Week In Review: Trump Restricts Student Loans And A’Ja Wilson Suffers No Fools

Welcome once again to the NewsOne Week in Review, where we speedrun some of the biggest stories you might have missed this week. From Trump finding new and inventive ways to make life worse for Americans to a truly horrifying story emerging from Cornell, it was quite a week. So let’s get into it. 

Trump Restricts Student Loans For Certain Degrees 

At a time when people are struggling to afford damn near everything, the Trump administration thought the thing to do before the midterms was potentially pricing out working-class students from a college education. Earlier this week, the Education Department implemented a rule requiring schools to prove that students who take out federal loans are earning degrees that lead to high-paying jobs. This is essentially being used to deny students loans to pursue degrees in music, film, journalism, religious studies, and basically anything that isn’t being a doctor, lawyer, or engineer. 

I went to film school on scholarships, a Pell Grant, and a student loan for my final year. While it took a beat, I made the most money of my career during my time in TV. The business I’m building is focused on media production. These are all things I’ve done and can confidently do thanks to the education I received. If I were starting school now, I might not have gained the knowledge needed to master my skill set. 

There will be winners and losers in every industry, which Trump should know given his considerable history of bankruptcies and business failures. The job market is terrible across the board right now in just about every industry, so the idea that someone will get a high-paying job out of college is laughable. Especially when people with decades of experience are struggling to find decent work. 

This rule, like everything the Trump administration does, is half-baked and causes more harm than good. Hopefully, it can be reversed should the next administration have some degree of competence. 

A’ja Wilson Deals With Unruly Fan In Playoffs 

The WNBA playoffs kicked off this week and, unsurprisingly, an Indiana Fever fan was being a weirdo. Vegas Aces star A’ja Wilson tried to work through a screen set by Fever player Sophie Cunningham when the two got tangled, and Cunningham hit the ground. A male Fever fan began gesturing and speaking disrespectfully at Wilson, which understandably set her off. The man was removed from the arena, and Wilson was given a technical foul. The incident triggered a much-needed conversation about the disrespect Black women are expected to endure. Not wanting that disrespect to become the narrative around Wilson in her playoff run, the King Center announced she will receive its 2027 Youth Influencer Award for her work through the A’ja Wilson Foundation. 

Wilson got the last laugh as the Aces knocked the Fever out of the playoffs on Thursday. So now Sophie Cunningham can get back to her true passion of being annoying and unseasoned on the internet. 

Tennessee Execution Fails

Lastly, our strangest story of the week takes us to Tennessee, where officials failed to execute Christa Pike. Pike was scheduled to be executed via lethal injection on Wednesday, but it quickly went off the rails. After her first injection, Pike was still conscious and asked the executioners if she was supposed to be feeling a burning sensation in her arm. They proceeded to inject her with another dose of pentobarbital. Pike was still breathing and audibly snoring after the second dose of the lethal drug. 

She was taken to a hospital shortly after the second dose, and NBC News reports that Pike is now in critical condition. Human rights concerns now center on what happened to Pike and whether her Eighth Amendment rights were violated. Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee has ordered an investigation into Pike’s attempted execution to determine what went wrong, and he has postponed the state’s remaining execution scheduled for this year. 

Pike had been on death row for two decades for her involvement in the torture and murder of Colleen Slemmer in 1995. Slemmer’s mother, May Martinez, was in attendance at the execution and called it “a mess.” 

“I didn’t get justice for my daughter,” Martinez told reporters on Thursday. 

So there you have it, folks. It was a frustrating, tragic, and weird week with the rare glimmer of good news. See ya next Friday for another NewsOne Week in Review. 

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