I wrote a handful of freelance pieces for National Review as an undergraduate, which led to my internship in the summer of 2022, a part-time position during my last undergraduate semester, a year-long fellowship sponsorship by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute this past year, and now, my new position as a staff writer. I want to thank the National Review staff members for their unending guidance and support. I also want to apologize to the readers: You’re stuck with me. 

There are many reasons why I love working for National Review, but I’ll name only one here: There is genuinely a culture of free expression and debate. It is present in our published pages, our podcast episodes, our morning Zoom meetings, and even our casual Slack channels. At other publications — including some I’ve worked for — the newsroom is eerily cultish, and all the writers seem to say the same things. But here at National Review, we are allowed — even encouraged — to disagree.