White House Argues ASL Interpreters unnecessary for Accessibility at press Briefings, report says

Molly Reinmann reported for CNN last week US District Judge Amir Ali, a Biden appointee, “grappled for over an hour” over whether to force the Trump administration to provide American Sign Language (ASL) interpreters at White House press briefings.

A lawsuit was brought by the National Association of the Deaf (NAD). Reinmann writes the suit alleges “the White House is violating deaf Americans’ rights under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 from accessing ‘critical information in real time.’” The attorney for the NAD, Ian Hoffman, subsequently argued Deaf and hard-of-hearing Americans are “deprived of their ability to participate in the democratic process.”

Biden’s briefings were staffed with ASL interpreters. The Justice Department ended the practice upon the transfer of power for President Trump’s second term, contending assistive technologies such as captioning and transcripts are sufficient enough. The NAD pushed back, saying—rightly so—that ASL and English are bespoke, distinct languages while emphasizing captioning oftentimes can prove “especially inaccessible to the many thousands of deaf persons fluent only in ASL,” according to Reinmann.

Relatedly, the NAD took umbrage over the first Trump administration’s lack of sign language interpretation during critical Covid–19 pressers that took place back in 2020.

Reinmann’s story, while newsworthy on merit alone, is especially appalling given the backdrop of July being Disability Pride Month and the Americans with Disabilities Act turning 35 on the 26th. The cretins representing the Justice Department argued the burden of proof is on the NAD to, as Reinmann said, “show that more thorough ASL translations were necessary and repeated her previous claim that the type of services provided should be at the discretion of the White House.” The Department of Justice is essentially paternally (and patronizingly) dictating accessibility—a move suggesting the able-bodied majority know best how to accommodate people with disabilities.

If Trump’s immigration policies are racist—they are—the inaccessibility is ableist.

Moreover, what rankles me most is the part in Reinmann’s lede when she writes Judge Ali “grappled” with his decision. I don’t blame her, but what anguish is there? You have a segment of the citizenry advocating for accessibility so as to be more informed. Disabled Americans, myself included, are Americans. We tune into White House news conferences. We read and watch CNN. We vote. That Judge Ali wrestled with some combination of legal and/or legal gymnastics in issuing his ruling underscores the deeply entrenched societal ableism that, in so many respects, are a bedrock of how not only the country works, but the world too. Most people treat disability like a disease.

As a CODA, I can empathize with Reinmann’s story on so many levels. My parents watched the local news every night after dinner while I was growing up and, despite the presence of captioning, they would rely on me to translate what was going on in the world and explain its meaning. It was quite the ask of a disabled kid himself going into his pre-pubescent years and beyond, but it’s illustrative of the notion that captions, however vital in their own right, has but limited utility. Captions can go only so far. Likewise, transcripts are good, but have their problems because, again, English typically isn’t a Deaf person’s first language and thus comprehension is compromised.

Karoline Leavitt and team clearly don’t understand that—or, if they do, they don’t care.

Editors, this is why accessibility in tech so richly deserves its own beat in newsrooms.