A free speech debate is raging over sign language at the White House

Disability advocates are taking their latest fight to the Trump administration, where the White House has been accused of discriminating against deaf Americans. This is due to the administration’s decision to axe a Biden-era policy that used sign language interpreters during major White House events, including all press briefings. The administration is now arguing in court that these interpreters should only be required in certain instances, though deaf advocacy groups disagree.

‘Clear, present and imminent harm’

The National Association of the Deaf (NAD) criticized the administration’s decision in a lawsuit, and at least one federal judge agreed. U.S. District Judge Amir Ali ordered the White House to restore interpreters to all press briefings conducted by either President Donald Trump or White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt. The “court finds that denying deaf Americans access to and the benefit of it presents a clear, present and imminent harm,” Ali said in his ruling.

This is due to the “nature of the programming at issue” during press briefings, Ali said, including “regularly scheduled briefings on critical topics implicating markets, medicine, militaries” and other issues. This was the main argument made by advocates for deaf Americans. These people have the “right to the same access to White House information as everyone else. Denying them ASL interpreters is a direct violation of that right,” said Dr. Bobbie Beth Scoggins, the CEO of NAD, in a statement. This information “must be provided not only through captioning but also in American Sign Language.”

The original choice to do away with interpreters was because the “president seemingly does not like the idea of sharing the spotlight with others,” said The Independent. This is not the first time deaf organizations have sparred with Trump, as NAD previously won a victory during his first term by “taking the administration to court over a failure to make coronavirus briefings accessible.”

‘Major incursion on his central prerogatives’

The administration has claimed that the scope of the sign language ruling is too broad, and that interpreters “should be limited to regularly scheduled briefings and not other events where the president takes questions from the press,” said NPR. The White House has also said that the federal ruling “should not apply to remarks made in a broad set of scenarios.”

Requiring Trump to “share his platform with ASL interpreters every time he or his press secretary communicates with the nation is a major incursion on his central prerogatives,” attorneys for Trump said in a court filing earlier this year. His attorneys have additionally argued that an ASL interpreter should be required only under certain scenarios, and that press briefings do not “encompass events with other purposes, such as a ceremony or a speech, at which the president may choose to take questions from the press,” they said in a separate court filing.

The administration is currently appealing the judge’s decision, setting up another potential courtroom fight. But the White House has said it will “proceed with providing ASL interpreters for ‘publicly announced press briefings,’” said DisabilityScoop, a news website for disability issues. The administration also noted that it “continues to have a contract with an ASL interpreter service that extends into 2028.”