Black Leaders Ask Obama to Appoint Marie Johns as SBA Chief by Hazel Trice Edney

April 7, 2013

Black Leaders Ask Obama to Appoint Marie Johns as SBA Chief
By Hazel Trice Edney

SBA Deputy Administrator Marie Johns

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Mounting support for U. S. Small Business Administration Deputy Administrator Marie Johns to be appointed as top leader of the agency is now knocking at the front door of the White House.

An April 4 letter bearing the signatures of at least 80 Black business and civil rights organizations, representing nearly 30 million small businesses, was sent to the Presidential Personnel Office in support of the appointment. Hope for the selection of Johns is said to be based on her established record of work for inclusion of Black and other minority-owned businesses which have been hit hardest during the economic downturn.

“On behalf of the 27.5 million small businesses and several national civil and human rights groups across the country, our collective organizations…are writing in support of the current Deputy Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), Marie Johns, being nominated for the position of Administrator of the SBA,” states the letter, penned by Ron Busby, president of the U. S. Black Chamber of Commerce. “During her tenure as SBA Deputy Administrator, Marie Johns has been instrumental in strengthening America’s entrepreneurial ecosystem by increasing global competitiveness and strategic alliances among small businesses, specifically within communities of color.”

Among the organizations listed on the letter is the National Bankers Association, which recently gave Johns its “Beyond the Call of Duty” award. Also listed in support are the National Urban League, the NAACP, the National Association of Minority Contracting, the National Association for Black Veterans, the National 8(a) Association and dozens of Black chambers of commerce around the nation.

President Obama was recently criticized by Congressional Black Caucus Chair Marcia Fudge (D-Ohio), among others, for his lack of Black appointments so far given that Black voters have proven to be his most faithful constituents. Fudge subsequently tamped down her criticism, saying she is more confident after a conversation with the White House and would take a wait and see approach. President Obama has yet to appoint an African-American to his cabinet or to a major agency leadership position in his second term. Attorney General Eric Holder, appointed in 2009, is now the only African-American cabinet member.

Meanwhile, with the nation’s economic woes and joblessness disparately impacting African-Americans and Latinos, some Black leaders see the SBA as a good place to start. Though Black joblessness has slowly subsided over the past year, it remains in double digits and remains twice that of White unemployment which is constantly below the national average. Economic experts, including Johns, have stressed that small business growth is the single greatest engine of the economy.

The letter credits Johns with major progress in five key areas. They are:

Advocacy: In part, the letter describes her as “one of the strongest advocates in the federal government for small businesses overall, as well as for small businesses owned by racial and ethnic minorities.”
Access to Capital: In part, it credits her as having led process improvements for the Community Loan Advantage and 7(a) Loan Programs as well as assisted Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) as well as women and minority-owned Banking Institutions in becoming SBA Lenders.
Contracting: She is, in part, credited with streamlining the request for proposals process by “reducing the amount of paperwork required to do business with the federal government”.
Entrepreneur Training: The letter states that SBA District Offices, SCORE, Small Business Development Centers, Women’s Business Centers, U.S. Export Assistance Centers, Veteran’s Business Outreach Centers, the Procurement & Technical Assistance Center, and the E200 Emerging Leader Initiative, have maintained a wealth of resources for growing sustainable enterprises. “Marie Johns has been a champion for ensuring that these options remain present in the underserved communities that need them the most.”
Chamber and Trade Association Development: “Thanks to introductions and connections made by Deputy Administrator Johns, organizations such as the U.S. Black Chamber, Inc., the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, the National 8(a) Association, the U.S. Pan Asian American Association, the Native American Contractors Association, and the National Bankers Association, are working more closely together to secure more opportunities, capital sources, and access to new financial markets,” the letter states.

Both Johns and current Chief Administrator Karen Mills are slated to leave the administration this term. That announcement caused alarm within the minority business community, which credits Johns for her hands-on approach and sensitivity to their struggle.

“I know Marie Johns. I have great respect for Marie Johns. I think Marie Johns would make a tremendous SBA director,” said Marc Morial, president/CEO of the National Urban League.

“Naturally our collective organizations are concerned about the continuity of progress made in the small and microenterprise communities going forward,” the letter states. “Given the tangible results yielded under the leadership of Deputy Administrator Marie Johns, we strongly support her nomination to be the Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration.”

