human rights

Fifty Years of Hard-Won Rights Are on the Line: The Fight to Save Section 504

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Published in support of the National Federation of the Blind‘s March 2026 call to action.

There is a lawsuit moving quietly through the American legal system right now that could undo five decades of civil rights progress for tens of millions of disabled Americans. It is called Texas v. Kennedy, and if you haven’t heard of it yet, that is exactly the problem.

The National Federation of the Blind (NFB) is sounding the alarm — and asking all of us, disabled or not, to pick up the phone and write the email. Here is why this matters, what is at stake, and exactly what you can do about it today.

The Law That Changed Everything

In 1973, Congress passed Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act — the first federal law in American history to prohibit discrimination on the basis of disability. Its principle was simple and radical: no person with a disability could be excluded from, denied the benefits of, or discriminated against in any program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.

In the decades since, Section 504 has meant that a blind child has the legal right to accessible materials in a federally funded school. That a wheelchair user cannot be turned away from a government building. That a disabled employee at a federally funded organization has recourse against discrimination. It was the direct legal precursor to the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 — one of the most important civil rights laws ever enacted in this country.

Section 504 is not a technicality. It is the legal backbone of disabled life in America.

What Texas v. Kennedy Threatens

The Texas v. Kennedy lawsuit, filed by a coalition of nine states led by Texas, challenges the federal government’s authority to enforce Section 504 as currently written and applied. According to the NFB’s official call to action issued in March 2026, the lawsuit “risks weakening or eliminating key protections that blind people in the United States rely on every day,” endangering access to “education, employment, public services, and other essential opportunities.” [National Federation of the Blind, March 2026]

If the plaintiffs prevail, the federal government’s ability to require accessibility accommodations, enforce non-discrimination standards, and hold federally funded institutions accountable could be dramatically curtailed. Schools could reduce or eliminate accommodations for disabled students. Employers at federally funded institutions could discriminate against disabled workers. Public services millions of people depend upon every day could become legally inaccessible without meaningful federal recourse.

The implications reach beyond Section 504 itself. The legal theory at the heart of this case — that federal authority to attach civil rights conditions to federal funding is constitutionally limited — could set a precedent that weakens enforcement of other civil rights statutes as well. This is not simply a disability rights issue. It is a civil rights issue for every American.

The Nine States Behind This Lawsuit

The following nine states are currently party to Texas v. Kennedy:

  • Texas
  • Alaska
  • Florida
  • Indiana
  • Kansas
  • Louisiana
  • Missouri
  • Montana
  • South Dakota

The NFB has already organized nine of its state affiliates to write directly to their respective attorneys general urging withdrawal from the case. [NFB Letter from Nine Affiliates, March 2026] Now it is time for the broader public to join that effort.

Why Your Letter or Call Can Actually Change the Outcome

It is easy to feel that a single email cannot change the course of a federal lawsuit. But that thinking misunderstands how political and legal pressure actually works.

Attorneys general and governors are elected officials. They are acutely sensitive to constituent opinion, organized public pressure, and the reputational cost of being seen as attacking the civil rights of disabled citizens. When thousands of letters arrive, when inboxes fill and phone lines ring, when local and national media begin covering a public outcry, political calculations change. Officials who joined this lawsuit made a choice. Sustained constituent pressure helps them make a different one.

Beyond the direct political impact, a documented record of public opposition shapes how officials talk about the case publicly, how they respond to press inquiries, and whether withdrawal begins to look like the politically prudent path. The history of American civil rights is full of moments where ordinary people writing ordinary letters tipped the balance. This is one of those moments.

If You Live in One of the Nine States: Contact Your Officials Now

If you are a resident of any of the nine states party to this lawsuit, your message carries the most direct political weight. Please contact your state attorney general and urge them to withdraw your state from Texas v. Kennedy immediately.

Here are the direct contact emails provided by the NFB [NFB Call to Action, March 2026]:

When you call or write, here is what to say (adapted from the NFB’s suggested message [NFB, March 2026]):

“Hello, my name is [Your Name], and I am a constituent. I am writing to urge you to withdraw our state from the Texas v. Kennedy lawsuit. This lawsuit threatens Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act — a critical civil rights protection that ensures equal access for blind and disabled Americans in education, employment, and public life. Weakening Section 504 would cause real, lasting harm to real people in our state. Please take immediate action to remove us from this harmful lawsuit. Thank you.”

Make it personal if you can. Tell them about a family member who depends on accessible education. A friend who relies on workplace accommodations. A neighbor whose independence would be threatened. Officials remember letters that put a human face on the law.

If You Live Outside the Nine States: Contact Texas Directly

Texas is the lead plaintiff and the political engine driving this lawsuit. Even if you are not a Texan, contacting the Texas Attorney General’s office sends a clear signal that this case has drawn national attention and national opposition.

Texas Attorney General: kenneth.paxton@oag.texas.gov

Tell them that people across the country are watching this case, and that the disability community — and everyone who supports civil rights — expects better.

Share This. Amplify This. Don’t Wait.

The NFB’s call to action is clear: “Your voice is critical. Every message sent and every phone call made helps demonstrate that blind Americans will not stand by while our civil rights are threatened.” [NFB, March 2026]

But this fight belongs to all of us. Forward this article. Post it. Print it out for someone who needs it. Bring it up at your church, your school, your community organization. The officials who signed their states onto this lawsuit are counting on public silence. Let’s make sure they don’t get it.

Section 504 is a promise America made to its disabled citizens fifty years ago. Let’s hold the line together.

Sources & Further Reading

For more information, contact the National Federation of the Blind at 410-659-9314 or visit nfb.org.

The Digital Door Is Closing on Disabled Americans: Please Help Us Keep It Open

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Imagine you are blind. Your child has a disability. The school district has just posted crucial updates to its website about your son’s Individualized Education Program — his IEP, the legally mandated document that governs every support, accommodation, and service your child is supposed to receive in school. You open the site. Your screen reader — the software that speaks text aloud so you can navigate a world built for sighted people — hits a wall. Images have no descriptions. Forms won’t load. Buttons have no labels. You click again and again, trapped in a digital maze with no exit.

