodation guaranteed by federal law—to allow at-home evening instruction to compensate, Ava and her parents sued in 2021.

A district court sided with Ava and her family—her last name is withheld—ruling in 2022 that the school district had violated her rights under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. But separate complaints say that the district had breached Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act, which include extensive disability rights provisions. In five of the 13 federal circuit courts, including the Eighth Circuit, which covers Minnesota, families suing schools under Section 504 and the ADA have to prove “bad faith or gross misjudgment,” a standard the Eighth Circuit said Ava’s case did not meet—despite acknowledging that the family “may have established a genuine dispute about whether the district was negligent or even deliberately indifferent.”

The Supreme Court agreed to hear Ava’s case, A.J.T. v. Osseo Area Schools, in January. Its ruling will decide whether that tougher standard—bad faith is notoriously hard to prove—applies nationwide under Section 504 and the ADA when suing schools. A ruling against Ava and her family could be a major setback for student disability rights enforcement and an equally major boon for the Trump administration’s plan to gut the Department of Education at the expense of disabled kids

MAHA Commission

In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread.    Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio.

A number of posts discussed Trump's support for the discredited notion.

 Another leading anti-vaxxer is presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.  He has repeatedly compared vaccine mandates to the Holocaust.  Rolling Stone and Salon retracted an RFK article linking vaccines to autism.  He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.

He is now Trump's secretary of HHS.

On Thursday, Trump signed an executive order establishing a "Make America Healthy Again Commission,"  which RFK Jr. will chair. Among other things, it will investigate the causes of autism.  We can expect that the commission will employ junk science to support the lies that Trump and Kennedy have repeated.

Emily Kennard at NOTUS:

Republicans in Congress want to spend taxpayer money to research the repeatedly debunked link between vaccines and autism — all as they continue to cheer on the Trump administration’s cuts to what they consider excessive spending.

So far in his presidency, Donald Trump has aggressively talked up government efficiency, giving Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency aides unprecedented power to review, and cut, federal spending wherever they see fit — including medical research funding. But lawmakers who told NOTUS they’d support more research into whether vaccines cause autism didn’t see it as wasteful or redundant.

...

Republicans largely told NOTUS they shared the same concerns as Trump, who has repeatedly said he wants his administration to look into this disproven link. Just last week, Trump pointed again to the increase in autism diagnoses in children.

 ...

The relationship between autism and vaccines has been studied — and repeatedly debunked. Many peer-reviewed studies and analyses spanning decades have refuted that vaccines can cause autism. Meanwhile, the 1998 study that first tried to causatively link the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine to autism was retracted 12 years later, after the study’s author was found to have altered medical records to support his conclusions.

From the Autistic Self Advocacy Network:

Under the leadership of Trump, who has publicly claimed that he believes in the debunked claim that vaccines cause autism, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr, who has founded an anti-vaccine group, claimed that no vaccine has been proven safe and effective, that the recommended vaccine schedule for children is dangerous, and that “autism does come from vaccines,” ASAN is deeply concerned about the call for increased causation research. Trump claimed in December that he would direct the HHS to investigate a connection between vaccines and autism, which has already been proven to be nonexistent. The executive order also directs the Make America Healthy Again commission to look into the “potential over-utilization of medication, certain food ingredients, certain chemicals, and certain other exposures pose to children.” While some of these things may indeed be connected to or cause other disabilities, such as lead poisoning and fetal alcohol syndrome, they do not cause autism. We also ask the president, why, if he is concerned about the link between toxic chemicals exposure for American children, he, in his first term, rolled back many regulations aimed at reducing toxic emissions and, in his second, has cut programs enforcing restrictions on toxic emissions, and pledged to further roll-back regulation aimed at eliminating and decreasing pollutants.

We are deeply concerned at the Trump administration’s commitment to further research thoroughly debunked myths about autism and his disregard for established science and research. We are also deeply concerned about the potential damage caused by President Trump and Secretary Kennedy using official channels and government agencies to promote false “cures” and “treatments” for autism, as well as other disabilities. This will not only decrease American confidence in public health agencies, but also cause real harms, such as the decrease in childhood vaccination in the United States since the beginning of the pandemic and the death of 83 people in Samoa, both attributable to anti-vaccine advocacy and specifically now-Secretary Kennedy. Autism causation research is dangerous, ignores decades of science and research, and ignores the autistic community, which has been insistent that we do not need or want a cure for autism, and that we will fight for the civil rights and services and supports needed for us to fully participate in all aspects of society.

A Very Bad Day for Americans with Disabilities

In The Politics of Autism, I write about social services, special education and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. 

