About Us: Meet The Little Lobbyists

Founded in 2017 by Elena Hung and Michelle Morrison, parents of Xiomara and Timmy, Little Lobbyists is the only national family-led, disability-forward organization advocating for kids with every type of disability.

Our work centers the lives and voices of our vibrant children and families in policy conversations, drives narrative change, and brings families of medically complex and disabled children together.

We advocate for health care, education, community integration, authentic representation, and joy, so our kids can survive and thrive in their communities and families, where they belong. 

Little Lobbyists brings:

• Stories from disabled and medically complex children and families directly to Capitol Hill as well as state houses. Our families meet with lawmakers, provide testimony, and speak at rallies all over the United States.
• Families of disabled and medically complex children together to build community in state chapters from North Carolina to Kansas and beyond.
• Partner organizations together to center children in healthcare policy and advocacy.

Hearing about the impacts of Medicaid directly from children and families is highly effective: In 2017, the “little lobbyists” who swarmed Capitol Hill helped defeat attacks on the Affordable Care Act, and nine years later, we are still changing hearts and minds, one conversation at a time.

Our storytelling has a direct, immediate, and profound impact.

Donors support this critical work, providing the backing kids and families need to travel to Little Lobbyists actions and events; without this funding, our families would be unable to afford the costs of showing up to tell their stories in person.

We advocate for all kids with disabilities: mobility, sensory, mental health, intellectual and developmental disabilities, and chronic health conditions.

Historically, children with complex medical needs and disabilities have been kept out of sight, hidden at home or in institutions, rendered invisible and forgotten.

Health care policy reflected this opinion, focusing on institutional care rather than home- and community-based services that keep kids in their communities and with their families and peers, where they belong. When disabled children were seen or discussed, it was as passive recipients of societal pity, even ridicule. Regrettably, this outdated view is still common. We're here to change that.

Medically complex children count on Medicaid to stay in their communities. Medicaid funds nursing for home and school; physical, occupational, and speech therapy; medications and supplies; equipment such as wheelchairs and ventilators; and even accessibility improvements to their homes. Without Medicaid, families risk bankruptcy and separation from their children.

We use the power of real stories to change hearts and minds

We take our families — kids and all — and their stories to Congress, state lawmakers, rallies, and events across the country. Our families speak with the media, from MSNBC to the New York Times, so the American public gets the story from us, rather than from people talking about us — check out Little Lobbyists' latest press coverage!

Encountering our kids firsthand and learning about the importance of Medicaid and other social programs directly from their families confronts lawmakers about the reality of the policies they're proposing and voting on, and makes the public reconsider the way they think about these programs.