Now imagine learning that your tax dollars paid for that website.

This is not a hypothetical. This is the daily reality for millions of Americans with disabilities. And right now, the federal government is moving to weaken a rule that was specifically designed to end this kind of exclusion.

We are asking you — disabled people, parents, family members, friends, teachers, healthcare workers, religious leaders, and every person of conscience — to take one action: request a virtual meeting with the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) and tell them to leave the 2024 Title II accessibility rule intact.

Click here to request a meeting.

What Is Happening and Why It Matters

In April 2024, after decades of advocacy by disabled people and their allies, the U.S. Department of Justice finalized a rule under Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act requiring state and local governments to make their websites and mobile applications accessible to people with disabilities. The technical standard adopted — the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, version 2.1, Level AA (known as WCAG 2.1 AA) — is an internationally recognized benchmark. For large government entities serving populations of 50,000 or more, the compliance deadline is April 24, 2026.

This rule was hard-won. The DOJ has recognized since at least 2003 that state and local government websites must be accessible under the ADA. The 2024 rule finally put concrete, enforceable teeth into that obligation.

But on February 13, 2026, OIRA — the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, an arm of the Office of Management and Budget — published a notice revealing that the Department of Justice had submitted a revised rule to OIRA as an “Interim Final Rule,” or IFR. Unlike a proposed rulemaking, an IFR does not require a public comment period. The public has not been shown what revisions are being proposed. This has never been done before with an accessibility regulation.

The changes could push back or eliminate the April 2026 deadline. They could hollow out other requirements. No one outside the agencies knows yet.

What we do know is this: anyone can request a virtual meeting with OIRA under Executive Order 12866 to explain why the rule matters and should not be changed. The agency is not required to grant a meeting, and a meeting does not guarantee an outcome. But if thousands of people and organizations step forward, their voices will be on the record — and in any future legal challenge to changes in the rule, that record may matter enormously.

The deadline is urgent. The April 24 compliance date for large governments is weeks away.

The Price of Inaccessibility: A Door Slammed in Your Face

When a government website is inaccessible to a blind person, it isn’t a minor inconvenience. It is the digital equivalent of a flight of stairs at the entrance of a government building — it says, without apology, you do not belong here.

Seven out of ten blind people report being unable to access information and services through government websites. Two-thirds of internet transactions initiated by people with vision impairments end in abandonment because the websites they visit are not accessible enough.

Consider what those transactions represent. They are not online shopping. They are applications for Medicaid. They are searches for food assistance. They are registration for school services for disabled children. They are requests for healthcare accommodations. They are the mechanisms through which citizens — including disabled citizens who are fully taxpaying members of their communities — participate in public life.

Inaccessible websites and mobile apps can make it difficult or impossible for people with disabilities to access government services, like ordering mail-in ballots or getting tax information, that are quickly and easily available to other members of the public online. They can keep people with disabilities from joining or fully participating in civic or other community events like town meetings or programs at their child’s school.

The harm is not abstract. During the COVID-19 pandemic, in at least seven states, blind residents said they were unable to register for the vaccine through their state or local governments without help. Phone alternatives, when available, were beset with long hold times and were not available at all hours like websites. “This is outrageous,” declared one disability advocate at the time, noting that blind people were being denied the ability to access something to get vaccinated during a public health emergency.

The Taxpayer Injustice

Here is something that should make every American’s blood boil, regardless of disability status.

The overwhelming majority of state and local government websites — the portals that serve parks departments, public schools, health departments, voting offices, libraries, transit authorities, courts, and social services — are funded by taxpayers. Property taxes. Sales taxes. Income taxes. Every resident pays into the system that builds and maintains these digital public squares.

Blind taxpayers pay these taxes. Deaf taxpayers pay these taxes. People with physical, cognitive, and neurological disabilities pay these taxes. And then, in far too many cases, they are locked out of the very websites and apps their money built.

This is not just bad policy. It is a profound ethical failure. It is taxation without representation. It is saying to an entire class of citizens: you will fund this, but you will not be allowed to use it.

The 2024 rule was an attempt to right this wrong — to ensure that when government spends public money on digital infrastructure, all the public can actually use it. Weakening or delaying this rule is a choice to perpetuate that injustice.

When Inaccessibility Has Real Consequences: Maria’s Story

Maria, a blind mother of two in a mid-sized American city, spent three days trying to access her daughter’s school district website after her daughter — who has a learning disability — was referred for a special education evaluation. The site, like most school district websites of its era, was built without accessibility in mind.

The forms to request records were PDF images — effectively photographs of documents, invisible to a screen reader. The contact directory was a graphic with no text alternative. The link to the district’s special education office was buried in a nested navigation menu that her screen reader could not parse. When she finally found a phone number and called, she was told to visit the website.

Maria’s story is representative. Administrative burdens — including inaccessible and poorly designed websites and complex application processes — cause real, lasting harm to disabled Americans, making it difficult to navigate a system that is supposed to help them cover basic necessities such as food, housing, and medical treatments. For a blind parent trying to advocate for a disabled child in a system that was never built with either of them in mind, the barriers compound each other into something that can feel insurmountable.

Maria eventually got help — from a sighted neighbor who could access the forms on her behalf. But consider what that means. A blind mother, exercising her legal rights on behalf of her disabled child, was forced to surrender her privacy and independence to a third party because a taxpayer-funded website could not do what basic accessibility standards would have required. Her child’s educational rights, her own dignity, and her family’s confidentiality were all casualties of inaccessibility.

When Accessibility Is Won: Angela Fowler’s Story

The story does not have to end in barriers. When accessibility is fought for and won, careers are saved, lives change, and the principle of equal access becomes real rather than rhetorical.

Angela Fowler had worked hard her entire life. She was a longtime member of the National Federation of the Blind, and she had earned a provisional job offer from an insurance carrier — contingent on passing California’s online insurance agent licensing exam. It should have been the next step in a promising career. Instead, it became a wall.

