The Brief

There are at least 63,000 students with disabilities in the Los Angeles Unified School District. For these students, the district's cellphone ban has implications beyond missing texts from friends or losing the option to scroll social media at lunch.

Families told LAist their child’s phones help them control medical devices, cope with anxiety and regulate their emotions.

While students with disabilities can be exempted from the Los Angeles Unified cellphone ban, that requires families to assert their rights.

Without an exemption, students can lose access to a valuable learning tool and the policy may also put students in the awkward position of sticking out from their phone-less peers.

When Faith returned to her sixth-grade class at Walter Reed Middle School in January, she learned students would soon have to lock their phones in pouches all day to comply with a new district-wide policy.

“I was concerned for students like me,” Faith said.

The North Hollywood student uses her phone to play Roblox, text her friends and to control a small electronic device that helps her hear. Faith’s cochlear implant sits over her left ear and translates sounds into electrical impulses that her brain interprets as sounds and speech.

We wanted to understand how students like Faith and their families are navigating the ban, which went into effect last month.

Pico-Robertson mom Ingrid Levy said she’s heard about the challenges cellphones pose at her daughter’s middle school, from bullying to students recording fights, but is also comforted by being able to reach her child, who experiences anxiety, in real time via her smartwatch.
“How do we find that balance?” Levy said. “It's tricky.”

Here's what we learned:

What rights do students with disabilities have?

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act guarantees students with disabilities a “free appropriate public education.” Still, many families struggle to access services that would help their children learn, and Congress has never fully funded special education as intended when the law first passed in 1975.

“The goal of all of those laws really is to be sure that students with disabilities are not unfairly segregated, or removed from the classroom, or from the learning that their peers get on the basis of their disability,” said Denise Marshall, chief executive of the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates, a national nonprofit that advocates for the legal and civil rights of students with disabilities and their families.

Special education law protects students’ rights to use technology that helps them in the classroom. For example, Los Angeles Unified provides more than 3,000 students with devices, such as iPads that translate text to speech, through its assistive technology program.

Marshall is skeptical of cellphone bans. She said that they may be a barrier, because families have to assert a right and go through the process rather than it being automatic.

Marshall said families of students who want to ensure their child’s access to personal technology can call a meeting of their child’s IEP or 504 Plan team to discuss adding an accommodation that specifies how the device is used to benefit the student.

But she’s also worried that students may feel too uncomfortable being the only ones in their class with access to a phone to use the device to their benefit.

“It's just the overall dampening of an effective, promising technology,” Marshall said.

Faith and her dad, John Perron, outside Walter Reed Middle School in North Hollywood.

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Zaydee Sanchez

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LAist

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Marshall said while there is validity to the argument that students may use technology in inappropriate and distracting ways during the school day, many use their cellphones in a way “that enhances their learning,” for example, by taking photos of assignments or leaving themselves a voice note during the school day.

And she said a ban does little to prepare young people for the future.

“The goal is supposed to be to graduate students, all students, from school who have the tools and the skills they need to be successful in the workplace in community living and interacting with other people,” Marshall said. “Artificially limiting their access to the number one way that people communicate in our society these days, to us, makes no sense.”

Students navigate a new reality

As Los Angeles Unified developed the cellphone policy last year, Faith’s dad, John Perron, contacted his school board member.

“I wanted to make sure that the parents and the students' voices made it to the top,” Perron said. He’s the former chairman of a committee that advises the district on special education.

“Devices have their place,” Perron said. “And some people have more of a need.”

The resolution that expanded the district’s existing cellphone restrictions included several exceptions, including for students with IEPs or Section 504 Plans.

However, the existence of either document doesn’t grant a student automatic access to their phone. Perron shared a district flier with LAist that read “exceptions can be made if the student’s IEP or Section 504 plan outlines specific needs for the device to support the student’s unique needs related to their disability.”

An LAUSD spokesperson said in a statement that students and families should discuss their child’s needs with their teachers, IEP teams and coordinators. The district could not provide the number of students who have received an accommodation related to their personal devices.

Perron said his request that Faith continue to have access to her phone to control her cochlear implant and apps that translate audio to text were met with “zero resistance.”

Faith holds up her cellphone pouch (bottom) next to her brother's, which is locked for the duration of the school day.

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Zaydee Sanchez

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LAist

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The school issued Faith a pouch with a Velcro closure that allows her to access her phone if needed. Her peers’ pouches are sealed magnetically and can only be unlocked by a staff member.

The exception doesn’t go unnoticed by Faith’s friends.

