ASAN is dismayed by the debt ceiling deal recently signed into law. While Medicaid remains protected, ensuring access to Home- and Community-Based Services (HCBS) and healthcare for many members of our community, the deal does harm to other safety net programs.

The debt ceiling negotiations were a manufactured crisis. Congress and the administration were not trying to agree on how the government will spend money in the future. Instead, the negotiations were about whether the US will keep its promises to pay for goods and services it already bought. If Congress had not raised the debt ceiling in time, the government would not pay all of its bills on time and the consequences of this would have been devastating. There would have been a recession in the US and possibly in other countries. Marginalized people— including disabled people— would have been hit especially hard by job losses. Benefits payments to individuals and federal wages might have stopped. Delayed Medicare and Medicaid payments could have caused chaos in the health care system and interrupted the HCBS many of us need to live in our communities. These consequences would have especially affected marginalized communities.

Congress should have raised the debt ceiling without trying to change federal spending, as it regularly did prior to 2011. It was irresponsible for some members of Congress to put Americans at risk of interrupted benefits and health care access, and people around the world in danger of job loss and poverty, just to try to cut benefits programs. Congress should decide what the country will spend in budget negotiations, not put millions of people at risk of hardship by arguing about whether to pay for what the country has already bought. 

The outcomes of the debt limit deal are mixed. We are glad that Medicaid was protected from funding cuts and new work reporting requirements. ASAN sends our thanks to everyone who contacted their legislators to protect Medicaid, and helped keep this vital program unchanged.

We are disgusted at the way the debt ceiling deal harms people who count on other lifesaving programs. The debt ceiling deal caps federal spending on many safety net programs for two years. This means that the programs’ budgets will not keep up with inflation. Because of inflation, these programs will need more money to fund the same amount of services, but the cap makes sure they will not get increased funding. This will work like a budget cut over time, hurting people who are part of these programs now or will need them in the future.

Congress also added more work reporting requirements to the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program and raised the age for work reporting requirements on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). That means that people on SNAP will have to continue meeting work reporting requirements until age 55 from now on, rather than 49. Fewer people will be able to get these critical benefits. Those who can still get help through these programs will have to fill out more paperwork and go through complicated processes that are often inaccessible. While there are some exemptions for disabled people, this ignores the fact that many disabled people cannot get a diagnosis due to disparities in healthcare costs and access. This is especially true for multiply marginalized people, including people of color and trans people. People without a diagnosis will not be able to use these exemptions. 

People will lose access to the benefits they need as a result of the funding caps and new work reporting requirements. Many of those people are disabled or otherwise marginalized. The decisions made during the debt ceiling negotiations will not meaningfully change the government’s debt. What they will do is cause mass suffering for some of the most marginalized people in our society. Parts of the debt ceiling deal, like cuts to funding for tax collection, will increase how much money the government has to borrow to meet its financial commitments. It is clear that the members of Congress who demanded changes to federal spending in exchange for raising the debt ceiling did not prioritize improving the federal government’s finances. Instead, their top priority was slashing assistance to the most vulnerable Americans.

ASAN remains committed to defending programs that serve as a lifeline for our communities, especially Medicaid. The fight for our community’s dignity and access to lifesaving essentials, like food, home- and community-based services, and access to healthcare does not end here — and we remain dedicated to seeing it through.

The Autistic Self Advocacy Network seeks to advance the principles of the disability rights movement with regard to autism. ASAN believes that the goal of autism advocacy should be a world in which autistic people enjoy equal access, rights, and opportunities. We work to empower autistic people across the world to take control of our own lives and the future of our common community, and seek to organize the autistic community to ensure our voices are heard in the national conversation about us. Nothing About Us, Without Us!

Autistic Self Advocacy Network

PO Box 66122
Washington, DC 20035

 

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