Daunte Wright and the ​‘Era of Punitive Excess’

By Rhiannon Meyers Collette, Communications Manager
 

Back-to-back mass shootings in March in Atlanta and Boulder — and another one just last night in Indianapolis — have rocked the nation. In a refrain that has almost become routine, policymakers have pledged to take swift action and President Joe Biden called for a ban on assault rifles.
 

What’s Happening: Despite the fact that the federal government has not advanced meaningful gun reform since 1994, when Congress passed a ban on assault weapons that expired a decade later, the political landscape has shifted: Biden is a longtime supporter of gun reform, and two-thirds of Americans support tougher gun laws. Are we entering a new era of action on gun violence — or will reform remain elusive?

Dive In: In this episode of “Deep Dive With Laura Arnold,” Arnold Ventures Co-Chair Laura Arnold sits down with four experts to discuss evidence about the causes of gun violence and effective approaches to prevention: Peter Ambler, co-founder of the Giffords organization; Kevin Madden, AV's executive vice president of advocacy; Jeremy Travis, executive vice president of criminal justice; and Walter Katz, vice president of criminal justice. Together, they dissect the political dynamics that continue to stand in the way of action.

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Related: The Biden administration is treating gun violence as a public health crisis by including $50 million for gun violence research in the president's fiscal year 2022 discretionary funding request.

By Adrienne Faraci, Communications Manager

Emmanuel Dunagan was just months from earning his bachelor’s degree at the Illinois Institute of Art, Chicago, when he learned that the for-profit school had lost its accreditation six months earlier and would be closing. With just a few credits remaining, he lost his chance at a degree — and over $80,000. “I didn’t need the school that I attended to...say, ‘Gotcha! We promised this thing but we won’t actually give it to you,’” said Dunagan. “They took my choice away.”

What’s Happening: Dunagan and thousands of students who have been defrauded by for-profit colleges have an ally for justice: a legal group called the National Student Legal Defense Network (Student Defense), which pursues litigation against both the government and private corporations on behalf of students of predatory school chains, holding them accountable for defrauding, deceiving, and manipulating students. “We focus a lot of our litigation efforts from the perspective of how can we help the most people and at the same time, create lasting and far-sweeping policy change,” says attorney Aaron Ament, president and co-founder.

What’s Next: Student Defense helped Dunagan get some of his loans returned, but he doesn’t believe real justice will have been served until the people who ran his institution are punished. “I would like the individuals who are responsible for this, who have names and faces and who have had some participation in it all, I would like them to be prosecuted to the full extent of the law,” he said. “I want them to be dealt with in the way in which people who look like me are dealt with in the court of law under far less offenses.”

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Related: “I was trying to lift myself up by the bootstrap, but I got cement shoes instead, and I’ve been drowning ever since.” The New England Institute of Art promised Ollie Venezia flexible class schedules, one-on-one support, and quality internship placements. What he got instead was almost $200,000 of student loan debt and no diploma, he tells the Project on Predatory Student Lending.

Related: More than 20 organizations are calling on the Department of Education to address the borrower defense program, which has had some borrowers waiting for years for relief.

By Ashley Winstead, Director of Strategic Communications

If you’ve ever been arrested or charged with a crime — even if you weren’t convicted — you are among the one in three adults in the U.S., about 78 million people, with a criminal record. Thanks to “tough on crime” laws passed in the 1980s and 1990s, people with criminal records face discrimination in virtually every aspect of their lives, from renting an apartment, to applying for a job, to obtaining a professional license, to voting in elections.

What’s Happening: Perfectly timed with Second Chance Month, a new national survey from the University of Maryland's Program for Public Consultation and Voice of the People reveals overwhelming bipartisan support for limiting the negative consequences of a criminal record. Large majorities of Democrats, Republicans, and independents voiced support for a range of reform measures that have been proposed in Congress, including prohibiting employers from rejecting a job applicant because of a criminal record and automatically sealing the records of people convicted of low-level offenses.

Why It Matters: As Sheena Meade, managing director of the Clean Slate Initiative, says, the survey "shows that there’s been a narrative shift in how people view people with criminal records. America is a nation of second chances."
 

New York, with a new law that ensures suspension of driver's licenses will no longer be the go-to punishment for failure to pay fines for minor traffic infractions. Advocates say it is intended to solve the “self-reinforcing cycle of debt and criminalization.”
 

What’s Happening: In just two years, 1.7 million people in New York State had their driver’s licenses suspended because they failed to pay traffic fines or show up in traffic court. That meant hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers couldn’t get to work, drive their children to school, or make it to doctor appointments. The "cruel and counterproductive" practice disproportionately affected low-income people.
 

Bottom Line: The bill that became law on New Year’s Eve 2020 was considerably amended. But it still represents a significant stride for the state and is an indication of a national trend in reforming problematic aspects of local justice systems around the country that exacerbate disparities.

While it’s from 2019, the documentary Ernie & Joe: Crisis Cops, streaming on HBO Max, is an example of policing done right. The film follows Joe Smarros and Ernie Stevens, part of a burgeoning mental health crisis unit in the San Antonio Police Department. Their mission: Divert people away from jail and treat mental health calls with compassion and humanity — and ensure the situation doesn’t escalate to the point of danger for either the officers or the people at the other end of the call. Smarros points out early on that officers spend 60 hours or more learning how to shoot a gun — and just eight on mental health and communication. “We need to shift that.” The footage is intimate: For one veteran who harmed himself and frightened his girlfriend, they provided medical care and initiated VA benefits. For a young suicidal woman, it was mental health services and multiple follow-up visits. He says the team would catch flak in the department for being “poor tactically” because they sit down and talk with people — but this film shows it’s that kind of approach to policing that engenders trust, discussion, and ultimately, real help for those in crisis. 

The Health Podyssey podcast from Health Affairs, which explores how the Affordable Care Act’s mandate requiring all private health insurance to fully cover birth control has led to wider use of long-acting reversible contraceptives, thus lowering barriers to contraceptive coverage and impacting women in a positive way. As Dr. Nora Becker at the University of Michigan says in this discussion with Health Affairs Editor-in-Chief Alan Weil, the benefits go beyond health: Women with access to contraception earn more money and have better professional outcomes. 

Related: Sally Rafie, a pharmacist who prescribes birth control, explains how allowing pharmacists to prescribe birth control can eliminate barriers to access for some patients. 

The Key podcast from Inside Higher Ed, on a new way of measuring whether colleges are preparing their students for success after they leave campus. Host and Inside Higher Ed Co-founder and Editor Doug Lederman sits down with Michael Itzkowitz of Third Way and Rutgers University’s Michelle Van Noy to talk about the landscape for holding colleges accountable for student outcomes.

• This intimately touching moment as 7-year-old Abigail Evans wipes away her mother’s tears at the memorial service for her father, slain Capitol Officer William Evans, who was killed in an attack earlier this month. 
   
• Molson Coors is investing in social change with a stake in TRU Colors, a craft brewery run by rival gang members.
   
• Spectacular new aerial footage of the eruption at Iceland’s Fagradalsfjall volcano, which had been dormant for 6,000 years.
   
• This heartwarming story of a mother who writes affirming messages on her son’s school pencils: You are so talented. You are creative. You will change the world. (I just used to put notes in their lunchboxes. I should probably start doing that again.)
   
• I have a confession: I sometimes watch “The Bachelor.” (Although the last season exposed just why this show is so problematic.) So although I didn’t see his season, I was touched by former Bachelor Colton Underwood coming out as gay to Good Morning America’s Robin Roberts. And by this open letter to Underwood in OutSmart Magazine. “This is the greatest gift you could ever give yourself.”