“There's a joke where whenever I'm using my phone, they'll be like, ‘This is a rare sighting, a phone in the middle of the school day,’” she said, with a smile.

She recognizes that her exception has limits — “I can't just open YouTube.” Faith said she’s already had to contact her dad several times to bring her a new battery for her implant.

Other families are taking more of a “wait-and-see” approach.

Crissy is a freshman at Venice High School and has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD.

Her IEP allows for her to take a “breather” from class and listen to music if she needs to calm down, but she says she hasn’t done that since the school’s full-day cellphone ban started in February.

“If I asked for permission, I feel like I'd be OK with it,” Crissy said. “But if I didn't, I feel like I'd be scared to do it.”

At Venice, students are expected to store their phones in locked cases that remain in their sixth period classroom.

The Los Angeles Unified School District budgeted $7 million to purchase pouches and other storage devices, like the lockers seen here at Venice High School, to enforce the all-day cellphone restriction. In February, a district spokesperson said in a statement that about half of schools chose to rely on the “honor system" and purchase no additional equipment.

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Brian Feinzimer

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LAist

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“Immediately in my brain, I was like, ‘I'm not gonna put it in the locker,’” Crissy said. “Anything could really happen. So I don't really trust it enough to be in a locker.”

LAist visited Venice classrooms in February and interviewed several students and teachers. At the time, the majority of students opted not to turn over their phones.

Crissy’s mom, Cristal Perez, said she does not encourage phone use during class, but supports her daughter’s decision.

“She's allowed to turn it off and turn it back on after school,” Cristal said. “I think that should be fine. She should not have to hand it over.”

Crissy said since the ban was implemented, her weekday screen time is down to about an hour a day. On the weekends, she spends about 8 hours a day on her phone, often watching make-up tutorials on TikTok and teen romances, including the “To All the Boys” series, on Netflix.

“When I'm on my phone, it just feels like I'm in my own world,” Crissy said. “It's just like a little safe space for me and it's something that can keep me entertained and calm.”

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development cannot impose dramatically different conditions for homelessness programs for now, according to an oral ruling Friday by U.S. District Judge Mary McElroy in Rhode Island.

McElroy granted a preliminary injunction to a group of states, cities and nonprofits who said a last minute overhaul of how to spend $4 billion on homelessness programs was unlawful. She also agreed with their argument that it likely would push many people back onto the streets in the middle of winter, causing irreparable harm.

"Continuity of housing and stability for vulnerable populations is clearly in the public interest," said McElroy, ordering HUD to maintain its previous funding formula.

The National Alliance to End Homelessness, one of the plaintiffs, said in a statement the order "means that more than 170,000 people – families, seniors, veterans, and people with disabilities — have respite from the government's assault."

HUD has sought to dramatically slash funding for permanent housing and encourage more transitional housing that mandates work and treatment for addiction or mental illness. The overhaul — announced last month — also would allow the agency to deny money to local groups that don't comply with the Trump administration's agenda on things like DEI, the restriction of transgender rights and immigration enforcement.

"HUD will continue working to provide homelessness assistance funding to grantees nationwide," said HUD spokeswoman Kasey Lovett in a statement to NPR. "The Department remains committed to program reforms intended to assist our nation's most vulnerable citizens and will continue to do so in accordance with the law."

'Chaos seems to be the point'

McElroy expressed frustration with a series of HUD actions in recent weeks. Just hours before a Dec. 8 hearing, the agency withdrew its new funding notice, saying it would make changes to address critics' concerns. But on Friday, HUD's attorney said the new version would not be ready until the end of the day.

"The timing seems to be strategic," McElroy said, asserting there was no reason the document could not have been ready before the hearing. "The constant churn and chaos seems to be the point."

In defending the agency, attorney John Bailey said HUD was simply trying to change its policies to reflect President Donald Trump's executive orders, which he called "legal directives." The judge interjected repeatedly to explain that he was conflating things, noting Congress — not the president — makes laws.

'It's kind of shocking'

HUD's changes were announced in November with little notice and only weeks before local homeless service providers must apply for new funding.

"Our agencies are just scrambling right now to try to respond," said Pam Johnson with Minnesota Community Action Partnership, whose members provide housing and other services for homeless people. "It also just reverses 40 years of bipartisan work on proven solutions to homelessness. So it's really, it's kind of shocking."

For decades, U.S. policy favored permanent housing with optional treatment for addiction or mental illness Years of research has found the strategy is effective at keeping people off the streets.