When Fowler sat down to take the state-administered exam, she discovered that the online testing platform used by the California Department of Insurance was completely inaccessible to her screen reader. She could not navigate it. She could not take the test. And when she asked the state to simply make the platform accessible — as California’s own disability access laws required — she was told she would first need to submit her private medical records to justify using a screen reader. Nondisabled applicants were not required to do anything of the sort. The process dragged on. The job offer she had worked toward disappeared.

In 2021, Fowler, joined by a second blind applicant named Miguel Mendez and later the National Federation of the Blind, filed suit against the California Department of Insurance and its testing vendor, PSI Services LLC. The case, Fowler et al. v. PSI Services LLC and California Department of Insurance, was a landmark disability rights action. It argued the obvious: that a state-run licensing examination system must be independently usable by blind applicants who use screen readers — without extra hoops, without burdensome medical documentation requirements, and without segregation from the testing experience available to everyone else.

In August 2024, the case settled. Under the agreement, the California Department of Insurance agreed to no longer require blind or low-vision test-takers who use screen access software to first provide medical documentation. Blind and low-vision test-takers who use screen readers gained access to the same examination scheduling options as those offered to others without disabilities.

NFB President Mark Riccobono called it a meaningful step toward a society that provides equal opportunity to everyone. Attorney Timothy Elder of TRE Legal Practice put it plainly: this case establishes that people who depend on assistive technology should not need a doctor’s note before they can expect an accessibly designed online exam.

Angela Fowler lost the job she had earned. But her fight — her refusal to accept that a government-run system could simply exclude her — ensured that the next blind person who wants to become an insurance agent in California will not face what she faced. That is what accessibility wins look like. That is what is at stake.

The 2024 rule was not asking for perfection. It was asking for a reasonable, internationally recognized standard. It was asking that government — of the people, by the people, for all of the people — actually serve all of the people.

A Word to Every Parent

If you have a disabled child, this message is for you.

You already know what it means to fight for your child in systems that were not built for them. You’ve sat in IEP meetings, argued with insurance companies, driven across town to accessible playgrounds, and spent countless hours researching, advocating, and never giving up.

The 2024 rule was a victory for you and your child. It said: the school district’s website that posts your child’s rights, their services, their calendar, their teacher contacts — that website must be accessible to you, whether you have low vision, blindness, cognitive differences, or any other disability. It said your child deserves parents who can access every digital tool that other parents take for granted.

If that rule is weakened or delayed, it is your child who loses. The IEP portal that you can’t open. The therapy scheduling app that won’t work with your screen reader. The school board meeting you couldn’t participate in because the registration link was broken.

Please. Request a meeting with OIRA. Tell them what your family’s digital access means to you. Tell them that your disabled child deserves parents who can fight for them with the same tools as everyone else.

Request a meeting here.

A Word to Every Friend and Ally

If you have a disabled friend — someone you love, laugh with, and care about — and you call yourself their ally, this is the moment that word is tested.

Disability is not a narrative device. It is not a cause for pity. It is a part of human experience shared by one in four Americans, including people who are brilliant, creative, funny, accomplished, and fully deserving of every digital door that the rest of the world walks through without a second thought.

When your blind friend cannot apply for transit benefits on her phone because the app is inaccessible, she is not experiencing a personal inconvenience. She is experiencing systematic exclusion. When your deaf colleague cannot watch the captionless public health video his county just posted, he is being told — by his own government — that he is not important enough to include.

Allyship means showing up when the stakes are real, not just retweeting hashtags. Requesting a five-minute virtual meeting with a federal regulatory office is one of the lowest-barrier, highest-impact things you can do right now for every disabled person in your life.

Do it because you love them. Do it because they would do it for you.

A Word to Teachers, Educators, and Healthcare Workers

You chose your profession because you believe in the dignity and potential of every person you serve. Every day, you work to ensure that students with disabilities get the education they deserve, that patients with disabilities receive the care they need.

But your work is undermined when the digital tools that are supposed to support it are inaccessible. A teacher of blind students who cannot access the district’s curriculum portal. A school counselor who cannot help a deaf student register for services online. A social worker who cannot guide a disabled client through a state benefits application because the site won’t work with assistive technology.

The 2024 rule would have made these failures less common. Weakening it makes them more so.

You have professional standing. You have community standing. A message from an educator or healthcare provider to OIRA carries weight. Please use it.

A Word to Religious Leaders — and to the Faithful

Every major world religion calls its followers to care for the vulnerable, to remove obstacles from the paths of those who struggle, and to treat all people as beings of sacred worth.

The Hebrew Bible commands, in Leviticus 19:14: “You shall not curse the deaf or place a stumbling block before the blind.” Jewish tradition teaches that stumbling blocks come in many forms — from inaccessible buildings to health care that is harder to access — and that we are obligated to remove them. The Torah repeatedly instructs: “If there be among you a person with needs, you shall not harden your heart, but you shall surely open your hand.” (Deuteronomy 15:7)

The Gospel of Luke records Jesus saying that when you give a feast, you should invite those who cannot repay you — the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind — “and you will be blessed.” (Luke 14:13–14) In Matthew 25:40, Jesus declares: “Whatever you did for the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” Turning away from the exclusion of disabled people is, in this framework, turning away from Christ himself.

In Islamic teaching, the Prophet Muhammad said: “If you want to find me, find me amongst the weak, because you are not given victory or aid from Allah except by the way that you treat those who are weak and oppressed.” The Quran directly addresses the treatment of blind people: in Surah Abasa (80:1–10), Allah rebukes the Prophet for turning away from a blind man who came seeking knowledge, teaching that every person — regardless of ability — deserves full attention and dignity. A Hadith states: “Cursed is the one who misleads a blind person away from his path” (Sunan Abu Dawud 2594) — understood both as an individual prohibition and a communal warning: a society that does not respect or care for those with special needs will be cursed.

In Buddhist teaching, karuna — compassion — is one of the four divine abodes, a foundational virtue applied without distinction to all beings. The Hindu concept of seva, selfless service, calls the faithful to act on behalf of those who are vulnerable. In the Sikh tradition, sewa — selfless service — is among the highest moral obligations.

