September 16, 2020

Weekly Writers Round-Up: School Choice, Immigration Obstacles, and Veterans’ Mental Health

By: Jenny DeMarco

Each week, we’ll be featuring opinion pieces from the alumni and current participants of AFF’s Writing Fellows Program. A few highlights from the past week are below. Do you dream of having bylines like these? Learn more about how the Writing Fellows Program can help boost your writing career!

More school choice will benefit all Tennesseans by Satya Marar (Spring 2020) in The Tennessean
Last month, the Tennessee Court of Appeals heard arguments for Gov. Bill Lee’s private school choice pilot program, which was deemed unconstitutional by a Nashville judge earlier this year after a legal challenge from county and public school district officials. If the Lee administration is successful in its appeal, then the program will provide low- and middle-income students enrolled in Nashville and Memphis public schools with an education savings account worth up to $7,300 a year, redeemable for various K-12 education expenses as well as private school tuition fees…

Trump Is Building His Wall Out of Red Tape by Sam Peak (Spring 2018) in The Bulwark
It’s no secret that President Trump failed to deliver on his 2016 promise to build his wall across the U.S-Mexico border. And the president kicked off his 2020 general-election campaign in equally bad faith last month by turning a naturalization ceremony into a re-election prop, and even failing to inform all the participants that they’d appear in a partisan event viewed by millions.

The spectacle was Trump’s latest attempt to brand himself as tough on illegal immigration, but welcoming of those who “come in the right way.” But turn off the cameras and pull back the curtain, and you’ll find a wall of red tape designed to keep legal immigrants out…

Veteran suicide awareness campaigns are about not just veterans but civilians too by Beth Bailey (Fall 2018) in the Washington Examiner
When veterans service organization Mission Roll Call launched in 2019, its goal was to connect with more than 20 million veterans in order to understand their needs and advocate for their diverse interests at all levels of society. After amassing more than 500,000 members on social media and email in its first eight months, Mission Roll Call has now unveiled a new anti-suicide initiative that will connect veterans with the nonveteran community.

When Director Garrett Cathcart and the Mission Roll Call team traveled the country interviewing veterans, they found that one of their greatest concerns is the crisis of veteran suicide. Veterans Affairs confirms an astonishing problem. Its 2019 National Veteran Suicide Prevention Annual Report found that veterans commit suicide at a rate about 1 1/2 times that of civilians, with around 20 veterans dying from suicide every day…