Protecting Education for Children with Disabilities

Floor Speech

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Ms. SIMON. Mr. Speaker, I thank Congresswoman Hayes for bringing us here tonight.

Mr. Speaker, America, this country, has long promised that every child has a right to learn. That promise exists because parents, not just this Chamber, parents, refused to give up on their children's future.

Mr. Speaker, one of those parents was my mother, Vicki Simon. I was born with congenital blindness, and my mother in the early seventies was on the phone consistently, day after day to ensure that I entered a school that would be there for me, that would ensure that I had assistance and support, and that I would read large print with power.

I am thankful for teachers and educators, like the gentlewoman, who brought children like me in front of the board. I was so happy to cosponsor the See the Board Act. It should be in this Chamber, and we should be voting to ensure that while the Republicans take away healthcare from families and disabled children, those deaf and those blind, that they get education and screening at their schools of choice.

We are also here because advocates refused to be silent because Congress recognized that an equal education is the foundation of any democratic society.

Before these protections, young people with disabilities around the country were not only silenced, they were institutionalized. Families were told to stay quiet while bright and brilliant minds were dismissed, and today that door is closing again, eerily quickly because of the Trump administration's reckless and cruel agenda.

Mr. Speaker, if you would ask any parent of a disabled child in this country regardless how they vote, red or blue, if you ask them if they knew that the Department of Education--yes, we want to trim it down-- but the very department, the Office of Civil Rights, was all but being severed, and you let them know what the Office of Civil Rights did: The Office of Civil Rights in the Department of Education ensures that every rape on a college campus in this country is investigated. If the city decides not to investigate, then the Office of Civil Rights comes in.

The Office of Civil Rights investigates for the mother and the child who uses the wheelchair when the school says they don't need a ramp.

The Office of Civil Rights literally provides constant oversight over every school district in this country so that a child in Alabama has the same rights to an education as their disabled peer in California.

Let's make it clear: We are not talking about any progressive agenda here. We are talking about letting it be known in this country that the Trump administration is literally taking away investigators who will oversee the educational progress of disabled children.

Tens of thousands of families are waiting for justice and their cases to be investigated. These are not statistics; these are real families that we serve.

Did Congress ever intend this?

Did the administration ever intend to block away rights and responsibilities of folks who are supposed to oversee the rightful education of disabled children?

The American people will not accept this.

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