If your faith calls you to love your neighbor, then your neighbor includes every blind person who cannot open a government website, every deaf person who cannot watch a public health video without captions, every person with a cognitive disability who cannot navigate a form that was built without them in mind.

Religious leaders: preach this. Organize your congregations. Help your laypeople understand that accessibility is a moral issue, not a technical one. Encourage every member of your community to request a meeting with OIRA. This is the work of faith made concrete.

What You Need to Do Right Now

Requesting a meeting with OIRA is straightforward. Here is how:

  1. Go to this link: https://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/eo/neweomeeting?rin=1190-AA82
  2. Provide your name, email, and phone number. You will receive a confirmation with a link to schedule your virtual meeting.
  3. When prompted, describe what you will present. You do not need legal language. You do not need to be an expert. Write in plain language. You might say things like:
    • How inaccessible government websites have affected you or your family member
    • Why the April 2026 deadline matters and should not be extended
    • What specific government services — parks, schools, libraries, health departments, voting — you depend on and need to be accessible
    • That the DOJ has recognized since 2003 that government websites must be accessible under the ADA, and this rule simply puts concrete standards to a long-standing obligation
    • That many state and local governments are already in compliance with the rule — and that following it has actually helped lower their costs over time
  4. You can request a meeting as an individual or on behalf of an organization. Both matter. The more voices, the stronger the record.
  5. Share this article. Send it to parents, teachers, pastors, imams, rabbis, priests, coaches, neighbors, and friends. Post it on social media. Read it aloud to someone who cannot read it themselves. The power of this moment lies entirely in how many people choose to show up.

The Rule Is Still the Rule — Until It Isn’t

It bears repeating: as of the publication of this article, the 2024 Title II accessibility rule is still in effect. The ADA still requires that state and local government websites and apps be accessible to disabled people. No change has yet been made.

But “not yet” is not “never.” An Interim Final Rule process moves quickly. Changes could come before the April 24 deadline. The window for public voices to be heard is narrow.

We have waited long enough. Disabled people have waited decades for a digital world that includes them. We have watched as every other aspect of public life went online — voting, education, healthcare, civic participation — and watched as too much of it was built without us.

We are not asking for special treatment. We are asking for access to what everyone else already has.

We are asking for the right to open the door.

Please, request your meeting today. For yourself. For your child. For your friend. For your neighbor. For the blind grandmother who cannot access her county health department’s website. For the deaf father who cannot watch the public school board meeting. For every disabled person who has ever stared at a screen that stared back — blank, impassable, indifferent.

This is the moment. The door is still open. Let’s make sure it stays that way.

Request Your OIRA Meeting Now →

Blind Access Journal covers accessibility, disability rights, and assistive technology. We are grateful to disability rights attorney Lainey Feingold, whose legal analysis at lflegal.com provided essential background for this article. We encourage all readers to visit her site for in-depth legal context and additional resources.

The Americans with Disabilities Act continues to require accessible websites and apps regardless of any changes to the 2024 rule. The fight for digital inclusion continues.

Sources

  1. Feingold, Lainey. “Tell the Federal Government Not to Change the Title II Accessibility Regulations.” Law Office of Lainey Feingold, March 2, 2026. https://www.lflegal.com/2026/03/title-ii-action-needed/
  2. Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA). “Pending EO 12866 Regulatory Review — RIN 1190-AA82.” Reginfo.gov, February 13, 2026. https://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/eoDetails?rrid=1282112
  3. OIRA Meeting Request Portal — EO 12866 Virtual Meeting Request (RIN 1190-AA82). https://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/eo/neweomeeting?rin=1190-AA82
  4. U.S. Department of Justice. “Accessibility of Web Information and Services of State and Local Government Entities — Final Rule.” Federal Register, April 24, 2024. https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2024/04/24/2024-07758/accessibility-of-web-information-and-services-of-state-and-local-government-entities
  5. Settlement Agreement: Fowler v. PSIhttps://dralegal.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Settlement-Agreement-Fowler_fully-executed_Accessible.pdf
  6. Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1. World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), June 5, 2018. https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/
  7. The Holy Bible, New International Version. Leviticus 19:14. BibleHub. https://www.biblehub.com/leviticus/19-14.htm
  8. The Holy Bible, New International Version. Deuteronomy 15:7. BibleHub. https://www.biblehub.com/deuteronomy/15-7.htm
  9. The Holy Bible, New International Version. Luke 14:13–14. BibleHub. https://www.biblehub.com/luke/14-13.htm
  10. The Holy Bible, New International Version. Matthew 25:40. BibleHub. https://www.biblehub.com/matthew/25-40.htm
  11. The Quran. Surah Abasa (80:1–10). Quran.com. https://quran.com/80
  12. Hadith. Sunan Abu Dawud 2594: “Cursed is the one who misleads a blind person away from his path.” Sunnah.com. https://sunnah.com/abudawud:2594
  13. Hadith. Narrated by Abu Darda: Prophet Muhammad on seeking victory through the weak and oppressed. Sunan Abu Dawud 2594. Sunnah.com. https://sunnah.com/abudawud:2594
  14. Feingold, Lainey. “Title II Web and Mobile Technical Accessibility Standards: History + Current Status.” Law Office of Lainey Feingold, originally published 2022, updated 2026. https://www.lflegal.com/2022/08/doj-web-regs-announce/

When Download Links Aren’t Links: A Critical Accessibility Failure in AI Tools Blind People Depend On

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Introduction

Artificial intelligence has the potential to dramatically level the playing field for blind and visually impaired people. Every day, blind professionals use tools like ChatGPT to create and export documents needed for jobs, education, and community participation: resumes, legal forms, code, classroom materials, and more.

But a recent shift in how ChatGPT delivers generated files has created a new accessibility barrier — one that directly harms the very users who could benefit most from the technology.

Not a Feature Gap — a Civil Rights Issue

When sighted users see a clickable download link, blind users encounter only this:

sandbox:/mnt/data/filename.zip

JAWS or NVDA reads it aloud like text.
It doesn’t register as a link.
Pressing Enter does nothing.