Morial, the convener of major civil rights organizations since Obama’s re-election, said he has “weighed in” with the Obama Administration on the general need for diversity.

“I believe that diversity in the Cabinet is important,” Morial said. “A qualified candidate like Marie Johns is a good way to approach it.”

HBCU Equality Lawsuit Could Become Signature for the Nation by Roz Hamlett

April 7, 2013

HBCU Equality Lawsuit Could Become Signature for the Nation

By Roz Hamlett

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from the Afro American Newspaper

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - The outcome of a lawsuit against the Maryland Higher Education Commission brought by an independent coalition representing students, alumni and supporters of the state’s four Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) has the potential to become one of the nation’s signature court decisions on higher education when it is announced later this year, HBCU advocates say.

Attorneys representing the Coalition for Equity and Excellence in Maryland Higher Education consider prospects for a settlement before judgment to be unrealistic, even though similar lawsuits in other states, including Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama and Texas, have all been resolved through voluntary agreements between the parties, though some of those agreements came after initial court rulings but prior to the outcome of appeals. In Maryland’s case, however, there is no indication that the Coalition is interested in pursuing a settlement in spite of reports that Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley has explored the possibilities of settlement through budget discussions with representatives of the Maryland Legislative Black Caucus. Even were the Coalition to consider a settlement proposal from the State, advocates say the issues in this case are so clear that a judicial ruling in their favor would set an important national precedent for HBCUs across the country.

The Coalition, on behalf of the HBCUs, is suing Maryland to address the disparities the HBCUs have suffered in comparison to the State’s historically White institutions due to Maryland’s failure to eliminate the vestiges of segregative practices reaching back to a time when segregation was required in Maryland by law and practice. The lawsuit contends that the State has failed to remedy those disparities and that it maintains and perpetuates a racially discriminatory and segregated system of higher education by continuing policies and practices that are remnants of its prior officially segregated era. The Coalition is asking for $2.1 billion to make up for the disparate funding, academic instruction, facilities, programs and other practices the HBCUs are alleged to have suffered. The Coalition asserts that the State’s failure to address the disparities suffered by the HBCUs was part of a deliberate policy that starved Black institutions of funds to carry out their mission and left them financially crippled and unable to compete with White schools.

“Since the state has argued that Black students are not injured by a lack of resources such as having to go to the traditionally White institutions to use the library, I don’t think it’s realistic to expect the State to rectify the deficiencies at the HBCUs,” says attorney Michael Jones, of the firm Kirkland & Ellis LLP, one of the attorneys representing the plaintiffs on a pro bono basis.

“In view of the State’s adamant official position that it has ’no legal requirement’ to address the historic inequities that it created between HBCUs and White institutions, I frankly doubt that anything will happen until they’re forced to do so,” Jones says.

“After all, Maryland promised to rectify these issues in 2000, which was 13 years ago, but then turned around and argued that it did not really mean what it said.”

The State established a commission in 2006 entitled the Bohanan Commission to develop a statewide framework for higher education funding, and among its recommendations stated specifically that HBCUs become comparable and competitive with other public institutions.

“If Maryland would not implement the recommendations of its own Bohanan Commission… it is pretty clear that the State has no real intention of living up to the statement in its 2009 State Plan for Higher Education, which said it was committed to putting the HBCUs in a position to compete with other institutions in the State," Jones says.

Meanwhile, in a related effort not intended to supplant the pending judicial decision in the Coalition lawsuit, members of the Maryland Legislative Black Caucus have pursued what can be done in the short term to assist HBCUs.

After recent meetings between the Caucus and Gov. O’Malley, the Governor requested an additional $4.1 million in funding that is earmarked for HBCUs or their students through the state’s FY 2014 supplemental budget.

That amount includes $360,000 in Educational Excellence Awards for students attending HBCUs, $1.5 million to convert contractual faculty at HBCUs to full-time positions, $1.8 million in institutional need-based aid, and $400,000 in a land grant research match for the University of Maryland Eastern Shore.

“As legislators, we can look at this from a broader policy perspective. Plans that HBCUs created for themselves can be integrated into a comprehensive strategy that is coordinated through the state budget process. The question remains whether Maryland has what it takes to do it. I refuse to believe we don’t,” says Del. Aisha Braveboy, chair of the Legislative Black Caucus.

