U.S. Trump administration shifts special education to Health Dept., sparking disability rights alarm

The U.S. Education Department announced it will transfer oversight of special education to the Department of Health and Human Services, now led by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Advocates warned that the move signals a return to a "medical model" of disability, potentially undermining the integrated community supports established since the 1960s.

Simultaneously, the Justice Department issued guidance that lowers the threshold for civil commitment of people with disabilities, echoing a White House executive order on homelessness that endorses involuntary hospitalization. Critics cite the 1999 Olmstead decision, which requires services to be provided in the most integrated setting possible, and argue the new policies could embolden states to deny mainstream education and community-based care for disabled individuals.