The file — often essential content — becomes completely inaccessible.

And the consequences are not theoretical:

  • A blind job seeker can’t download the resume they just generated.
  • A blind accessibility engineer can’t retrieve screenshots or audit reports.
  • A blind student can’t access generated study materials.
  • A blind parent can’t obtain forms needed for family programs.

This is not a mere inconvenience. It is a functional blocker to employment, education, and independence.

A Growing Problem in the Tech Industry

Too often, companies “secure” content at the expense of accessibility — and assume the tradeoff is justified. But security and accessibility must coexist. When they don’t, developers have simply chosen the wrong priorities.

One blind accessibility tester put it directly:

“I’m locked out of my own work. The AI wrote me a document — but I can’t download it.”

Another blind user shared:

“If it’s not accessible from the start, it’s not innovation. It’s segregation.”

The Human Impact of a Missing <a> Tag

What looks like a minor UI oversight is actually a critical, task-blocking WCAG 2.2 conformance failure in at least four different success criteria, including keyboard accessibility and name/role/value semantics.

But beyond compliance…

If a blind user cannot access a file — it does not exist for them.

We should not have to rely on workarounds, Base64 hacks, sighted assistance, or manual extraction to download content we requested and created.

This Is Fixable — Today

The solution is simple: make sure every file intended for download is represented as a real hyperlink:

  • Keyboard-focusable using tab and shift+tab navigation
  • Screen-reader announceable
  • Actionable without a mouse
  • Secure and accessible

This is not a feature enhancement — it is a restoration of equal access.

Blind Users Belong in the Future of AI

OpenAI has expressed a strong commitment to accessibility — and I believe the company will resolve this issue. But this situation reminds us of something bigger:

Accessibility must be built into every step of development — not patched later.

When disabled people ask for accessibility, we are asking for inclusion, dignity, and independence.

We are asking to belong.

Call to Action

  • Developers: Test with JAWS, NVDA, VoiceOver and other assistive technologies before shipping.
  • Accessibility leaders: Add file interaction to automated regression tests.
  • Companies building AI tools: Welcome us in — or risk leaving us behind.
  • Disabled people, friends, relatives and others who care about us: Please reach out to the OpenAI Help Center asking them to fix the current accessibility issue and to publicly recommit to at least WCAG 2.2 conformance as a definition of done that must be achieved before shipping new or updated products.

Blind users contribute, create, and advocate every day.
We deserve access to the results of our own work.

— Written by a blind accessibility professional, community advocate, and lifelong champion of equal access to information and technology.

About the Author

Darrell Hilliker, NU7I, CPWA, Salesforce Certified Platform User Experience Designer, is a Principal Accessibility Test Engineer and publisher of Blind Access Journal. He advocates for equal access to information and technology for blind and visually impaired people worldwide.

Random Accessibility Thoughts: We Blind People Need to Change the Path of Least Resistance

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When I was 13 years old, all the way back in 1986, I learned exactly how horrible some people were when I found out the principal of my local high school was not going to let me enroll because of my blindness. She wondered things like, “how would he use the bathroom” and thought I should stay at the school for the blind, which she determined to be the “least restrictive environment” for my educational needs.

This discrimination was ultimately put down, and my local school district had to pay for me to attend public school in another district where I was actually wanted, thanks to the support of family and friends and a hard fought legal battle won on my behalf by the National Federation of the Blind.

Despite this victory, and my subsequent educational success in high school, I lost a lot of my innocence and my ears were forced wide open. I realized, once and for all, that my blindness really did set me apart from the rest of the world and that I would be constantly forced to prove my worth as a human being over and over again for anything I wanted to accomplish. I quickly decided there was an “us vs. them” scenario with “us” being myself and others like me, my blind brothers and sisters, and “them” being the sighted people comprising the rest of the world around me. At age 13, it was already war time!

Then, just one year later, in 1987, I got my first computer, an old Apple 2E with an Echo speech synthesizer! It even came with a 1200 baud modem! It was almost immediately followed by the awesome, revolutionary Braille ‘n Speak note taking device by Blazie Engineering!

I quickly discovered the incredible potential for computer technology to level the playing field for blind people like me. As I integrated technology into my life, I found it enabled a vast amount of communication and greater information access. I could complete the majority of my homework on the long car rides home from school. I could read some books, especially those on technology, using a brand-new service called Computerized Books for the Blind (CBFB). I could communicate with blind and sighted people on computer bulletin board systems on terms of equality. I could even, finally, do my own logging of the contacts I made on amateur radio, saying “goodbye” to static paper logs written with my Perkins Braille Writer and unweildy tape recordings my mom manually wrote into a printed logbook.

In the late 1980s, as I progressed through high school and enhanced my technology skills, I thought I was on top of the world and I just knew there wasn’t anything a blind person couldn’t do if only they set their mind to it and used the necessary technology. While sighted students were still plodding along with pencil and paper, I was taking better and quicker notes on my Braille ‘n Speak. While some Braille books were still available from several sources in the older transcribed format, we started scanning, transcribing and Brailling our own books using technology. With floppy disk, Braille ‘n Speak and the accompanying serial cable in hand, I was the mad scientist around school, hooking up my gizmos to the various IBM computers around school so I could enjoy their text-based user interfaces largely on terms of equality with my sighted peers. In conjunction with my talking radios, I could hook up my computer and enjoy packet radio just like my fellow amateur radio operators around the world.

In this scenario, in any situation where I found I really needed sight in order to accomplish something, I generally found an available sighted person willing to read something to me, because, I knew, thanks to the philosophy instilled in me through my association with the National Federation of the Blind, my blindness wouldn’t stop me from doing anything I set my mind to accomplish.

Sadly, while enjoying my text-based technology, I began to realize the sighted world was leaving us behind. While we blind people clung onto DOS, sighted people moved to Windows. As sighted people embraced the Internet, the old systems like command-line shell accounts, FTP, Gopher and text-based email moved onto the World Wide Web. While we plodded along with our text-based Lynx web browser, sighted people moved on to NCSA, Netscape, Internet Explorer and, finally, to the browsers we know today. As ebooks finally became normalized in the sighted world, blind people got left behind through the use of inaccessible, protective wrappings around information that should have otherwise been accessible.

