“Critical thinking is the cornerstone of American civilization.”
                                                                  ~ Michael Patrick Leahy

Now more than ever, Tennessee has the political will, the legislative momentum, and the opportunity to lead the nation in restoring what has been lost in American education.

The evidence is not in dispute: fewer than one in three Tennessee fourth graders reads at grade level.

The solution is not in dispute either. Proven, structured teaching methods work, educational choice expands opportunity, and vocational training builds lives.

What has been missing is the organized, persistent advocacy to turn that knowledge into law.

Tennessee Leads exists to close that gap.

We are an organization focused on solutions, not outrage.

We advance legislation tailored to unleashing the American can-do spirit back into the classroom with real-world answers to the education crisis too many of our communities face every school day.

Our four priorities are clear:

• Adopt Direct Instruction as the evidence-based standard for K-5 reading, writing, and arithmetic;
• Expand traditional shop and vocational offerings in high schools and community colleges;
• Grow Education Freedom Scholarships tenfold to serve 200,000 Tennessee students by 2031; and
• Streamline charter school approval so families can access high-quality alternatives without bureaucratic obstruction.

It’s time for Tennessee to lead America’s schools back to greatness and show the world why Tennessee leads the way.

Michael Patrick Leahy is the founder of Tennessee Leads and one of Tennessee’s most consequential voices in conservative media, policy, and civic organizing.

Leahy is the CEO, Editor-in-Chief, and majority owner of Star News Digital Media, which owns and operates a family of 12 state-focused conservative news sites including The Tennessee Star, and The Star News Network. He is also the host of The Michael Patrick Leahy Show, broadcast weekdays on 20 America First radio stations across the John Fredericks Network.

In 2019, Leahy co-authored The Star News Digital Media Guide to the Constitution and Bill of Rights for Secondary School Students — a volume now in its third printing — bringing the founding documents directly into the hands of students who might otherwise never encounter them seriously. That work is the intellectual foundation from which Tennessee Leads grew.

Leahy’s career has been defined by building civic infrastructure at pivotal moments.

In 2008 he founded Top Conservatives on Twitter, one of the earliest organized conservative presences in social media. In February 2009 he organized and hosted the conference call, joined by key figures that would go on to shape the next decade of politics and media in the United States.

Then-volunteers and concerned citizens, Jenny Beth Martin of Tea Party Patriots, radio host Dana Loesch, and Star News Digital Media co-founder Christina Botteri were among the initial group of participants on Leahy’s conference call that launched the first Tea Party rallies that one week later, would spawn the Movement of the same name.

In 2012, HarperCollins published his book Covenant of Liberty: The Ideological Origins of the Tea Party Movement, under its Broadside Books imprint.

Shortly afterward in the same year, he was hired by legendary journalist Andrew Breitbart as a contributor for Breitbart News. During his 10-year tenure, Leahy broke stories covering refugee resettlement, the re-emergence of long-defeated illnesses like tuberculosis, and the truth about Massachusetts U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren’s native American heritage, and more.

After launching The Tennessee Star with Botteri in 2017, Leahy organized the first-of-its-kind National Constitution Bee, and has awarded over $60,000 in cash and scholarships at the annual event to high school contestants for use in their higher education.

In 2025, Leahy and The Tennessee Star were awarded the Dao Prize for Best Local Journalism for groundbreaking coverage of the 2022 Kilmar Abrego Garcia traffic stop.

A native of upstate New York, Leahy holds a degree from Harvard College and an MBA from Stanford University. He has lived in the Nashville area since 1991.

Michael Patrick Leahy is available to speak at conferences, civic gatherings, candidate forums, donor events, and media appearances.

His topics include the case for Direct Instruction, Education Freedom, constitutional literacy, and the role of independent journalism in a healthy democracy.

To inquire about availability, contact us at theteam@tennesseeleads.com.