Politics

This school’s response to school shootings should upset parents everywhere

Published

1 year ago

November 12, 2024

This school’s response to school shootings should upset parents everywhere

The day after police say a 14-year-old was arrested Georgia’s Apalachee High Schoola radio report about that murderous attack began to play as I drove my 7th grader to school. She wanted to know if anybody had died. I said, “I think so,” deliberately avoiding giving her the details that two students and two teachers were dead. She had just recently participated in her school’s “See Something, Say Something” campaign and had recently had a lockdown drill, and I felt sick with the realization of how much she’s been forced to think about threats at school and what she’d do if one arose.

It was upsetting to hear what a Catholic school in Virginia Beach did when an 11-year-old told officials there that a classmate had brought a bullet to school.

That’s one of the reasons it was so upsetting to hear about what a Catholic school in Virginia Beach did when an 11-year-old 6th grader told officials there that a classmate had brought a bullet to school. He should have been effusively thanked for reporting what he saw. But in a move that epitomizes the trend in American schools of making innocent actors outlaws, the principal, who reportedly commended the boy, at the same time, punished him with a suspension. His waiting two hours for the opportunity to make the report anonymously, they said, was unacceptable and warranted punishment.

It filled me with a rage to think that our daughter, or anybody’s child, would be made to feel bad in such a situation.

Worse still, the boy who reported that his classmate had brought a bullet to school was given the same punishment — a 1-1/2 day suspension — as the boy who brought the contraband. To punish the boy who alerted school officials to a possible danger is by itself indefensible, but to give the other boy the same punishment renders their actions equivalent. It beggars belief that officials at St. John the Apostle Catholic School are acting as if they are.

But school officials and leaders of The Catholic Diocese of Richmond are defending their actions. “Failure to report a safety concern affects the safety of everyone in the school,” Leslie Winneberger, a lawyer for the diocesewrote in a letter obtained by The Washington Post. “… The school cannot, and will not, take chances when it comes to student safety, especially true in light of the school shooting in Georgia this past week.”

But thanking the boy who reported what he saw and using his delay as an opportunity to emphasize the importance of acting with urgency would not have represented the school taking chances. It would have been humane and gracious and in keeping with the school’s mission to provide a “Christ-centered learning environment” with a focus on students’ “moral development.”

What Christ-centered message is St. John the Apostle communicating here: that rain falls on the just and the unjust?

All schools have a role to play in students’ moral development. They should all foster — and at a minimum not impede — students’ discernment of good and bad and right and wrong.

All schools, not just religious ones, have a role to play in students’ moral development. They should all foster — and at a minimum not impede — students’ discernment of good and bad and right and wrong. But whether it’s pre-kindergarteners getting suspended for hugging or elementary students getting sent home for playfully shaping their fingers into a gunwe’ve witnessed a trend over the last couple of decades of school officials letting their fear of being sued justify their punishing undeserving students.

When you add those decisions to policies that criminalize certain hair stylesand demand that students eat lunch without talking to one another and remain just as quiet while walking the halls in perfectly straight linesthere seems at times to be a concerted effort in our country’s schools to stamp out any and every sign of young people’s humanity. And to replace their human-centered sense of right and wrong with the latest download from the school’s risk-management team.

Not only is punishing a boy who alerted school officials to his classmate’s bullet likely to give the entire student body a warped sense of ethics, as an attorney hired by his mother rightly points out, it sends students the message that they’d be “better off not saying anything,” as reported by the Post.

The last thing school officials should want is students who are fearful that reporting something suspicious will get them in trouble from school officials who say they took too long. For many students, the fear of getting in trouble — especially suspended — may be a the worst thing they can imagine. I was such a child, and I don’t think our daughter is much different. And while we may hope that a student who senses a threat rightly prioritizes school safety over fear of getting in trouble, the best way to encourage them to make that a priority is to remove from them the fear of getting in trouble.

Ironically, the boy waited till the end of a standardized test — which the educational establishment has succeeded in convincing students are all important — before he said anything.

For many students, the fear of getting in trouble may be the worst thing they can imagine.

The mother of the boy who told school officials what he knew says he wanted to make the report about the bullet quietly, “because one of the things he didn’t want was to be bullied and didn’t want to be labeled a ‘snitch,’” but because he and the other kid disappeared from their classroom at the same time and they served their suspensions simultaneously, his peers quickly figured it out.