Fast forward to today, 2018, 31 years after I got my first computer… I think we have another chance at truly equal accessibility, but will we insist on taking it for ourselves?

As I see it, we blind people enjoy the following technology advancements which should help us catch up to the sighted world, if not actually compete with the sighted on terms of equality once in awhile:

  • The free, open-source Nonvisual Desktop Access (NVDA) screen reader makes computer technology more affordable and accessible to more blind people than it has ever been before.
  • Popular operating systems including Android, iOS, Mac OS and Windows all now feature built-in screen readers blind people can use out of the box without the need to purchase and install a separate, 3rd-party solution.
  • Internationally-recognized guidelines, such as the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, provide website developers with the framework they can follow in order to insure their sites are accessible to people with disabilities.
  • Mainstream technology companies, including Adobe, Apple, Google and Microsoft, all provide best practices and tools for insuring the content created using their solutions is accessible to people with disabilities.
  • Legislation, such as the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act in the United States, as well as many other similar laws around the world, are avenues we can use to obtain equal accessibility as a human right.
  • And, finally, when everything else fails, we now have visual-interpreting services such as Aira and Be My Eyes, where we can go back to a scenario where we employ sighted readers to access critical information we’re just not going to get any other way.

Despite all these assets at our disposal, it sadly seems the world around us remains largely inaccessible…

  • The staff at doctor’s offices, hospitals and other healthcare facilities usually whine about HIPAA and being too busy when they are asked to provide accessible, electronic medical records or even, all too frequently, to help us fill out their inaccessible paperwork.
  • Many blind college students still can’t gain access to their textbooks on time because they are not available in an accessible format they can read.
  • There are still lots of blind people who can’t get hired, are unable to perform important parts of their jobs or find themselves left out of promotional opportunities due to the use of inaccessible workplace apps, websites and other forms of information technology.
  • Banks, health insurance companies, and a myriad of other private businesses often still communicate with their customers using inaccessible websites, send inaccessible critical correspondence and insist on inaccessible, obsolete methods of communication without providing reasonable accommodations to blind customers.
  • Many grocery delivery services, stores and other e-commerce companies continue to insist on using inaccessible apps and websites, despite the plethora of options available for making them accessible.
  • Even some companies with an apparently forward-looking approach to accessibility often fail to take care of obvious accessibility issues that lock us out, what I call the accessibility low-hanging fruit, choosing instead to focus on catchy, fancy, whiz-bang accessibility features while hiding behind their “accessibility teams” who rarely, if ever, respond to genuine feedback about their inaccessibility.
  • Even seemingly regulated federal and state government agencies continue to communicate using inaccessible websites, send inaccessible critical correspondence and insist on inaccessible, obsolete methods of communication without providing reasonable accommodations to blind people.

As the available information and technology for making things accessible improves on a daily basis, I become angrier and angrier each time I encounter yet another inexcusable accessibility barrier. As a blind person who is not broken and is, in fact, a full human being with the same responsibilities, rights and intrinsic value as that sighted person over there, I vow to continue fighting the good, accessibility, fight and I am always looking for a few good warriors to join me.

So, this is all very disappointing and discouraging, isn’t it? What can, or must, we do when we encounter accessibility issues that discriminate against us and lock us out of full and equal participation? Here are just a few ideas:

  • Contact a company on social media services, such as Facebook or Twitter, pointing out the accessibility issues and asking that they be directly addressed.
  • Write and send a certified letter to a company’s CEO pointing out accessibility concerns, providing possible solutions and asking him or her to direct the prompt, ongoing resolution of those concerns in a sustainable manner.
  • Engage in structured negotiations or take other legal action against a company as you deem appropriate after trying other, less drastic methods first.
  • Publicly call out all organizations doing business specifically in the blind community whenever you encounter accessibility barriers, as the leadership of these organizations should always know better.

So, in conclusion, finally… I think there are two ways we can go down the road of better accessibility: optimistic and pessimistic. We should try the optimistic approach first: simply politely point out the accessibility barrier(s), provide possible solutions if you have some good ideas and directly ask for prompt, sustainable resolution… But, if that optimistic approach does not work, we should be willing to go to war… In the pessimistic approach, we have determined that the gloves are off and playing the nice guy is no longer going to work. As I see it, the key goal of this approach is simply to change the perceived path of least resistance from one of inaccessibility and ignoring us to one of greater accessibility and attention to our feedback. This pessimistic, or cynical, approach involves taking complicated, difficult and often dramatic steps such as digging in by not doing what is asked in the inaccessible manner, legal action, protesting at the CEO’s office or in the streets and consistent public call-outs of the organizations ongoing wrongdoing.

Let’s all figure out how to work together, as blind brothers and sisters, to break down, using all means necessary, the accessibility barriers that hold us back from living the lives we want.

Accessibility in the New Year: Will You Join Me?

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As another year ends and a new one begins, I find myself asking the question: “Do blind people have more accessibility now?” Sadly, as each year goes by, I keep coming up with the answer “no.”

So, perhaps, I should ask another question: “What do I really want?”

The answer is as simple as its implementation may be quite complex: “I want to be fully included and valued as a human adult with all the rights and responsibilities that status entails.” Put another way: “I don’t want to be left out or set aside because I happen to be blind.”

What does that mean? In as straightforward a way as I can express the sentiment, it means I want to be a productive member of society who is able to support his family and himself without undue, artificial, discriminatory barriers being imposed on me by companies, individuals or organizations. In my admittedly simplified view, if we are granted comprehensive, nonvisual accessibility to information, technology and transportation, the opportunity to enjoy full, first-class citizenship will follow.

There are many examples of the kind of accessibility I believe would allow me to realize the goal of first-class citizenship. How about a top-ten list?

