Senior Writer, Chronicle of Higher Education
Peter Schmidt is a senior writer for the Chronicle of Higher Education and a blogger at Color and Money. He is the author of Color and Money: How Rich White Kids Are Winning the War over College Affirmative Action
Diversity in higher education is back in the crosshairs Despite decades of legal actions, legislation, and US Supreme Court decisions, "affirmative action" in college admissions is still a political hot potato. The New York Times reports that the Trump Administration is recruiting from among its political appointees to the Justice Department's Civil Rights division for lawyers who want to bring challenges to race-based policies in university and college admissions. Critics fear that will weaken protections for blacks and Latinos. Caught in the middle is the fastest-growing minority, Asian-Americans. Is the Administration aiming for real change — or signaling to its base of supporters? Is the real enemy of "diversity" not race after all--but economic inequality?
Activists Take Aim at California's Proposition 209 In 1996, California voters passed Proposition 209 , which banned public institutions from discriminating on the basis of race, sex, or ethnicity. Today, an activist group known as BAMN filed a lawsuit against the University of California, challenging Prop 209 . Peter Schmidt, senior writer for the Chronicle of Higher Education , is author of Color and Money : How Rich White Kids Are Winning the War over College Affirmative Action.
Replacing Obamacare: Now you see it… now you don’t As the Senate deliberates replacing Obmacare, health coverage for millions of people is at stake. There've been no public hearings, and a draft measure won't be made public. Is the House version so unpopular that that Senate is hiding a version that looks much the same?
The Trump agenda: where's the beef? President Trump says big things are happening. After celebrating a House bill on health care, he doesn’t yet have Senate agreement. With James Comey’s public testimony scheduled tomorrow, the President today tweeted his selection of a new FBI Director. Is the Chief Executive all style and no substance? Later, terror attacks in Iran and conflicting claims about who’s behind them.
Who's to blame for the opioid crisis? Some of the lawyers who took on Big Tobacco are now going after Big Pharma. It’s all about the deadly epidemic of opioid use. Are the drug companies to blame? What about the users? Later, on today’s Talking Point: making sense of Britain’s upset election.