Speaking of a warped sense of right and wrong, a North Carolina man was arrested after officials say he emailed a bomb threat to St. John the Apostle and caused officials to shut down school for two days. It should go without saying that nothing justifies threatening a school, and school officials are right to be angry at the threat.

But that arrest does nothing to address the anger from the mother of the boy who was wrongly suspended or ease the fears of parents who may fear that their school will adopt a policy just as wrongheaded as St. John the Apostle. We all want our children to be safe. But we don’t want them to be made out as villains if they try to keep their school safe but don’t do it quickly enough according to some ridiculously arbitrary standard.

Jarvis DeBerry

Jarvis DeBerry is an opinion editor for BLN Daily.

Politics

Pritzker helped a Black woman become senator. Some Black leaders are still mad at him.

Published

17 minutes ago

March 19, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Congressional Black Caucus members, after a stinging loss in the Illinois Democratic Senate primary, are training their ire on Gov. JB Pritzker — and saying it’s on him to rehabilitate the relationship.

After Pritzker’s outsized financial support for Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton helped lift her to victory, lawmakers vented frustrations that his money unfairly tilted the race in her favor and away from their candidate, Rep. Robin Kelly, a CBC member who finished a distant third. And as Pritzker eyes a 2028 presidential bid, some members, cognizant that the path to winning the Democratic Party’s nomination will run through the caucus, signaled they won’t forget that he crossed them this round.

“He has to justify what he did,” said Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.). “I’m sure at some point if he decides to run, he’ll have to come with that justification. As to whether or not it has merit or not, remains to be seen.”

Pritzker’s money helped put Stratton on the path to becoming just the sixth Black senator in U.S. history. But by boxing out Kelly, he frayed his relationship with the caucus, which holds significant sway over which candidates break through with Black voters — a large and powerful voting bloc the billionaire governor will need if he chooses to run for the White House.

“Keep in mind, the Democratic candidate for president that prevails has to go through [the CBC],” said Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio). “The CBC is very strategic and so if there is an issue … we will lay out our framework for what it will take” to get our endorsement, she added.

Many top CBC officials are in no rush to make the first move to mend fences.

“We don’t need to reach out to the governor,” said Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.) who chairs the Congressional Black Caucus PAC, adding that the group is focused on midterm races and delivering House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries the speaker’s gavel.

“Others are going to have to reach out to us,” he said of Pritzker. “Those conversations happen when those conversations happen.”

Pritzker’s political arm issued a statement in response saying he was “proud” to support Stratton, Illinois’ first Black lieutenant governor: “With only six black women having served in the U.S. Senate throughout its history, Gov. Pritzker supported his partner in governance because he’s worked side by side with her for almost a decade and knows she will deliver for the people of Illinois,” Jordan Abudayyeh, Pritzker’s spokesperson, said.

His team did not address questions about CBC members’ concerns, but did point to Rep. Jim Clyburn, the powerful South Carolina Democrat, saying ahead of the election that Pritzker was “free to support” anyone.

Clyburn on Wednesday told Blue Light News he would “expect” for Pritzker to support his No. 2 and that he was not focused on 2028.

Still, lawmakers’ veiled threats lay bare the difficulties Pritzker could face beyond Tuesday’s primary. And they underscore the duality the CBC is navigating as high-profile defeats of their members in Illinois and Texas raise questions about their political influence — even as they celebrate Stratton’s victory.

In interviews with more than a dozen CBC members on Wednesday, they made clear their irritation is not with Stratton, who many said will be welcomed into the caucus if she wins as expected in November. Their indignation rests solely with Pritzker, who they accused of playing kingmaker by pouring millions of dollars into propping up Stratton.

Tensions flared between the powerful legislative voting bloc and the billionaire governor in early March. CBC Chair Yvette Clarke lashed out at Pritzker, saying she was “beyond frustrated” with the governor for “tipping the scales” a nod to his funneling of $5 million from his super PAC to help catapult Stratton into contention with Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, who for much of the primary was leading in the polls and started with a massive cash advantage.

Many CBC members, and Clarke specifically, took Pritzker’s presence in the race as a snub to Kelly, who had a long-standing beef with Pritzker after he worked to oust her as chair of the Illinois Democratic Party in 2022. While both Kelly and Pritzker were said to have moved beyond it, the Senate campaign reopened old wounds.

