Advisor
Senator Tom Harkin represented Iowa in the United States Congress for more than four decades. He served Iowa’s 5th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1975 to 1985 and was a U.S. Senator from 1985 to 2015. Among his many accomplishments was his role as the primary advocate in the Senate for disability rights. This included:
As a young senator, Tom Harkin was tapped by Senator Ted Kennedy to craft legislation to protect the civil rights of the millions of Americans with physical and mental disabilities. Senator Harkin knew firsthand about the challenges facing people with disabilities from his brother, Frank, who had been deaf since an early age. What emerged from that process would later become one of the senator’s most important legislative achievements: The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
Senator Harkin championed the 2004 Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which ensured public schools could provide resources to students with disabilities. The act mandated “free and appropriate public education” and individualized education programs (IEPs) for those with disabilities.
To preserve the intent of the ADA after court rulings weakened its standards, Senator Harkin and Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) introduced the ADA Amendments Act to ensure continuing protections from discrimination for all Americans with disabilities. This was signed into law in 2008. In addition, the Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2008 sought to increase the enrollment of young people with disabilities in community colleges and universities.
In 2014, Senator Harkin introduced the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act, which established vocational education services to ensure the success of people with disabilities in the competitive, integrated job market.
Senator Harkin continues his disability work today, calling for moving more people with disabilities into the workforce, eliminating sub-minimum wages for the disabled and reforming government health programs that force them into nursing homes and institutions. The Harkin Institute and the Harkin Disability Employment Summit, which the Senator founded in 2016, will convene this year in Paris bringing representatives from business, disability advocacy, government, education, foundations, and NGOs bring their lessons from Asia, Africa, Australia, Europe, and the Americas to identify and create strategies to increase the employment opportunities for people with disabilities.