States aren't required to provide community-based care for people with disabilities, new DOJ opinion claims

Key Points:

• The Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) released a new opinion stating that states are not legally required to integrate mentally disabled patients into community or home-based care, challenging the long-standing Olmstead v. LC Supreme Court precedent that supports community integration for people with disabilities.
• The 1999 Olmstead decision, considered a landmark civil rights case for disability rights, held that unjustified institutional isolation violates the Americans with Disabilities Act, affirming the right of people with disabilities to receive services in their communities.
• The new OLC opinion argues that the DOJ's Civil Rights Division has overstepped its authority by pressuring states into deinstitutionalization and enforcing integration mandates beyond the Supreme Court's original ruling, though it does not change the law or set legal precedent.
• Disability rights advocates warn that this reinterpretation threatens decades of protections that have enabled people with disabilities to live and participate in their communities, potentially leading to increased institutionalization.
• This opinion is part of broader DOJ shifts under the Trump administration and Civil Rights Division leadership, which have included efforts to curtail civil rights protections for marginalized groups and controversies involving insensitive remarks by senior officials.