The supplemental budget additionally directs MHEC to undertake a study that will serve as the basis for the development of a plan to ensure the long-term stability and success of the HBCUs.

The study will examine resource needs, affordability, college readiness, degree completion, leadership, faculty, and perhaps most controversially, program duplication.

States such as Georgia, Ohio, and Texas, which also operated under U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights compliance agreements, are following developments in the Coalition case closely to determine how their own public higher education systems will be affected.

Jones warns HBCUs across the country to be careful because policy statements from state officials are not always kept. “It’s the easiest thing in the world, as they say in Washington, to kick the can down the road by creating another study,” says Jones. “After all, Maryland's first study was in 1937 and noted ’an enormous differential in favor of the white race.’”

A study in 1960 conducted by the Frampton Commission recommended that Morgan State College be the principal institution in the Baltimore region for students of any race or color, but the State ignored this recommendation and instead started a brand new school in 1966, the University of Maryland Baltimore County, that duplicated many of the courses offered at Morgan.

A study in 1974 conducted by the Cox Commission recommended special funding to allow the HBCUs to "enhance their role and image" but Maryland ignored that Commission’s report also.

In 1981 a report called upon the state to again "strengthen the role and missions of the historically Black institutions" but, as in the past, the State failed to follow its own recommendations that time too. And a 1992 report that studied the HBCUs, entitled "Achieving Eminence" called for "catch-up funding.” The findings of that report were also ignored by the state.

Maryland's Bohanan Commission in November 2008 appointed a blue ribbon panel of experts in higher education, entitled the HBI Panel, which called for "substantial additional resources" for the HBIs "to overcome the competitive disadvantages caused by prior discriminatory treatment."

“Now, the governor is calling for another study to be done by the end of 2013? That adds up to more than 75 years of studying the problem and very few years of fixing the problem.” says Jones.

At the heart of Maryland’s repeated rejection of its own policy statements toward HBCUs is the concept of equality v. equity, a well-established remedy in English Common Law, dating back to the time of the Magna Carta, the system that led to constitutional law in the colonies.

“Equality is a 50/50 split. Equity is an extraordinary legal remedy that makes a victim whole after a wrongdoing has occurred. If you want HBCUs to do the job, then make us whole,” says attorney John W. Garland, president-in-residence at the Thurgood Marshall College Fund, and former president of Central State University in Ohio.

Attorney Raymond Pierce, former deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights during the Clinton Administration, understands why the Governor might be motivated to propose settlement given the strong evidence that exists to support a finding on behalf of the plaintiffs.

Pierce, who is also the former dean at the North Carolina Central University School of Law, says a settlement is in no way dispositive in future HBCU lawsuits against states.

“A settlement could be in the specific best interests of Maryland HBCUs,” Pierce says. “They may say let’s settle this and get what we can get. But a settlement would do little to clarify state and federal higher education policy.

“The greater service to HBCUs would be to set a legal precedent. You can’t factor a settlement into federal higher education policy or a state or federal court decision. A judge would say, ‘you want me to take judicial notice of a case you’ve settled? Are you out of your mind?’”

HBCU proponents, both in and outside Maryland, contend that anything less than a judicial remedy would relegate HBCUs to the more-or-less permanent status of stepchildren within the hierarchy of Maryland’s public higher education community, and do very little to advance the cause of HBCUs nationally.

“Every case can be won and every case can be lost, but there are times when you want to take the case to verdict,” says Garland, “this is one of those times. Let the court rule and let the chips fall where they may.”

While many are applauding the efforts of the Legislative Black Caucus for taking decisive steps in the FY 2014 budget to address the issue of parity for HBCUs, both advocates and attorneys representing the Coalition plaintiffs say the Caucus’ actions will not alter or supersede a decision by the court, since the settlement of a legislative budget bill has no relationship to any settlement of the Coalition lawsuit in federal district court were such to be considered in the future.

