The upcoming U.S. presidential election promises to be one of the most riveting in decades, featuring two major candidates with fascinating and divergent backgrounds vying to lead our nation during an era fraught with international confl ict and a jittery economy. Among the many pressing issues facing the nation, people with disabilities also want to know how the candidates might side on issues that impact them in particular. How do Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona and Democratic Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois stack up in terms of their records and pledges regarding issues affecting people with hearing loss?
Primarily because of the disparity in years of legislative service between the two candidates, this can be somewhat like comparing apples and oranges. McCain served as a congressman for four years prior to becoming a senator in 1987, while Obama began his national career in 2005, having served as an Illinois state senator for seven years prior. McCain’s long legislative record will necessarily create an imbalance between the candidates’ track records. On the other hand, Obama has already made some notable pledges in regard to ongoing and future legislation.
One of the most infl uential pieces of legislation affecting anyone with a disability, including those with hearing loss, is the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA), sponsored by Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) and cosponsored by McCain and 63 others. According to the Arizona Center for Disability Law, “McCain was specifically responsible for the portion of the bill that established relay services, which is, without a doubt, one of the most important and useful services that the Deaf community uses every single day. He also helped write Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act that states that employers cannot discriminate against hiring or promotions of people with disabilities.”
According to MSNBC, “The Supreme Court generally has exempted from the law’s protection people with partial physical disabilities, as well as people with physical impairments that can be treated with medication or devices such as hearing aids.” Because of this, Congress is now considering the ADA Amendments Act, which will strengthen the defi nition of what constitutes a disability, thereby allowing further employment rights to those with hearing loss. Both Obama and McCain are cosponsoring this bill, along with 62 other senators.
Another landmark bill affecting people with hearing loss was the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which required phone manufacturers to ensure hearing aid compatibility and also dealt with numerous issues, such as reform of cable television operations, obscene programming and the granting of broadcast licenses for digital television. The bill passed the Senate by a vote of 91-5. McCain was the only Republican joining four other Democrats in voting against it, though his opposition was not related to the bill’s provisions for hearing aid compatibility. He said, “All the interests were at the table but the public interest,” indicating his view that telecommunications corporations were granted greater favor in the bill than were American citizens.
Two bills enacted in the 21st century have contained provisions to assist children with hearing loss. The Newborn and Infant Screening and Intervention Act of 2000 has facilitated hearing screening for approximately 95 percent of newborns and the opportunity for infants and children with hearing loss to receive immediate treatment, whether hearing aids or cochlear implants. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004 (IDEA) provides for accommodations to be made in classrooms for deaf or hard of hearing (D/HH) children. McCain voted in favor of both these bills.
McCain also served for 11 years on the board of trustees of Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C., the student body of which is D/HH students. Upon his appointment to this post in 1995, the university said in a press release that, “McCain has been a strong advocate not only of Gallaudet University but of telecommunications legislation benefi tting D/HH people. McCain introduced the Telecommunications Accessibility Act of 1988 and he was a chief cosponsor of the Television Decoder Circuitry Act of 1990. The law requires most new TV sets to have built-in decoder circuitry capable of receiving closed-captioned programming.”
In light of his involvement in these acts, it is perhaps ironic that there are no evident closed-captioned
video features on McCain’s campaign Web site, whereas Obama’s campaign Web site contains some 35 video clips (as of this writing) which are closed-captioned. Additionally, Obama’s Web site has a Disabilities feature under the Issues tab outlining his policies regarding people with disabilities in a nine-page document. On McCain’s Web site there is no comparable description of his policies regarding people with disabilities, other than a brief mention of what he would do in relation to disabled veterans. McCain, however, did participate via satellite in a Presidential Candidates Forum in Columbus, Ohio, in July, which was sponsored by numerous organizations working on behalf of people with disabilities, while Obama, who was out of the country at the time, sent Harkin as his representative.
One of the bills Obama has cosponsored since entering the Senate in 2005 is the Higher Education Amendments of 2007, which would provide culturally enriching educational activities for D/HH, as well as supply opportunities for them to integrate more fully into mainstream culture. The bill also has many other aspects that don’t relate to D/HH and, though Obama cosponsored it, neither he nor McCain voted on it. The bill passed the Senate by a vote of 95-0 and still needs to be passed in the House and signed by the president to become law.
Obama’s Plan to Empower Americans with Disabilities outlines numerous initiatives he would undertake as president, including the full funding of the IDEA, $10 billion per year for early intervention educational and developmental programs for children up to age five, and mandating the hiring of an additional 100,000 federal employees with disabilities within fi ve years. Obama would also “direct the Small Business Administration to amend regulations under the Small Business Act that provide preferences in federal contracting to small businesses owned by members of socially and economically disadvantaged groups to include individuals with disabilities.”
Obama would further expand the Family and Medical Leave Act by reducing the threshold for which employers are covered from companies with 50 or more employees to those with 25 or more. Employees would then be entitled to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for a family member’s or their own serious health condition. Obama would provide $1.5 billion to assist states with start-up costs in adopting a paid leave system and require employers to “provide seven paid sick days per year – which may be taken on an hourly basis – so that Americans with disabilities can take the time off they need without fear of losing their jobs or a paycheck.” Obama does not specify in his plan how these and other initiatives would be funded.
Obama is one of 21 cosponsors of the Community Choice Act, which is currently under consideration and promises to increase the access of people with disabilities to community-based services. McCain has said he is opposed to this bill as presently outlined because, as one legislative expert said, “No one knows what the true cost will be.” In the Presidential Candidates Forum
mentioned above, McCain compared his concerns about it to those he has in regard to the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement and Modernization Act of 2003, which was originally promised to cost some $400 million over 10 years but which has ballooned out to about $1.2 trillion.
Obama also supports the CLASS Act as one of five cosponsors, a bill that would create a national, voluntary disability insurance program to help individuals with functional impairments and their families pay for services and supports that they need to maximize their functionality and independence and have choices about community participation, education and employment. Similarly, Obama supports the ratifi cation by the United States of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. McCain has not expressed a strong position on either of these matters.
A number of other bills that would affect people with hearing loss are currently under consideration by the Senate. None of them are sponsored or cosponsored by either McCain or Obama and neither campaign responded to requests for the Senators’ positions. Voters might want to keep abreast of the progress of these bills and whether either candidate expresses his support or opposition for them. Legislation can be tracked at the Library of Congress Web site at: http://thomas.loc.gov.
- The Early Hearing Detection and Intervention Act (S. 1069) would renew and expand provisions for screening newborns for hearing impairment.
- The Hearing Aid Tax Credit (S. 1410) would provide a tax credit of up to $500 toward the purchase of hearing aids every fi ve years for seniors 55 and older and for dependents of taxpayers.
- The Training for Realtime Writers Act (S. 675) will promote recruitment, training, and placement of individuals as writers providing closed captioning in video programming
- The Medicare Hearing Health Care Enhancement Act (H.R. 1665) would allow Medicare beneficiaries the option of going directly to a qualified audiologist for hearing and balance diagnostic tests, without a physician referral.
With McCain’s long record of mostly pro-disability voting and Obama’s laudable future plans to positively impact people with disabilities, voters with hearing loss will likely have a friend in the White House next January, no matter who wins the election.