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, 7.5 million children 3 to 21 years old received services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act in AY 2022-23.

About 980,000 of them were autistic, up from 498,000 in 2012-13.

The only reason school districts comply with IDEA is that the state could lose federal funding if they don't.  But if you cut off federal funding, there is no enforcement mechanism.

The Senate confirmed RFK Jr. as HHS Secretary.

The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee held a confirmation hearing for Linda McMahon to be Secretary of Education.  She wants to obey Trump's command to dismantle the department. When she testified that HHS could take over the administration of IDEA, Senator Maggie Hassan pointed out: "I just want to be clear: you're going to put special education in the hands of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr."  

See this clip at about 3:25:

Erica Meltzer and Kalyn Belsha at The hechinger Report:

McMahon said multiple times that parents of children with disabilities should not worry about federal funding being cut for the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, though she said it was possible that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services would administer the money instead of the Education Department.

But it appeared that McMahon had limited knowledge of the rights outlined in IDEA, the landmark civil rights law that protects students with disabilities. And she said it was possible that civil rights enforcement — a large portion of which is related to complaints about children with disabilities not getting the services to which they’re entitled — would move to the U.S. Department of Justice.

Dismantling the education department by moving key functions to other departments is a tenet of Project 2025, the playbook the conservative Heritage Foundation developed for a second Trump administration. Most of these functions are mandated in federal law, and moving them would require congressional approval.

McMahon struggled to articulate the goals of IDEA beyond saying students would be taken care of and get the assistance and technology they need.

“There is a reason that the Department of Education and IDEA exist, and it is because educating kids with disabilities can be really hard and it takes the national commitment to get it done,” Hassan, the New Hampshire senator, said. “That’s why so many people are so concerned about this proposal to eliminate the department. Because they think kids will once again be shoved aside, and especially kids with disabilities.”

Trump's Threat to Students with Disabilities

In The Politics of Autism, I write about social services, special education and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. 

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, 7.5 million children 3 to 21 years old received services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act in AY 2022-23.

About 980,000 of them were autistic, up from 498,000 in 2012-13.

The only reason school districts comply with IDEA is that the state could lose federal funding if they don't.  But if you cut off federal funding, there is no enforcement mechanism.

Jessica Winter at The New Yorker:

Dan Stewart, the managing attorney for education and employment at the National Disability Rights Network, a legal-advocacy group, told me that, through these executive orders, “this Administration is engaging with education at the micro level as well as the macro level. It’s looking at curriculum, which is traditionally in the power of the local schools and the state, at the same time that it’s looking at different ways of moving public dollars out of the system.”

...

“The vast majority of I.D.E.A. rights only apply to public-school students,” Jessica Levin, who is litigation director at the nonprofit Education Law Center, told me. I.D.E.A. mandates certification requirements for special-education teachers and shields students from being punished for manifestations of their disability. It also enshrines parents’ rights to be involved in developing their children’s education plans and to argue for more or different services, which can range from speech-language or occupational therapy to assistive technology. “These rights are all lost when a student goes to a private school,” Levin said.

Project 2025 proposes rolling federal Title I and special-education funding into block grants, which states can administer without extensive federal oversight. “The states would no longer have a check on how they are complying with I.D.E.A. or other federal laws,” Stewart said. The likely scenario for kids with special needs, he went on, is “fewer teachers, fewer funds, delayed funds, and less certainty.” Of course, according to the school-choice movement, parents who are dissatisfied with their child’s cash-strapped public school should have the opportunity to choose a private one in a thriving educational marketplace. In reality, Levin said, “private schools are legally allowed to not accept students with disabilities or serve them appropriately, and so you end up with a higher concentration of higher-needs students in schools that now have fewer resources.”
...
Public and private schools alike, Stewart told me, are incentivized to view students with disabilities as “a drain on their resources.” Underfunded districts in red, blue, and purple states routinely fail these students, whether they are illegally capping the percentage of children who can receive services or willfully keeping parents in the dark about their constitutional rights. I.D.E.A. is perhaps a law too aptly named, as its protections often seem more theoretical than concrete.

...

Trump and Musk’s public statements are instructive here. In 2023, Musk fired a longtime employee of his who has muscular dystrophy and then ridiculed him on Twitter, falsely claiming that he “did no actual work.” (Musk later apologized and indicated that the employee could remain at Twitter; he did not.) As for Trump, according to a memoir written by his nephew, the disability advocate Fred Trump III, the President once commented that some disabled people “should just die,” and said, of Fred’s own son, who is nonverbal and uses a wheelchair owing to a rare genetic disorder, “Maybe you should just let him die.”