But many conservatives argue it's failed to stop record rates of homelessness.

"What is the root cause of homelessness? Mental illness, drug addiction, drug abuse," HUD Secretary Scottt Turner said recently on Fox Business Network. "During the Biden administration, it was just warehousing. It was a homeless industrial complex."

Turner and others who support the changes say the goal is to push people towards self-sufficiency.

But local advocates say mental health and substance abuse are not the main factors driving homelessness.

"It's poverty. Poverty, low income and significant lack of affordable housing," says Julie Embree, who heads the Toledo Lucas County Homelessness Board in Ohio.

Many in permanent housing have disabilities that make it hard to work full time, she said. Embree agrees with Trump administration goals like efficiency and saving money, but says pushing people back into homelessness, where they're more likely to land in jail, the courts or a hospital, is not cost-effective.

"One emergency room visit is just as expensive as a month of sustaining this [permanent housing] program," she said.

In Los Angeles, Stephanie Klasky-Gamer with LA Family Housing said there is a need for more transitional housing, but not at the expense of long-term housing. And the idea that programs could simply switch from one to the other is not only unrealistic, it's illegal.

"You cannot take a building that has a 75-year deed restriction and just — ding! — call it interim housing," she said.

Those challenging HUD say providers who own such properties – or states who've invested millions of dollars in permanent housing projects — face "significant financial jeopardy" if their funding is not renewed.

In addition to the legal challenges, members of Congress from both parties have questioned HUD's sudden shift on homelessness. Advocates have lobbied lawmakers to step in and, at the least, push for more time to prepare for such a massive overhaul.

President Donald Trump said the administration has reached agreements with nine more drugmakers to bring their U.S. drug prices more in line with what other wealthy countries pay.

Fourteen companies in total have now reached what the administration calls most-favored-nation pricing deals. The companies that took part in Friday's announcement were: Amgen, Boehringer Ingelheim, Bristol Myers Squibb, Genentech, Gilead Sciences, GSK, Merck, Novartis and Sanofi.

They agreed to charge the U.S. government no more for new drugs than the prices paid by other well-off countries. The agreements will allow state Medicaid programs to access lower prices from the nine companies. In a statement, the White House said the change will result "in billions of dollars in savings."

The drugmakers also agreed to invest at least $150 billion in manufacturing operations in the U.S. The president is seeking to increase domestic production of pharmaceuticals.

In addition, the companies agreed to make some of their most popular drugs available at lower prices to consumers who pay out of pocket through a government website called TrumpRx.com. The TrumpRx website is expected to launch in early 2026, and would take consumers to pharmaceutical companies' direct-to-consumer websites to fulfill orders.

For example, Merck will reduce the price of Januvia, a medication for Type 2 diabetes, from $330 to $100 for patients purchasing directly through TrumpRx, the White House said. Amgen will reduce the price of Repatha, a cholesterol-lowering drug, from $573 to $239 when purchased through TrumpRx.

In exchange for these concessions, the companies will be exempt from possible administration tariffs for three years.

The extent of savings for consumers under the agreements is unclear. Medicaid and its beneficiaries already pay some of the lowest prices for drugs. And people with health insurance could spend less on copays for their medicines than paying cash for them through the drugmakers.

Separately, Trump said during the press event that he would like to get health insurers to lower their prices, too.

"I'm going to call a meeting of the insurance companies," he said. "I'm going to see if they [will] get their price down, to put it very bluntly."

America's new top health diplomat is Bethany Kozma.

The job she took on this week — leading the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Global Affairs — does not have a high profile. And Kozma herself is not a familiar name in the world of public health.

But it is a position with power — and Kozma has a record of public statements and activism on health issues, equating abortion with "murder" and campaigning against gender-affirming care.

The office sometimes is referred to as the "diplomatic voice" of HHS. As director, Kozma will have considerable influence over how the U.S. shapes health policy in other countries in the wake of the Trump administration's foreign aid cuts and withdrawal from the World Health Organization.

Kozma declined to be interviewed for this story. She doesn't appear to have a background in global health based on publicly available information online. The HHS website offers few details about her professional profile. In response to questions about her qualifications and vision for the role, HHS responded with this statement.

"The Office of Global Affairs (OGA) advances the Trump administration's agenda and priorities by bringing common sense, transparency and gold-standard science to global partners. Under Secretary Kennedy's leadership, OGA is committed to strengthening the United States' position as the global gold-standard for public health and ensuring Americans are protected at home and abroad."

Who is Bethany Kozma?

