In letter, Senators urge Leadership to address concerns raised by Congressional oversight to improve accessibility of Senate technology for people with disabilities
2022 report revealed failures across the federal government to make technology fully accessible, as required by law
Senators: “Inaccessible technology disadvantages people with disabilities when they seek to contact their Senators, use Senate services while visiting their Senators, or fulfill duties while working for a Senate office.”
Washington, D.C. - Today, U.S. Senator Bob Casey (D-PA), Chairman of the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging, joined his colleagues Senators Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), John Fetterman (D-PA), Bernie Sanders (D-VT), Maggie Hassan (D-NH), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) in sending a letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) about the accessibility of Senate technology. Federal law requires technology used by Congress, such as websites, apps, and kiosks, to be accessible for people with disabilities. Unfortunately, recent oversight suggests that the Senate can be doing more to ensure accessibility. These findings follow the release of Casey’s 2022 report, Unlocking the Virtual Front Door, which found failures by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), and other federal departments and agencies, to make their own technology fully accessible for people with disabilities. The Senators letter to leadership calls on the Senate to meet many of the same accessibility standards the Senate has demanded from VA and other executive agencies serving the American public.
The Senators wrote, “The United States Senate must ensure its technology is accessible for people with disabilities as both a matter of equal access and a legal necessity. Inaccessible technology disadvantages people with disabilities when they seek to contact their Senators, use Senate services while visiting their Senators, or fulfill duties while working for a Senate office.”
In the letter, the Senators highlight a number of ways the Senate could improve accessibility, including by instituting mandatory scans of websites for accessibility errors, building accessibility into Senate PDF files, and adding accessibility features to technology on the Senate grounds.
Chairman Casey has led the charge in Congress to improve the accessibility of government websites and technology. Federal law requires technology at federal departments and agencies to be accessible for, and usable by, people with disabilities. However, in a report issued in December 2022 entitled Unlocking the Virtual Front Door, Chairman Casey found that inaccessible federal technology creates barriers for people with disabilities to access essential services, including VA benefits, health care, employment, Social Security, and more. Chairman Casey’s report issued 12 recommendations, including a call for Congress to ensure its own technology is accessible, as also required by law.
Casey’s efforts have focused in particular on making federal technology accessible for veterans. In 2020, Chairman Casey passed the VA Website Accessibility Act that required VA to report on the accessibility of the Department’s websites and kiosks. VA’s report to Congress, released in 2021, found that only 10 percent of VA’s websites were fully accessible. In response, Chairman Casey led a bipartisan push for VA to do better. In 2023, Chairman Casey introduced the bipartisan Veterans Accessibility Act to establish a Veterans Advisory Committee on Equal Access at VA that will issue regular reports on VA’s compliance with federal disability laws.
In this letter, Casey is calling on Senate Leadership to reassess the Senate’s technology, and take steps to ensure accessibility for constituents, Senate employees, and Senators with disabilities.
You can read the full text of the Senators’ letter HERE or below:
Dear Majority Leader Schumer and Minority Leader McConnell:
We write today concerning the accessibility of Senate technology for people with disabilities. Accessible technology allows everyone to access government resources, but recent Congressional oversight found that government technology is often inaccessible for people with disabilities. The Senate’s work has increasingly shifted to electronic formats, and we must guarantee equal access to Senate information and resources – both in person and remotely. Accordingly, we ask leadership to work in coordination with the Senate Sergeant at Arms and other relevant internal and external Senate stakeholders to ensure the Senate’s electronic resources are accessible for all Americans, including those with disabilities.
When designed properly, technology can enable equal access to information and services for people with disabilities. For example, accessible websites, apps, electronic documents (such as PDFs), and kiosks can work with screen readers, which speak aloud the text on a screen for a blind user. Another example of frequently used accessible technology is a telephone that includes a screen with captioning options for a person who is deaf or hard of hearing. Accessible government technology is important for ensuring that people with disabilities are equally served by their government and for ensuring public employees with disabilities can do their jobs. Because older adults are more likely to have a disability, designing accessibility into government technology will grow in importance as America ages.
The Special Committee on Aging has shined a spotlight on the accessibility of government technology for people with disabilities, finding there is substantial room for progress. A majority staff report entitled Unlocking the Virtual Front Door, two committee hearings, and bipartisan letters to federal departments have revealed failures by departments and agencies across the federal government to make their technology fully accessible for people with disabilities, as required by law. The report included recommendations for executive agencies and Congress, including a recommendation that Congress ensure its own technology is accessible.
The United States Senate can and must do more to ensure that its websites, electronic documents, and other technologies are fully accessible for people with disabilities. For example, the Senate does not routinely scan its websites for accessibility errors. Automated scans can help to catch accessibility errors that are introduced over time. The Senate’s office of Printing, Graphics, and Direct Mail (PGDM) has an accessibility team, but that team is small and has limited capacity, and as such has reported they do not build accessibility into PDF documents unless the requesting office specifically asks. Finally, the new customer kiosks installed at the Senate’s Dirksen Cafeteria appear to lack accessibility features, such as a headphone jack or auditory voicing of on-screen information. Similar devices have created accessibility barriers at federal departments and agencies. As the Senate urges federal agencies to improve, we should strive to do so as well.
The United States Senate must ensure its technology is accessible for people with disabilities as both a matter of equal access and a legal necessity. Inaccessible technology disadvantages people with disabilities when they seek to contact their Senators, use Senate services while visiting their Senators, or fulfill duties while working for a Senate office. Many Senate employment resources are online, and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) protects people with disabilities from discrimination in “applying for jobs, hiring, firing, and job training.” The ADA also prohibits discrimination against people with disabilities in public services and accommodations, areas where technology plays an increasingly significant role. Accordingly, we ask leadership to work to implement the following changes:
- Review and update accessibility standards for the acquisition and development of Senate technology, in consultation with the United States Access Board and organizations that represent people with disabilities. Senate contractors, such as those running on-campus restaurants, should also be required to demonstrate that their technology is fully accessible for people with a broad range of disabilities before implementing new technology for the Senate community and the public.
- Build into upcoming budgets the capability to begin, in a timely fashion, routine accessibility scans for all online Senate resources and remediate any accessibility barriers as soon as possible. Unlocking the Virtual Front Door and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) recommend routine scans paired with manual testing for federal departments and agencies. Routine scanning is an important first step in holding the Senate to the same standards we demand from federal departments and agencies, and a remediation plan to address problems found by scans and manual testing will result in a more accessible Senate for the public and employees.
- Establish mandatory training on electronic accessibility for Senate employees, and regularly promote accessibility training documents. Senate employees should be familiar with why accessibility is important and how staff can generate accessible electronic documents. This type of knowledge and training is akin to cyber security and harassment training that is currently required of Senate employees.
- Work with Senate appropriators, Senate PGDM, the Office of Congressional Accessibility Services, and other stakeholders to establish a central resource for document accessibility. These resources could include a website and helpline to provide technical assistance to Senate staff. PGDM should be staffed as necessary to provide assistance and build accessibility into all documents PGDM is asked to design.
These changes to safeguard the accessibility of Senate technology are necessary to serve all Americans and all Senate employees equally. The Senate would not require someone in a wheelchair to walk up a flight of stairs. Yet, its information, materials, and services are equally denied to a person with a disability if Senate technology is not fully accessible.
We appreciate your consideration of this matter. Please reach out to Doug Hartman with Aging Committee staff at 202-224-5364 or Stephanie DeLuca with Senator Duckworth’s office at 202-224-2854 if you have any questions.
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