Clarke issued a statement — some 12 hours after the Illinois Senate primary was called — to congratulate Stratton on her victory, calling it “a significant moment for Illinois and the nation that calls for unity” before pivoting to praise Kelly.

The CBC chair on Wednesday said she and Pritzker had not spoken.

“I’m sure there’ll be a moment where we’ll have a conversation,” Clarke said. When asked if she felt like she needed to initiate a conversation with the governor, she responded tersely. “No, I don’t.”

Former Illinois Sen. Carol Moseley Braun, the first Black woman elected to the body in U.S. history, endorsed Stratton in the race. She took issue with CBC members’ intense focus on the governor’s role in the process instead of the historic outcome, and said the group seemed more focused on backing its own than expanding Black representation.

“To weigh in on this race was just backwards,” she told Blue Light News. “[Kelly] was a member of the caucus and so it’s understandable on that level. But at the same time, Juliana deserved at least something from that group.”

Many current CBC members refrained from attacking Pritzker directly, however — another sign of the complex politics at play. Congressional Democrats want Pritzker’s billions to help bankroll their bid to retake control of the House and make Jeffries, the minority leader and New York Democrat, the first Black speaker. They’ve already been working him behind the scenes.

“I’ve already reached out to Governor Pritzker,” said Rep. Steven Horsford (D-Nev.), a former CBC chair. “I’ve talked to him this morning, in fact, and I’ll talk to him in the weeks and months to come, because I have one objective: to win this House, to help win the Senate, and to make sure we end the chaos that’s coming out of this administration.”

Others took pains to separate their evaluation of Pritzker’s role in propelling Stratton to victory from any campaign he may run in 2028, suggesting they were willing to reset the relationship.

“You will still have to show your bona fides, and you still will have to make your case as to why the CBC and Black people should take you into consideration. So we have reset it,” Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-Calif.) said. “Good for him, for her, but that has no bearing on the 2028 race.”

Shia Kapos contributed to this report.

Politics

Judge orders restoration of Voice of America

Published

5 hours ago

March 19, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

NEW YORK (AP) — A federal judge on Tuesday ordered the Trump administration to restore the government-run Voice of America’s operations after it had effectively been shut down a year ago, putting hundreds of employees who have been on administrative leave back to work.

U.S. District Court Judge Royce C. Lamberth gave the U.S. Agency for Global Media a week to put together a plan for putting Voice of America on the air. It has been operating with a skeleton staff since President Donald Trump issued an executive order to shut it down.

A week ago, Lamberth said Kari Lake, who had been Trump’s choice to lead the agency, did not have the legal authority to do what she had done at Voice of America. In Tuesday’s decision, Lamberth ruled on the actions she had taken to respond to Trump’s order, essentially shelving 1,042 of VOA’s 1,147 employees.

“Defendants have provided nothing approaching a principled basis for their decision,” Lamberth wrote.

There was no immediate comment on the decision by the agency overseeing Voice of America. Lake had denounced Lamberth’s March 7 ruling, saying it would be appealed. Since then, Trump nominated Sarah Rogers, the undersecretary of state for public diplomacy, to run USAGM. That requires Senate approval, a step that was not taken with Lake.

Patsy Widakuswara, Voice of America’s White House bureau chief and a plaintiff in the lawsuit to restore it, said she is deeply grateful for the decision.

“We are eager to begin repairing the damage Kari Lake has inflicted on our agency and our colleagues, to return to our congressional mandate, and to rebuild the trust of the global audience we have been unable to serve for the past year,” she said.

“We know the road to restoring VOA’s operations and reputation will be long and difficult,” she said. “We hope the American people will continue to support our mission to produce journalism, not propaganda.”

Voice of America has transmitted news coverage to countries around the world since its formation in World War II, often in countries with no tradition of a free press. Before Trump’s executive order, VOA had operated in 49 different languages, broadcasting to 362 million people.

Politics

Judge orders restoration of Voice of America

Published

6 hours ago

March 19, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

“Defendants have provided nothing approaching a principled basis for their decision,” Lamberth wrote.

Patsy Widakuswara, Voice of America’s White House bureau chief and a plaintiff in the lawsuit to restore it, said she is deeply grateful for the decision.