Following up on my Quote of the Day, Bryan Lowry reports:\

The executive director of a group that works with intellectually and developmentally disabled Kansans called Wednesday for the resignation of a state agency spokeswoman who used the phrase “slow learners” on social media.

Angela de Rocha, spokeswoman for the Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services, criticized on Facebook an effort by the League of Women Voters to teach college students how to register themselves and their peers to vote.

De Rocha questioned that it took a course to register, quipping, “Do we want these slow learners voting?”

Tim Cunningham, executive director of Tri-Valley Developmental Services, a Chanute-based group that provides transportation and residential services to intellectually and developmentally disabled Kansans, said in an e-mail that he was appalled by de Rocha’s comment.

“Is she suggesting that people who are ‘slow learners’ should not be allowed to vote? This is not the type of message we want coming from the spokesperson for the Kansas Department of Aging and Disability Services,” Cunningham wrote in an e-mail to eight lawmakers from southeast Kansas and to Kari Bruffett, secretary of KDADS and de Rocha’s superior. “This is not the first time she has caused angst among people with disabilities by her comments and it is time for her to go!”