Rights Leaders Say New Strategies Necessary for Old Issues by Hazel Trice Edney

March 31, 2013

Rights Leaders Say New Strategies Necessary for Old Issues

By Hazel Trice Edney

swforum

Stateswomen for Justice - Kim Keenan, NAACP; Laura Murphy, ACLU; Leslie Proll, NAACP-LDF; Barbara Arnwine, Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law; Tonya Robinson, the White House discuss modern-day civil rights issues and strategies as forum organizer, Hazel Trice Edney, looks on. PHOTO: Roy Lewis/Trice Edney News Wire

(TriceEdneyWire.com) – When Barbara Arnwine sensed the pending attack on voting rights across the country by a string of Repubican politicans attempting to enact voter identification and other questionable laws last year, she immediately tried to warn everybody who would listen. But, it was her son, Justin, 25, who gave her the ultimate tool by which to warn the nation.

“He said, ‘Mom, you need a map…And he said it would ‘go viral,’” she recounted at an annual forum at the National Press Club last week. From that concise suggestion was born the now famous “Map of Shame”.

With this map, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and its partner organizations charted and fought the legislative movements of dozens of states as they attempted voting changes that would ultimately result in a civil rights backlash. That backlash included a grassroots ground operation, church to church get out to vote inspiration, social media strategies, phone banking and word of mouth that galvanized the largest Black turnout in voting history in the Nov. 6 presidential election.

Arnwine, president/CEO of the Lawyers' Committee, credits youth ingenuity, coupled with seasoned civil rights minds for the successful result. “We’ve got to have that intergenerational and multigenerational fight,” she told the audience at the “Stateswomen for Justice” luncheon and forum March 28.

“Let’s unite, let’s stay vigilant, let’s remember that we never prevail by sitting back and thinking others will take care of our issues.” As a part of the Third Annual forum, - a celebration of Women's History Month - Arnwine was being honored by the host, Trice Edney Communications and News Wire, for her 30 years of civil rights leadership with the Lawyers’ Committee, now in its 50th year.

The forum, moderated by Dr. Elsie Scott, founding director of the Ronald W. Walters Center at Howard University, featured Arnwine alongside four other leading women in civil rights. They outlined crucial issues and future methods of engagement five decades since the March on Washington and founding of the Lawyers’ Committee.

Tonya Robinson, special assistant to President Barack Obama for justice and regulatory policy pointed out yet another important anniversary this year, 50 years since President John F. Kennedy’s signing of the Equal Pay Act, a goal that has yet to be attained. “In the five decades since the signing, [there has been] tremendous progress, but women on average still earn only 77 cents for every dollar that a man earns,” she said, noting the significant difference of 23 cents.

“Perhaps unsurprisingly to this crowd, the gap is even more stark for women of color with African-American women earning 64 cents” and Latino women earning only approximately 50 cents for every dollar. With 23 million working mothers, “Regardless of where you are, your race or your age, the 23 cents matters,” she said.

She said President Obama drew a “line in the sand” with the Lilly Ledbetter Act as the first piece of legislation he signed in his first term, extending the time that a woman can sue over pay issues. Still, she said, there remains “a compelling economic case that especially impacts women of color and African-American women with respect to the need for African-American women to finally close the pay gap.”

For the most part, the string of modern-day civil rights battles discussed among the leaders reflected a continuum of the battles of the 1960s. “All of these anniversaries are coming at us at a single moment in time – WEB Dubois’ death, whether it’s the assassination of Medgar Evers or whether it’s the March on Washington for Jobs and Justice…And here it is, here we are 50 years later and guess what we need to march for - jobs and justice,” said Kim Keenan, NAACP general council. “That work is not done.

The work isn’t based on the color of the president.” Civil rights battles take place from the streets to Congress to the courts. Diversity and conscious people on the inside of institutions have historically made a difference said Leslie Proll, director of the Washington, D.C. office of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. “Civil rights laws are only as strong as the judges who enforce them,” she said. “We need to get some African-American women nominated and confirmed. It’s very important that new people get nominated to take over the mantle.”

Proll cited startling numbers. She said there are only 75 African-American judges on the District Court benches and 50 of them are men. “I hope you will join in this fight,” she said. She said Obama's judicial nominees are often slowed by partisan politics in the U. S. Senate.

