Re-Tennessee

Hey, Bob.

I live in the part of Nashville that Justin Jones represents (though he is not my representative, his district ends something like 2 streets over, thanks to an attempt at gerrymandering in the city). The outrage here is quite palpable.

The Nashville Metro Council is in charge of appointing Justin Jones' replacement. Over half of the member of the council say they plan to appoint…Justin Jones. (I honestly have yet to be able to see if Memphis works the same way and if they are likely to do the same for Justin Pearson.)

That's great news. But I worry about the messaging, or the potential for messaging. My gut says that the ones who voted for his expulsion knew that he'd be returned by the Metro Council, so it was their way of giving him a "symbolic" punishment. However, in a country that is (or supposed to be…) built on precedent to determine paths forward, and where censure is a perfectly fine option, this seems like a way to give other legislative bodies the cover to f*ck with whoever they want and maybe sometimes the person really will stay expelled.

All this…over a tiny, legal protest.

Tennessee can't possibly tell you it's hip. I can tell you that we're more hip on the Nashville island, but surrounded by Stone Age piranhas for most the rest of the state. Sometimes it bears a real resemblance to New York, where you can put the same state abbreviation in the address, but be in two different worlds. The major difference is that our state house is in this city, not out in the hinterlands. So legislators all have to see what we want here instead of pleading "I never go into the city" ignorance.

My wife is a personal chef and was asked to help out with some food for the funeral of Evelyn Dieckhaus, who was murdered in the shooting here last week. This sh*t really comes at you differently when you're asked to incorporate her favorite color into plates and walk into the home the reception is being held at and see it literally full of picture frames that presented you with the fullness and promise of life that a 9 year old girl had.

Without change, someday, everyone will be closely related to this kind of heaviness, like the decades the conflict in Northern Ireland. This sh*t has to end.

Matt O'Donnell

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Hey Bob.

The Convenient School is just seven minutes from my house in Nashville as well as one of our TN Senators, Hagerty, who is my next-door neighbor. I went down to the memorial at the front of the school to pay my respects, but he did not. Nor did Senator Blackburn or Governor Lee. You get what you pay for here in TN. There will be no comments from any one of these individuals regarding the actions of the State House. The majority-run Republican politicians of TN use our kids as a handbasket for their hate and fear. "We're protecting our kids," they say while they refuse to address what the kids of TN fear. Putting the NRA aside (Blackburn reportedly has taken $1.3 mill) it appears that the only thing these "leaders" are protecting is their inability to coexist and work with people who aren't like them. Nashville is a wonderful town in a State of shame.

Changes will come.

Best

John Dittmar

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The expulsion of the two members of the TN state legislature is only just the most recent power move by the Republican super majority.

They have waged a war on the city of Nashville with cynical, mean spirited, and yes fascist laws that have disenfranchised us more than any other big city in 'the free world'.

For 150 years Nashville has had a city wide congressional district, typically electing a Democrat. That ended last year when the state legislature gerrymandered the city into 3 rural-controlled districts. So the neighborhood where the Covenant shooting occurred has a republican representing them in the U.S. House, despite the fact that the area is highly educated, cultured, and liberal.

The state legislature has also passed a targeted bill to force the city of Nashville to slash its large city council in half. At 40+ reps, Nashville has one of the largest city councils in the nation. There has been internal back and forth for years about whether or not the districts should be made larger to lessen the number of councilpeople. So, the city of Nashville voted on this a few years back and decided, on our own, that we liked having small districts with individual neighborhood representation. Recently, as payback for Nashville's denial of the 2024 GOP convention, state legislators from rural towns overrode our own democratic vote and is forcing us to reduce the council reps. I thought republicans believed in small central governments and local autonomy?

The state legislature is also commandeering the City of Nashville's Airport Board, our Sports Authority Council, and Convention Center administration so that the rural small town Tennesseans have control over key infrastructure and the funds that they generate. They are trying to redistribute Nashville's tourism dollars to their small town districts, and rebrand Nashville as a conservative media mecca that is not reflective of the citizens who made this a destination city for hip, young creative folks. The success of Nashville's real estate market, and its ascent as an international culture center over the past 15 years all happened in spite?*of the yokels who are now trying to push us around. Nashville is the economic engine for the state of Tennessee and the fact that we are being disenfranchised is an undemocratic abomination almost without equal in modern American politics.

Due to the gerrymandering, many Nashvillians are now proposing that a city wide General Strike may be the only recourse for fed up citizens. It's worth a shot, and i hope that message gets amplified.

Luke Schneider

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Good morning Bob. I've read your newsletter on and off for years but I have never been as inspired to reply as I am right now.

As I was reading todays newsletter, I kept thinking "come on Bob say it, say the word, "Fascism" and you did. And I am grateful that you're using your platform to bring more people to this discussion.

I live in Nashville, I fight the good fight as best I can. I'd do anything for a magic wand to make the lift lighter to convince people to vote, and further to foster curiosity about voting in the interest of the collective.
To your point, people are complacent. If it's not happening TO THEM it's not urgent. And when you're complacent, you're complicit. That's a simple fact.

I say this all the time. Hope is a discipline and hard work is rewarded. The youth of Tennessee are SHOWING UP and that gives me hope. Gen Z showed up in Wisconsin and that gives me hope. All is not lost but fascism is rearing its ugly head and we've got work to do!

To quote my girl Hillary "Do all the good you can, for all the people you can, in all the ways you can, for as long as you can."

Hopefully more of your readers wake up (but not too woke or the other Bob might gun them down) and will jump in to fight this fight and do what they can with their platforms and reach!!

Thanks Bob

Ali Harnell

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Well said Bob! I live in TN and could not be more proud of the students and TN representatives who stood in solidarity with them. I have two young daughters and am sick of gun violence. Civil disobedience is warranted and the only step left now.

