Last week, a quiet legal opinion from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) threatened one of the most hard-won protections in disability rights history: the right to live and receive services in your own community, instead of being shut away in an institution.

The law has not changed. In 1999, the United States Supreme Court ruled in Olmstead v. L.C. that people with disabilities have the right to live and receive services in their communities, not in institutions. That ruling is a binding precedent. It cannot be undone by an internal DOJ memo, and a legal opinion from the Office of Legal Counsel is not the same thing as a court decision. It doesn’t erase Olmstead or change Supreme Court precedent, and it doesn’t take away the ADA, Section 504, or the regulations that protect community living.

Here’s what has changed: how the federal government says it plans to enforce that law. The DOJ’s June 19 memo represents a significant shift in federal posture, one that abandons decades of bipartisan enforcement, protecting people with disabilities from unnecessary institutionalization. A non-binding legal opinion shouldn’t be used to justify defunding care that people depend on to live, work, and stay with their families, and it’s important to name that risk clearly, even as we work to make sure it doesn’t become a reality.

This is the moment for our community to show its size. Not in a year, not after the next lawsuit. Now.

If you are part of this community, if you love someone in it, or if you have built your career around this work, we are asking you to act:

• Call your elected officials — tell them you expect them to defend the Olmstead mandate and to reject any state budget that uses this memo as an excuse to cut home and community-based services.  

• Talk to your neighbors — most people have no idea this happened. Make sure they do. 

• Get involved —  sign up to stay informed about YAI’s advocacy efforts. 

Olmstead is still the law. We intend to make sure it stays that way, and we are not doing it quietly.