One of the reasons fair judges are needed is because of the disparate numbers of African-Americans and other people of color coming through the system, said Laura Murphy, director of the Washington Legislative Office of the American Civil Liberties Union. “From the moment that we enter the criminal justice system, African-Americans are treated differently…There is still rampant racial profiling in the United States,” Murphy said. For this reason, Murphy disagrees with Vice President Joe Biden who wants more security officers in public schools.

“Those police officers in the schools are much more likely to send African-American and Latino students into the criminal justice system. I’m not just talking about teenagers, I’m talking about” elementary-aged children, she said. “I am very concerned because this is the first step in the school to prison pipeline …Once kids are brought into the criminal justice system, they get records, they are more likely not to graduate, they are more likely to get suspended. We’re talking about young people who often encounter police officers when they need guidance counselors or tutors. We’ve over-criminalized America. We have more people in prison than any nation in the world.”

Murphy said current immigration laws are exacerbating the arrest rate of people of color as some go to jail “merely for crossing the border…The Department of Homeland Security spends more money on border security than the DEA, the FBI and the Justice Department combined. We are talking about billions of dollars…I’m appealing to taxpayers to look at how many people’s lives we’re ruining because they have to have encounters with the criminal justice system.”

The civil rights leaders told the audience what must be done to heighten public involvement in those issues: Those recommendations included the following: Become more active in the community. “Don’t stand there and let this happen,” said Keenan. “We have been chosen to carry on this legacy, to carry on this work. I submit to you that it’s never done because once it’s done, we have to make sure it’s not undone.”

She told a group of Maya Angelou Public Charter School students in the audience, “We need you all coming hard and strong with the biggest, baddest of everything you can bring because this fight must go on and we will not give up.” Get on the email list of civil rights organizations, including the ACLU, and make sure notices don’t go to the SPAM folder, said Murphy. As for influencing members of Congress, "Never underestimate the power of one visit or one call,” says Proll.

“Your weighing in on the ground is really the most important thing. Call the local office.” Arnwine stressed the importance of remembering the enemies of justice and how they work. “Those of us who are driven by a vision of inclusion and diversity and love have got to realize that there are people who are equally driven by a vision of exclusion, privilege, racial superiority and other thoughts,” she said. “We can have an African-American president in the White House but at the same time have people trying to take our voting rights so you must be vigilant.”

$13M History Museum Expected to Open in 2014

April 7, 2013

blackhistorymuseum-va

Rendering courtesy of Black History Museum and Cultural Center of Virginia

This rendering shows what the Leigh Street Armory is proposed to look like as the new home of the Black HistoryMuseum and Cultural Center of Virginia. The view shows the proposed addition at the rear of the historic building,looking east from Leigh Street. The proposed total cost: $13 million.

$13M History Museum Expected to Open in 2014

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from the Richmond Free Press

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - The Black History Museum and Cultural Center of Virginia plans to move into its proposed renovated home early next year.The total pricetag is $13 million, including $10 million for the project and $3 million in reserve to maintain the facility, which is expected to attract national visitors to Richmond, the former capital of the Confederacy.

In preparation for the big move to the nearby historic Leigh Street Armory, the museum is going to halt daily operation at its current site, it has been announced. Effective Monday, April 8, the museum was to close to walk-in visitors and tour groups at its longtime historic home, 00 Clay St., which is a former public library named for Rosa D. Bowser, the city’s first black female schoolteacher.

The museum will reopen occasionally “to participate in or to host community events,” Maureen Elgersman Lee, museum executive director stated.

The museum has operated from the Bowser building since 1991.Stacy Burrs, chairman of the museum’s board, said last week the board agreed that Dr. Lee and her small staff need to focus on the planning and development of the new museum in the 108-year-oldarmory — the castle-shaped building that originally housed black Richmond militia units.

The building is in the 100 block of West Leigh Street, neighbor to Ebenezer Baptist Church.The museum is being designed to tell the story of African-Americans in Virginia from 1619 to the present and to serve asa community cultural and events space.

“There are a lot of details involved,” Burrs said. “We are not proposing to simply move what we have to the new space.We are creating a new museum experience.”

Burrs said that if all goes as planned, the museum would reopen in the renovated armory in February 2014 and complete the overall project in 2015, including a new addition.The museum is seeking to raise $13 million, he said, with $10 million for development and $3 million for property upkeep.