Van Patton

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It's funny, Schumer and crew told us it was "impossible" to convince Machin/Sinema that the voting rights act should be passed when Democrats controlled Congress. Now we in Tennessee are the victims of this type of bullsh*t because these power hungry Republicans are out of control. Thanks for the help, Chuck.

Mick Fury

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I moved out of Tennessee two years ago today and could not be more thankful. Sure, I took a financial hit by moving to Oregon with all their taxes and west coast pricing, but that's a fair trade off for not being led by a bunch o nonsensical "religious" nut jobs.

Michael Vorhees

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Funny how the anti vaxers, anti abortionists, anti gun regulation fanatics all complain that THEIR rights are what's being taken away.

I always wonder why the label they chose to throw on progressive activists is Antifa, which is short for anti fascist. If they despise people who combat fascism, then it would make them pro fascist. Embracing the swastika because you hate Jews somehow trumps the fact that they killed a lot of American soldiers?

That really illustrates the core problem. Their legions are uneducated, lazy and angry. Most of them wouldn't know the difference between Communism, Marxism or Socialism if you gave them a map. It's too much work.

Basically, the Thomas thing really chaps my hide. He's got the white man's entitlement thing down ironically. For a SC justice to be so blatantly politicized with a record to prove it is very scary. Plus, originalism is such a mindless way to interpret an archaic document.

It is another reminder of how the court is more about ideology than the rule of law. I don't know what bothers me most, the fact that he didn't think twice about accepting the trips/gifts or that, apparently, if he had merely bothered to report it everything would be just fine.

John Brodey

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It's been a long time since I've written Bob - but this is my take - Carrie from Vanderbilt

1. When / why were representatives expelled in the past from the TN state house?

The only other individuals who have been "expelled" from the State Legislature heretofore were:

A) Civil War Era representatives that refused to vote to ratify the 13th Amendment (ending the legal institution of slavery in the United States/where ratification was required to rejoin the Union);

B) in 1980, a representative who was caught accepting $1000 in exchange for his promise to try to keep a bill from making it out of committee;

C) in 2016, an admitted sex-addict who was having sex with under-age staffers in the State Capitol. And this particular representative was given the opportunity to present a defense after being questioned on the House floor, receiving a modicum of due process. As is also publicly acknowledged, recently, a member of the House unabashedly urinated upon another House member's chair, in the House chamber; and also recently, another member, accused of sexually abusing minors, was allowed to retain his seat upon the understanding that he would not run for re-election. Evidently these are not expulsion-worthy displays of unethical behavior or lack of decorum.

2.How does this situation compare? Is it totally unprecedented?

Completely unprecedented. This situation is nothing like these other instances. And comparatively, looking at other states who have expelled members, they have removed members after state and federal felony convictions. No laws, local, state or federal, were broken here. And the prosecutorial tenor and treatment they are receiving in this removal is shocking to reasonable viewers. Many viewers also recognize this for the politically manufactured excision of those who would challenge the status quo of completely unchecked gun legislation in the state Tennessee. They were well within their Constitutional Rights to speak out during the House Recess, per the state and Federal Constitution.

3. Does today's expulsion vote have any connections with the larger way TN Republicans have wielded their political power? Are there any other notable instances of the GOP attempting to water down or cut out the influence/voice of Democratic voters?

Yes; absolutely. This is an exercise of power solely for power's sake. It is akin to a pack of dogs refusing to stop biting and exiling the runt. The super-majority in both chambers of the Tennessee state legislature routinely refuse to allow the Democratic members of the chambers to speak during committee or on the floor. The won't make eye contact with each other. And given the numbers 74 R, 24 D (now 23 – and presumably within the next hour, that will be reduced to 21) they have no incentive to be civil or professional to the Democratic members of the chambers. They do not need Democratic support for anything.

In 2020, they ensured their dominant pack status by stripping and splitting the metro centers of the state (with the largest population centers) of their representation by gerrymandering/cracking the historically Democrat-leaning counties into unrecognizable electoral districts, at the state and federal level. By changing these boundaries, they strategically ensured that the once Democratic stronghold of Nashville would fall. Further, they have recently passed legislation cutting the membership of Nashville's City Council in half, arguably as political retribution for Nashville declining to host the RNC's national convention in 2024.

4. Does race or racism play into today's vote, either directly, or systemically?

Yes. Racism and sexism. The way that the members have been treated, the way that the leadership speaks to these members and uses code words like "ineffective," "attention-seeking," "disrespectful," "aggressive" – It's clear that the ability of these three members to repeatedly garner the support of thousands of young people and outspoken celebrity activists that support them, has shaken the Republican leadership to the point of feeling their only option is to expel these members. These three have refused to comply with the routine expectations of the Republican leadership, expectations that demand staying "in their place," turning a blind-eye, tolerating the dismissive treatment. The sexism is just as rampant – the treatment of interns in the past rose to the level of many universities refusing, for a time, to send their young people there for fear of sexual harassment.

The introduction of the video today, as "evidence" was "in violation of" the house rules. It is against the rules for members to record video on the house floor. The same representative who took that video is the one who assaulted Representative Jones on Monday night. That same representative – Representative Lafferty – was responsible for thishttps://www.cnn.com/2021/05/05/politics/justin-lafferty-tennessee-lawmaker-three-fifths-compromise/index.html
Will he be brought to answer for his breach of procedure? No. He will not. Because the Republicans can exercise arbitrary power without any other branch exercising a modicum of balance, much less recourse.

I love this state - I love our people- and this political theater both broke my heart, and watching our state's children and young people step up and speak, emboldened me to be hopeful.

Carrie Russell JD, PhD
Vanderbilt University


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