California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) recently addressed the bombing in Iran on MSNBC, describing it as an illegal act, immoral act, and unconstitutional act. His handling of disability rights in his state government has been criticized by both political parties, as the Americans with Disabilities Act is a morally necessary structure to allow people with physical, developmental, and cognitive disabilities a chance at equity in maintaining an independent quality of life through modest and limited accommodations, including working from home.
Newsom’s state government frequently refuses to accommodate those employees in need, contributing to the exodus of those with disabilities. Both political parties seem skeptical of Newsom’s authenticity and leadership, as the state of California has a terrible track record when it comes to empowering individuals with disabilities and vulnerable populations. Enforcement and consequences for violators make change happen and influence future behavior patterns. In a state already overregulated like California, oversight and enforcement with high rates of accuracy cannot be guaranteed.
California’s employees are treated with such disdain due to the woefully underfunded state retirement system. The cost of each state employee with a disability on the state retirement fund cannot be quantified from published data, but if former state employees lose their jobs and are forced to take early refunds of their state pension retirement contributions, they lose their eligibility to draw a disability pension later on. This creates an additional incentive for Newsom to run off as many disabled state employees as possible, including by not accommodating them.
What Newsom saves in the retirement fund just gets passed on to other strained government programs, such as Medi-Cal, which is already overstretched. Healthline reported in April that people with disabilities account for 7 percent of Medi-Cal enrollees but for 19 percent of its spending.
For every Democratic candidate for president, the blessing of former President Barack Obama would be going backwards on his own policy if he were to approve Newsom as the nominee. This would be hypocritical and reinforce Newsom’s own description of the current Democratic Party as “toxic.”
