Author

Michele Johnson

Michele Johnson

COMMENTARY
California voters at a protest against Medicaid cuts. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Commentary: Medicaid expansion has never been about money. 

By: - May 24, 2021

As our legislators adjourn, they keep in place for the seventh year their law preventing their fellow Tennesseans from receiving federal health insurance. Legislators also keep in place the health coverage that they and their families enjoy, subsidized by the taxes of their fellow Tennesseans.  In 2015, Republican Gov.  Bill Haslam proposed to expand Medicaid […]

COMMENTARY
Gov. Bill Lee addresses members of the 112th General Assembly at the opening of a special session dedicated to education. (Photo: John Partipilo)

Commentary: A costly way to change the subject

By: - January 19, 2021

Over 150 years after the Constitution was amended to promise equal rights to African-Americans and a decade after the nation’s first African-American president signed the Affordable Care Act into law, racism continues to dominate Tennessee health policy. Last week’s rush to ratify the Trump Administration’s TennCare block grant was the latest chapter in Tennessee officials’ […]

COMMENTARY
Michele Johnson, Executive Director of the Tennessee Justice Center

In the unforgiving light of the pandemic

By: - May 6, 2020

As an implacable force of nature that is utterly immune to political spin and ideological cant, the coronavirus is shining a harsh light on Tennessee. The pandemic highlights our collective vulnerabilities and, especially, the folly of a politics guided by ideology rather than facts. With the stern authority of reality and the deadly seriousness of […]