The midterm election is over – and today, I am filled with cautious hope.
While the final votes are still being counted in some races, one thing is clear: the political landscape is changing, and with it comes a new opportunity to advance the issues that matter most to our community.
Following the 2024 election, I wrote to you about my “deep concern for our community as we enter this period of uncertainty, anxiety, and change.” The last two years have made those concerns painfully real.
Medicaid has been the target of devastating cuts and relentless misinformation. Home and community-based services (HCBS) have been under attack. SNAP benefits have been slashed, and immigrant members of our community – including direct support professionals who provide essential care every day – have faced hostile policies and rhetoric.
Our community has been tested in significant ways. And yet we are resilient and have continued to fight, pushing for change at the state and national levels.
Last night’s results offer a reason to believe that a different path is possible.
Across the country, voters elected candidates who made inclusion, protecting vulnerable communities, and restoring dignity and opportunity central to their campaigns.
Long-time champions of disability causes won important victories. Ohio Senator-elect Sherrod Brown returns to the Senate. Josh Turek, a Paralympian, was elected in Iowa. Senator Ed Markey, one of our community’s fiercest and steadfast champions here in Massachusetts and at the national level, will be returning to the Senate. Candidates who campaigned on protecting Medicaid were elected governor, including Ohio’s Dr. Amy Acton and Georgia’s Keisha Lance Bottoms.
These results matter. They mean tangible opportunities to build coalitions, strengthen protections, defend essential services, and ensure that the voices of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) and autism and their families are heard.
But even as we embrace hope, we must be clear-eyed: a change in the political configuration of Congress does not automatically undo the damage that has been done.
Cuts to Medicaid enacted in the 2025 Federal Budget Reconciliation Bill will continue to reverberate for years to come and cause difficult realities in Massachusetts. Legal challenges to attacks on inclusion and HCBS are ongoing.
The work of protecting our community is far from finished – and we need you to stand with us for the work to come.
At The Arc of Massachusetts, we are already hard at work preparing for the new Massachusetts legislative session that begins in January 2027. We will continue to work closely with our partners at The Arc of the United States and through our IDD-Autism Coalition to move our community forward here at home and in Washington, DC.
But we cannot do this work without you.
I hope you take this moment to celebrate the victories, embrace the possibility for change, and look ahead with renewed determination. And I hope that you will make a gift to The Arc of Massachusetts today – to ensure that our fight for a brighter, better tomorrow can begin on its strongest footing today.
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With deep gratitude,
Maura Sullivan, MPA
Chief Executive Officer