Kozma began her career in public service during the George W. Bush administration, working at the White House Homeland Security Council. During the Obama years, she re-entered public life as an activist.

In a 2016 commentary for The Daily Signal, a conservative news website founded by the Heritage Foundation, she argued against the Obama administration's guidance that public schools should allow children to use the bathroom that comports with their identity.

"This radical agenda of subjective 'gender fluidity' and unrestricted shower and bathroom access actually endangers all," she stated, noting that "predators" could abuse the policy.

In 2017, she joined the Trump administration as senior adviser for Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment in the United States Agency for International Development, eventually being promoted to deputy chief of staff. In videos obtained and released by ProPublica, Kozma recalls calling the U.S. a "pro-life" country in a closed-door U.N. meeting about women's rights in 2018, when access to abortion still was protected nationally by Roe v. Wade.

In August 2020, Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., and four other Democratic senators issued a letter labeling Kozma and several other political appointees at USAID as "prejudiced" and called for them to be removed from their posts. Kozma has "spoken extensively and derisively of trans people and trans issues," the senators wrote.

During the Biden administration, she also was involved in Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation's "blueprint" for a new Republican administration. She played a prominent role in Project 2025 training videos, obtained and published by ProPublica.

In one nearly 50-minute training video focused on left-wing language, she called for a Republican administration to "eradicate 'climate change' references from absolutely everywhere," and said that concerns over climate change are efforts at "population control." She also called gender-affirming care "absolutely infuriating" and said "the idea that gender is fluid is evil." Overall, she argued that changing language around these policies should be a priority for political appointees.

Kozma joined the second Trump administration as a chief adviser at the HHS Office of Global Affairs. In September, she spoke at a U.N. event commemorating the 30th anniversary of the declaration that denying women's rights is a human rights violation.

"While many may celebrate so-called successes gained for women over the last 30 years, one must ask what defines true success for women?" she began, adding that "biological reality is rooted in scientific truth and is confirmed by the universal truths that we are endowed by our creator who made us 'male and female.'"

Those views can be divisive but have garnered some support for Kozma's promotion.

"Bethany is an excellent pick for global affairs at HHS," says Roger Servino, vice president of domestic policy at The Heritage Foundation. "She was an early champion of protecting children from gender ideology back when the medical establishment was able to silence voices of reason and dissent and she is perfectly placed to help push back on global health bodies trying to impose left wing pseudoscience on the American people and the world."

What will her goals be at the Office of Global Affairs?

Kozma is taking over as director of the HHS Office of Global Affairs at a time of drastic change for global health.

In previous administrations, a main focus of the office was dealing with the World Health Organization. Typically, the director, who usually has a background in public health, is involved in negotiations on sharing data for pathogen surveillance or developing vaccine policy, for example.

After President Trump withdrew the U.S. from WHO, the administration has started a new strategy: striking deals with individual countries to give health aid in exchange for their meeting certain policy prescriptions. Kozma has been involved in some of those negotiations, but the details aren't quite finalized.

Some reproductive rights advocates believe Kozma will use her new position to insert anti-abortion and anti-LGBTQ policies into these agreements.

"[Kozma] is vehemently anti-trans, anti-LGBTQI+, anti-abortion," says Keifer Buckingham, managing director at the Council on Global Equality, a coalition of advocacy organizations that focuses on LGBTQ issues. "For those of us who want to ensure that the provision of U.S. foreign assistance and health doesn't discriminate against people based on who they are, [Kozma's appointment] raises a lot of red flags."

One particular worry is about the Helms Amendment, a U.S. policy that prohibits foreign aid being used to fund abortion services.

"There's been speculation that there's an intention by the U.S. government to expand the Helms Amendment beyond abortion to include LGBTQ's as well," says Musoba Kitui, director of Ipas Africa Alliance, a non-profit that works to provide access to abortion and contraception. He's concerned that health groups that serve those populations could lose funding. That speculation is backed up by reporting from The Daily Signal that the administration is planning to prohibit U.S. aid funding for "gender ideology and diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives."

Given LGBTQ people are often at higher risk for diseases like HIV, such policies could make these communities even more vulnerable, says Kitui.

"We could see more marginalization, inequality, spikes of infection," he says. While many African governments signing these deals understand those dynamics, Kitui says they may still agree to more restrictive conditions as aid cuts have "starved health systems to a point of desperation."

Have information you want to share about ongoing changes at federal health and development agencies? Reach out to Jonathan Lambert via encrypted communications on Signal: @jonlambert.12