  1. I would like to be able to do my job without having it continuously threatened by the thoughtless implementation of inaccessible technology that does not meet internationally-recognized accessibility standards or vendors’ developer guidelines.
  2. I want to make a cup of coffee in the morning without worrying about the power and brewing lights I can’t see.
  3. I would like to be able to fill out my time sheet on terms of equality with my sighted co-workers.
  4. I want to cook dinner knowing, for certain, that I have the oven set correctly.
  5. I would like to be able to update the apps on my iPhone, confident that each update will be at least as accessible, if not better, than the previous version.
  6. I want to do business with IRS, Social Security and other government agencies in ways that are fully accessible to me without the burden of intervention by third parties.
  7. I would like my accessibility needs to be met in a sustainable manner that works well for everyone, every time, without constantly re-inventing the wheel!
  8. I want to sign documents, exchange correspondence, access my medical records, and do all manner of other similar forms of business, all without the financial cost and loss of privacy that comes along with relying on a sighted reader.
  9. It would be nice to be able to go shopping, either online or at a brick-and-mortar store, independently, with dignity and without the bother of an inaccessible website or the need to have help from a customer service person who couldn’t care less.
  10. When I communicate with agencies, companies, individuals and organizations about accessibility concerns, I would like them to be taken for the serious, human rights issues they actually are, instead of being patted on the head, set aside and told to wait!

These, of course, represent just a drop in the bucket! I know… I want so much. I am high maintenance: a real accessibility diva! How could anyone possibly imagine that a blind person, like myself, might simply want to avail himself of all the same opportunities as sighted people? After all, how do I even manage to get out of bed, go to the bathroom or poor my own orange juice, for Heaven’s sake?

Since I don’t live in the fantasy world I have just described, and there’s no evidence flying unicorns will be discovered anytime soon, what will I resolve to do to make things better?

I will:

  1. Love and support my family and myself in the less-than-accessible world in which we cope daily.
  2. Educate myself more formally about topics relevant to the accessibility and assistive technology industries.
  3. Take at least one action to resist any case of inaccessibility that comes up while striving for balance with the need to prioritize and pick my battles effectively.
  4. Evangelize accessibility and provide agencies, companies, individuals and organizations with effective solutions and resources to move forward in a positive direction.
  5. Provide accessibility and assistive technology testing, training and encouragement in helpful ways that appropriately value my effort, money and time.

So, now, fellow readers, what will you do? Will you join me? In this new year, will you strive to overcome daily by doing all you can, each in your own way, to move accessibility forward? Will you stand up and say, yes! We can, with equal opportunity and accessibility, live the lives we want?

iPhone App Maker Justifies Charging Blind Customers Extra for VoiceOver Accessibility

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A recent version 2.0 update to Awareness!, an iOS app that enables the user of an iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch to hear important sounds in their environment while listening through headphones, features six available in-app purchases, including one that enables VoiceOver accessibility for the company’s blind customers.

Awareness! The Headphone App, authored by small developer Essency, costs 99 cents in the iTunes Store. VoiceOver support for the app costs blind customers over five times its original price at $4.99.

Essency co-founder Alex Georgiou said the extra cost comes from the added expense and development time required to make Awareness! Accessible with Apple’s built-in VoiceOver screen reader.

“Awareness! is a pretty unusual App. Version 1.x used a custom interface that did not lend itself very well for VoiceOver,” he said. “Our developers tried relabeling all the controls and applied the VoiceOver tags as per spec but this didn’t improve things much. There were so many taps and swipe gestures involved in changing just one setting that it really was unusable.”

Essency’s developers tackled the accessibility challenge by means of a technique the blind community knows all too well with websites like Amazon and Safeway that offer a separate, incomplete accessibility experience requiring companies to spend additional funds on specialized, unwanted customer-service training and technical maintenance tasks.

“The solution was to create a VoiceOver-specific interface, however, this created another headache for our developers,” Georgiou said. “It meant having the equivalent of a dual interface: one interface with the custom controllers and the other optimized for VoiceOver. It was almost like merging another version of Awareness! in the existing app.”

As an example of the need for a dual-interface approach and a challenge to the stated simplicity of making iOS apps accessible, Georgiou described a portion of the app’s user interface the developers struggled to make accessible with VoiceOver:

“Awareness! features an arched scale marked in percentages in the centre of a landscape screen with a needle that pivots from left to right in correspondence to sound picked up by either the built in mic or inline headphones. You change the mic threshold by moving your finger over the arched scale which uses a red filling to let you know where it’s set. At the same time, a numerical display appears telling you the dBA value of the setting. When the needle hits the red, the mic is switched on and routed to your headphones. To the right you have the mic volume slider, turn the mic volume up or down by sliding your finger over it. Then you have a series of buttons placed around the edges that control things like the vibrate alarm, autoset, mic trigger and the settings page access.”

Georgiou said maintaining two separate user interfaces, one for blind customers and another for sighted, comes at a high price.

“At the predicted uptake of VoiceOver users, we do not expect to break even on the VoiceOver interface for at least 12 to 18 months unless something spectacular happens with sales,” he said. “We would have loved to have made this option free, unfortunately the VoiceOver upgrade required a pretty major investment, representing around 60% of the budget for V2 which could have been used to further refine Awareness and introduce new features aimed at a mass market.”

Georgiou said this dual-interface scheme will continue to represent a significant burden to Essency’s bottom line in spite of the added charge to blind customers.

“Our forecasts show that at best we could expect perhaps an extra 1 or 2 thousand VoiceOver users over the next 12 to 18 months,” he said. “At the current pricing this would barely cover the costs for the VoiceOver interface development.”

Georgiou said payment of the $4.99 accessibility charge does not make the app fully accessible at this time.

“It is our intention that the VoiceOver interface will continue to be developed with new features such as AutoPause and AutoSet Plus being added on for free,” he said. “Lack of time did not allow these features to be included in this update.”

Georgiou said the decision to make Awareness! Accessible had nothing to do with business.

“From a business perspective it really didn’t make sense for us to invest in a VoiceOver version but we decided to go ahead with the VoiceOver version despite the extra costs because we really want to support the blind and visually impaired,” he said. “It was a decision based on heartfelt emotion, not business.”

