California disability rights leader Alice Wong dies

Alice Wong, the California disability rights activist who employed wit, creativity and at times shock to fight for justice, has died at age 51.

The San Francisco-based radical, a self-styled “cyborg oracle,” rose to national prominence in 2013, when President Obama appointed her to the National Council on Disability. Wong attended a 2015 White House reception in virtual form as a “telepresence robot.”

“One of the things that really gives me joy is the fact that there are so many amazing, brilliant, creative disabled people out there,” Wong told comedian W. Kamau Bell on the City Arts & Lectures podcast in 2020. “But part of my rage — and it’s a very real rage — is that most people don’t really know about them.”

A prolific advocate for disability justice, Wong authored a memoir, penned numerous essays, edited two anthologies, hosted a podcast and founded the Disability Visibility Project, a platform for disabled writers and artists. Her nonpartisan #CriptheVote hashtag forced national candidates to pay attention, and in 2021 she helped prioritize access to COVID vaccines for thousands of high-risk Californians. Wong even challenged San Francisco’s attempt to ban plastic straws, pointing out that many disabled people need them.

In 2024, she was awarded a MacArthur Foundation “genius grant,” for calling attention to the “prejudice disabled people face and to the policies that adversely affect them.”

“Hi everyone, it looks like I ran out of time,” Wong said in a prewritten message released after her death. “I have so many dreams that I wanted to fulfill and plans to create new stories for you … as a kid riddled with insecurity and internalized ableism, I could not see a path forward.

“It was thanks to friendships and some great teachers who believed in me that I was able to fight my way out of miserable situations into a place where I finally felt comfortable in my skin. We need more stories about us and our culture. You all, we all, deserve the everything and more in such a hostile, ableist environment.”

“Alice has a plan for everything,” her close friend and collaborator, Sandy Ho, told The Times in 2022. “She describes herself as a disabled oracle, and that’s a part of it. She foresees the future.”

President Obama greets Alice Wong via robot during the Americans with Disabilities Act 25th Anniversary reception at the White House in 2015.

(Lawrence Jackson/The White House)

Wong was the daughter of immigrants from Hong Kong, grew up in Indiana, and spent most of her adult life in San Francisco.

Wong succumbed to infection on Friday while at UCSF Hospital. Ho posted the announcement of Wong’s death on her X account. It was relayed as well to her GoFundMe page, which asked donors to help cover her ongoing daily care costs while decrying the need for such charity as “ableist oppression.”

“The state pays to shut us away in medical institutions, but we must fight like hell to live in the community,” the pinned fundraising request noted.

“She will be remembered as being a fierce luminary in disability justice, a brilliant writer, editor and community organizer,” the post said.

“As we mourn the incomprehensible loss of Alice, we share the words she gifted us with from her memoir, Year of the Tiger:

“The real gift any person can give is a web of connective tissue. If we love fiercely, our ancestors live among and speak to us through these incandescent filaments glowing from the warmth of memories.”