Ed Markey, Congress’ Staunchest Disability Rights Champion, Likely Headed Back to Senate

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Last Updated: September 4, 2026

Tags: Featured Special Project, National, Politics
Ed Markey, in his office, the image is in black and white.

Ed Markey has been fighting for disability rights for decades

At a very brief first glance, the primary campaign for a Massachusetts’ Senate seat was the type of race a Democratic incumbent is designed to lose in the current political environment. Edward (Ed) Markey is 80 years old, he’s been in federal politics since 1976, and meets the textbook definition of an establishment Democrat by all the usual metrics. He was also running against someone who fancied himself as part of a new wave of Democratic change makers.

Except Markey trounced his closest challenger, U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton, a congressman since 2015, winning by almost 30 percentage points. Looking at pre-election day polling, the race was never in much doubt, at least not recently. Moulton is well known and clearly had worn out his welcome with an electorate disinterested in culture war arguments while Markey had endorsements from people fellow Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren of Vermont and Massachusetts, respectively.

However, Markey’s story is different from other long-term federal lawmakers keeping their seats: he’s perhaps the strongest and longest standing protector of disability rights in the Senate. For starters, he was one of the authors of the Americans with Disabilities Act and resulting legislation related to accessibility.  In recent memory he’s been vocally against education cuts for disabled students, he’s introduced bills aimed at supporting caregivers, brought forward attempts to stop disabled people being turned away from serving on juries, and that’s just in the last eighteen months. Also, in an era where a large swathe of democratic strategists seem to endorse the idea that their path to the White House requires the dehumanization of trans people, Markey has taken the opposite tack. In January he was part of a group of politicians, which included Sanders and Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden, who stood up for trans people when the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced plans to remove gender dysphoria from its definition of disability and the protections afforded by Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. At the time, the group wrote:

“We are gravely concerned that this proposed rule, if finalized, will not only invite discrimination against people with gender dysphoria, but will also set a precedent for additional exclusionary regulations and practices to take root—targeting other members of the disability community and the broader populace. We urge you to immediately rescind this proposal and commit to supporting discrimination protections for all people with disabilities. We cannot and will not stand for the distortion of our nation’s fundamental anti-discrimination laws to be used to harm the very communities that these laws were meant to protect.” 

Directly tying disability issues and 2SLGBTQIA+ concerns is a common step in activist circles, but is far less common on the national political stage, especially when it comes to the rights of transgender people. In contrast, Moulton was lambasted for telling the New York Times in 2024, “I have two little girls, I don’t want them getting run over on a playing field by a male or formerly male athlete, but as a Democrat I’m supposed to be afraid to say that…” It was something that resurfaced during debates during the campaign at a time when Moulton was trying to make Markey’s age a central topic. As local NPR affiliate GBH pointed out shortly after the results were made public, Markey clearly swayed voters by connecting trans rights—and, by extension disability rights—together and actively challenging the idea that ageism and transphobia should factor into these political campaigns. 

As much was clear in the speech of Taylor Hack, a local non-profit leader who introduced Markey before his acceptance speech. 

“There have been people in this party who looked at the cruelty transgender Americans were facing and decided that maybe if Democrats sacrificed the right people, abandon the right kids and distanced ourselves from the right community, voters would reward us for it. Tonight should bury that idea,” Hack said.

While what Markey’s win proves about the Democratic establishment is unclear, what is evident is that a prominent disability rights protector who hasn’t forsaken other minority groups for his own success is likely to return for another term.

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