Georgiou said accessibility should be about gratitude and he would even consider it acceptable for a company to charge his daughter four to five times as much for something she needed if she were to have a disability.

“Honestly, I would be grateful and want to encourage as many parties as possible to consider accessibility in apps and in fact in all areas of life,” he said. “I would not object to any developer charging their expense for adding functionality that allowed my daughter to use an app that improved her life in any way. In this case, better to have than not.”

Georgiou said he wants to make it clear he and his company do not intend to exploit or harm blind people.

“I first came into contact with a blind couple when I was 10 years old through a Christian Sunday school (over 38 years ago),” he said. “They were the kindest couple I ever met and remember being amazed at the things they managed to do without sight. I remember them fondly. I could not imagine myself or my partner doing anything to hurt the blind community.”

A common thread in many of Georgiou’s statements seems to ask how a small company strikes a balance between doing the right thing and running a financially sustainable business that supports their families.

“I don’t think you understand, we’re a tiny company. We’re not a corporate,” he said. “The founders are just two guys who have families with kids, I’ve got seven!”

Georgiou said he understands how accessibility is a human right that ought to be encouraged and protected.

“I recognize that there is a problem here that can be applied to the world in general and it’s important to set an acceptable precedent,” he said. “I think I’ve already made my opinions clear in that I believe civilized society should allow no discrimination whatsoever.”

In spite of accessibility as a human right in the civilized world, Georgiou said he believes this consideration must be balanced with other practical business needs.

“When it comes to private companies, innovation, medicine, technology, etc., It’s ultra-important all are both encouraged and incentivized to use their talents to improve quality of life in all areas,” Georgiou said. “The question is who pays for it? The affected community? The government? The companies involved?”

Thomas Jefferson: Founding Father of an Evolving Natione!

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I made this post in my History (HST) 109 course discussion forum in response to the following class discussion question:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

Ever seen these words before? Sure you have. They are from the Declaration of Independence and they were written by Thomas Jefferson. Did it ever strike you that these words about “all men” being created equal and having certain rights were written by one of the world’s largest slaveholders? How do we, as Americans, reconcile Jefferson’s words with Jefferson’s deeds? Is it just that TJ is cranking out political rhetoric to stoke a revolution that he hopes will preserve him from bankruptcy? Is he a racist who in using the phrase “all men” knows that his readers know he is excluding what he considers to be lower races (Native Americans, Blacks), or is he simply one of the premier hypocrites in American history? His putative sex life with a slave mistress would probably make even Bill Clinton blush. What’s your take on Jefferson? Which of the above categories does he fall into, or does he fit into “all of the above?” Why do we consider him such a great man?

In some ways, Thomas Jefferson was ahead of his time while in others he was not. On one hand, Thomas Jefferson was instrumental in the writing of the Declaration of Independence and the overall foundation of the United States of America. These developments served to synthesize the works of people like John Locke and Thomas Paine into a real, workable national republic ultimately leading to what we have today as our American society. It seems quite obvious that Thomas Jefferson helped to initiate an evolutionary process of moving toward equal human rights for everyone. It is quite likely he had no clue that his actions would bring out such momentus change in the world. We must take special care to avoid judging our Founding Fathers according to our modern world view.

In the late 18th Century and early 19th Century, during the time in which Thomas Jefferson lived, white males were the only people recognized as full citizens in Western Europe and the American colonies. The man was expected to do the work, own the property and care for his family in all respects. The woman was expected to stay in or near the home, bare and raise children and otherwise support the man’s goals. By and large, she was not expected or permitted to act as an independent individual. For example, American women did not gain such basic human rights as ownership of property and the right to vote until the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. Native Americans were simply swept aside as white men of European descent mercilessly conquered the New World. It has never been the tradition of any society to recognize the basic human rights of those they wish to subjugate for their own purposes. The rights of African Americans were not considered based on the simple explanation that they were usually bought and sold as property in most of America. Finally, people with disabilities were viewed as being crippled and, thus, incomplete. Their individual needs and desires were never accommodated or considered. Such people were often sheltered by their families, forced to depend on meager charity or outright killed as a means of relieving a burden from the community. In all ways, prior to the late 19th Century, women, minorities and people with disabilities all had one thing in common: they were viewed as less than a complete person by the dominant white male society. further, no laws existed as a means of changing society’s attitude or protecting these groups against persecution.

In most respects, Thomas Jefferson was simply a product of his time. As a farmer and property owner, he was a part of the accepted dominant class of American society. Should we be surprised that he owned slaves? Of course not! Many of his contemporaries also owned numerous slaves. Few white males entertained the possibility that ownership of another human being might be wrong, and the opinions of those from other groups were simply not considered. Should we be shocked when we learn that Jefferson was promiscuous and unfaithful? Absolutely not! Remember, white males dominated. Anytime someone dominates, they hold all the cards. What power did Martha have in the relationship? How would we propose she was going to stop her husband from messing around and having children with other women? He could certainly divorce her if he became unhappy, while it was quite unlikely she would have been able to initiate her own divorce.

Ultimately, we see that the initial intent of the Declaration of Independence was simply freedom from British domination. The rights to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” applied only to white males in the dominant class of American society. Women, African-Americans, the “Indians”, people with disabilities, and all others were deemed less than full citizens and, thus, not entitled to the same guarantees provided by early American doctrines such as the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. While the Declaration of Independence signifies the beginnings of the United States, the Constitution is the document that gives real staying power to the new nation. It is quite fortunate, however, that our Constitution provides mechanisms permitting the United States to evolve toward a “more perfect union.” The Judiciary interprets the Constitution while the legislative branch can amend the actual Constitution! It is only through these amendment and legislative processes that the slaves were ultimately freed, women were finally granted the right to vote and people with disabilities are finally starting to have a real chance at participating as full American citizens! We can credit Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin and the rest of our Founding Fathers for demonstrating the foresight necessary to establish a nation with underlying principles that allow it to evolve away from dominance by one small class of men and toward full inclusion for all its citizens!