NASHVILLE, Tennessee — Brian Kempf is a high school government teacher from Illinois. He was in Nashville for his little brother’s bachelor’s party but had been fixated on the developing news here last week after two black lawmakers were unceremoniously booted from their posts for taking part in a gun control demonstration. Kempf’s brother, Eddie, got married on Saturday, but the elder Kempf decided to stick around for another week to watch the events unfold.
“This is democracy in action,” he told the Washington Examiner on Thursday morning near the Tennessee Capitol. “There are important lessons to be learned here.”
GOP PUSH TO SLASH NASHVILLE COUNCIL IN HALF PUT ON PAUSE BY STATE JUDGES
Kempf was among a group of supporters, 14 camera crews, and a gaggle of national, state, and local reporters who showed up at the statehouse to watch Democratic state Rep. Justin Pearson be sworn back into the state House of Representatives on Thursday.
One week after being expelled, Pearson and state Rep. Justin Jones, the other black lawmaker who was expelled, were both back in their seats. Jones and Pearson were unanimously reappointed by their respective county commission councils. Jones was reinstated Monday. Both will have to run for reelection.
Before he was sworn back in, Pearson addressed his supporters, even asking a few to come up to the podium and stand with him.
He said the solutions Democratic lawmakers have offered to stop gun violence are not “good enough” or “ones that can keep us safe and protect us.”
“Unfortunately, the solution offered by the Republican Party in the state of Tennessee was to try and expel us, try and expel our voices, and silence our fight to end gun violence,” he said. “They worked to expel our constituents’ representation by subverting our democracy for their mobocracy, where their dollars and their egos rule. But our democracy is powered by people, and people power always wins.”
Pearson then took aim at Republican House Speaker Cameron Sexton.
“My mother says what the devil meant for bad, God meant for good,” he said. “God needed to reignite this movement to end gun violence. God needed to catalyze the conversation about antidemocratic behavior of the Republican Party in the state of Tennessee. God needed to wake us up to the reality of this moment that we’ve got a new generation, new ideas, new beliefs to guide us into the future. So what Cameron Sexton meant for bad, God has turned into good.”
Pearson’s parents were also in attendance. His mother, wearing a black-and-white checkerboard dress, read the poem And Still I Rise by Maya Angelou, ending the tribute with a fist in the air, “Justin J. Pearson rises!”
Kempf said the move by Republicans, who hold a supermajority in the General Assembly, to expel Pearson and Jones has catastrophically backfired and made martyrs out of Pearson and Jones.
“It made them look like gun-toting racists,” he said. “It was and still is a disaster.”
In a surprise announcement to members of his own party, Gov. Bill Lee, a Republican, asked legislative leaders this week to create and pass new “order of protection” legislation to prevent people law enforcement proves are threatening from purchasing guns.
“It won’t solve all of our problems, but I think it takes a good step forward,” he said.
Lee’s biggest hurdle, however, may be his own party.
In the last few years, Republicans in the Tennessee legislature have pushed back strongly against any sort of gun restrictions.
“We have to be very careful,” state Senate Majority Leader Jack Johnson warned Wednesday, adding, “It’s a constitutional right whether you agree or disagree with it. The right to bear arms is a fundamental constitutional right, and I support that wholeheartedly.”
State Senate Minority Leader Raumesh Akbari called the governor’s comments “a pleasant surprise.”
“I know the governor and Republican leadership have said they want to do something, but to see him come out so strongly, especially on red flag laws, something that our caucus has been pushing for the past several weeks, is super encouraging,” she said.
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However, many are skeptical there will be any changes and wonder if Lee’s comments were just lip service to pacify a growing frustration in the state.
For any new gun laws to pass, roughly 25% of Republicans in the House would have to sign on, 30% of Republicans in the Senate, and 100% of Democrats in both chambers.
