The Political Bias of Mainstream IDD Advocacy, 09/09/2025
- joetpotts
- Aug 9, 2025
- 2 min read
What has become so clear over the last 6 months in IDD Advocacy is that it is a "target for cuts", but why? Over the last 20 years of my IDD advocacy I have tried to maintain a neutral political bias and focus on what is best for all people with IDD. Over these 20 year I have lived in a community of people with IDD I have found out people with IDD and their families are mostly just like the general population. Their political inclinations (which they most defiantly have) cut just about like the general population, 50/50%. However, my "neutral political bias" in IDD advocacy has brought me few friend in mainstream IDD advocacy. However, I am thankful for the exceptions of Kathy Neas, the CEO of The Arc of the US, and Linda Litzinger, of Parent to Parent who's friendships have kept me going when I felt like quitting IDD Advocacy.
I bring this up because of a "stone wall" I have run into related to the future of people with IDD and IDD advocacy. It is evident to me there are people in positions of political power that want to push people with IDD back into the 1900s or worse. Everything IDD advocacy has fought for is over the last 100 years is now at risk. Our power to resist this "return to the past" is in our numbers and in our votes. However, we cannot succeed with only half of our numbers, we need all people with IDD and their families. I have reached out to most all IDD advocacy organizations to ask them to move toward the middle and welcome all people and families with IDD. The response I have received has been near total silence. They seem to be unwilling to choose the best for all people with IDD over their political bias. They seem determined to "circle their wagons" and continue to do what they always have done even in the face of total failure. These IDD advocates are the one who got us where we are today and they deserve our gratitude but time and circumstances have changed. I am an evolutionary biologist and it is well known that organisms that cannot change with a changing environment are doomed to extinction.
Joseph T. Potts
CEO, Full Life Services
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