May 17, 2010: Republican Senate Candidate Says Americans with Disabilities Act Is Unfair to Business Owners

US Senate candidate Rand Paul (R-KY), a favorite of the tea party movement, speaks out against the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA—see July 26, 1990) during an interview. [Think Progress, 5/17/2010] The ADA was sponsored by Congressional Democrats and signed into law by then-President George H. W. Bush. The ADA “prohibits discrimination against people with disabilities in employment, transportation, public accommodation, communications, and governmental activities.” Recently, it has been attacked by conservative pundits and candidates, largely because businesses have to spend money to comply with its mandates. [Media Matters, 9/7/2010; US Department of Labor, 2011] Paul says that he favors local governments being able to decide whether disabled people have the rights under the legislation; requiring businesses to provide access to disabled people, Paul argues, isn’t “fair to the business owner.” Paul says: “You know a lot of things on employment ought to be done locally. You know, people finding out right or wrong locally. You know, some of the things, for example we can come up with common sense solutions—like for example if you have a three-story building and you have someone apply for a job, you get them a job on the first floor if they’re in a wheelchair as supposed to making the person who owns the business put an elevator in, you know what I mean? So things like that aren’t fair to the business owner.” [Think Progress, 5/17/2010]