The museum plans to start work, he said, with the $3.3 million already in hand, primarily in state and city grants and historic tax credits. He said he and others are courting donations from foundations and corporations and expect to take the campaign to the public within a year.

Burrs said the museum isplanning a summer groundbreakingceremony to launch the restoration of the armory, the nation’s only 19th century building created for African-American militia.The city designed and built the armory in 1895 as the home of the First Virginia Volunteers Battalion and its subordinate units. John Mitchell Jr., the courageous, crusading editor of the Richmond Planet, secured the funding while serving on CityCouncil.

The city had previously built an armory for White militia units during the era of strict, official segregation.When the battalion disbanded a few years later to protestracial bigotry against its officers, the city-owned building was mostly used as a school until it was left vacant in the mid-1980s.During World War II, the armory also served as a recreation center for Black soldiers.

Sequestration Hits Home With Education by Jacqueline Williams

March 31, 2013

Sequestration Hits Home With Education
By Jacqueline Williams

house leaders and president

Among a string of meetings with both Republicans and Democrats to discuss sequestration, President Barack Obama greets House leaders before a meeting with the House Democratic Caucus at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., March 14. Standing with the President, from left, are: Assistant Democratic Leader James “Jim” Clyburn, D-S.C.; Chairman Xavier Becerra, D-Calif.; Rep. Steve Israel, D-N.Y.; Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.; Vice Chairman Joe Crowley, D-N.Y.; and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, D-Md. PHOTO: Pete Souza/The White House

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - With the sequestration in full effect, many students and educators are upset with the large budget cuts to education and lack of compromise in Washington.

“You always hear children are our future and how we must educate the younger generation, but I don’t see how the government expects us to do this if they are playing tug-of-war with them and their education,” said 42-year-old mother of a college junior at the University of California, Riverside, Roberta Martin.

Education is taking a big hit from the sequester, with approximately $3 billion being cut from education alone according to the National Education Association’s official website. Many education programs such as Head Start as well as after school programs for children will lose considerable amounts of funding. According to www.whitehouse.gov, the sequester will cause over 30,000 teachers and school faculty to lose their jobs.

“It’s a very scary thought because I cannot imagine or afford to lose my job. I never thought it would come to this because they’ve always found some way to figure everything out,” said 38-year-old Stephen Wright, a Corona, Calif. middle school teacher.

The country entered into this period of sequestration because Congress and the President failed to reach an agreement on how to reduce the deficit by $4 trillion. It is the result of a 2011 agreement that stated if an agreement was not met, automatic cuts would take place the first day of March. These spending cuts were originally constructed by Congress and President Obama to discourage its implementation and encourage compromise.

“The whole design of these arbitrary cuts was to make them so unattractive and unappealing that Democrats and Republicans would actually get together and find a good compromise of sensible cuts as well as closing tax loopholes and so forth. And so this was all designed to say we can't do these bad cuts; let’s do something smarter. That was the whole point of this so-called sequestration,” said President Obama according to www.whitehouse.gov.

With large cuts to defense, education, and many other areas, many people are frustrated with Congress and the president. “These cuts hurt everyone, it’s not just one area either, and it bothers me that the people that are most affected by it are those who really cannot afford to have anything else against them - people are struggling to get by,” said 21-year-old San Jose State University Junior,Vanessa Parks.

Students enrolled in colleges and universities are also upset with the sequestration state as it affects their tuition rates. “I can barely afford to pay for school now and it’s not easy getting loans, this sequester is just making it that much harder on me to be honest,” said 20-year-old Shaw University student Paul Schatz.

Students who are enrolled in school that are also enrolled in the military are affected by the sequester as well. There will be a decrease in the benefits received by those in uniform, including a cut in tuition assistance. This poses a large problem because many young people often join the military so they can get financial assistance for school.

“I joined the Navy so that I could go back to school and these tuition assistance cuts are upsetting, especially because many of us risk our lives every day and earn and deserve those benefits,” said 22-year-old Navy officer Chadwick Johnson.

Many are hoping that something is done quickly and a compromise is met in order to avert the sequester because of its harmful effects. Wright stated his faith in an end to the sequester, “I don’t think this will go on too much longer, but only because I think the federal government will eventually understand the disgust the public feels toward it all and act to fix it quickly.”