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Protesters call for gun reform laws and show support for three Democratic representatives who are facing expulsion as legislators start the morning session Thursday at the Tennessee State Capitol in Nashville. Democratic Reps. Justin Pearson of Memphis, Justin Jones of Nashville and Gloria Johnson of Knoxville face expulsion after they led a protest at the Capitol. Protesters listen from the Tennessee House gallery during a protest to demand action on gun reform laws and to support three lawmakers who faced an expulsion vote — in what experts call an extraordinary disciplinary move.
Who is Justin Pearson?
The trio held hands as they walked onto the floor and Pearson raised a fist during the Pledge of Allegiance. Jones said on CNN that Republicans are using authoritarian methods to silence the opposition. "It's very concerning and it represents a clear and present danger to democracy all across this nation," Jones said. "We've had skirmishes on the floor that have taken this long to resolve, and there were never any consequences."
Why is the expulsion so unusual?
He later directed troopers to remove one woman, Lauren Shipman-Dorrance, from the ticketed gallery. Tennessee House Republicans on Tuesday passed legislation to allow some trained teachers and school staff to carry handguns despite pleas from Democrats, students and gun-reform advocates to defeat the bill. Representatives are elected to two-year terms with all representatives standing for election at the same time. This is consistent with the practice in all other states with the exceptions of Alabama, Louisiana, Maryland, and Mississippi which allow representatives to serve four-year terms.
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What are the 3 lawmakers saying?
In 2019, lawmakers faced pressure to expel former Republican Rep. David Byrd over accusations of sexual misconduct dating to when he was a high school basketball coach three decades earlier. Republicans declined to take action, pointing out that he was reelected as the allegations surfaced. County commissions in their districts get to pick replacements to serve until a special election can be scheduled and they could opt to choose Jones and Pearson. Thousands of people flocked to the Capitol to support Jones, Pearson and Johnson on Thursday, cheering and chanting outside the House chamber loudly enough to drown out the proceedings. The split votes drew accusations of racism, with lawmakers ousting Reps. Justin Jones and Justin Pearson, who are both Black, while Rep. Gloria Johnson, who is white, survived the vote on her expulsion.
Gloria Johnson was the only member of the "Tennessee Three" to not be expelled from the legislature on Thursday, retaining her seat by a single vote. She has been stripped of her committee assignments and it's unclear if those will be restored. Twenty-five Republicans voted against the fourth bill, which included measures that could lead to a ban on TikTok in the United States and that would redirect funds from seized Russian assets to help aid Ukraine.
On Monday, April 10, the Nashville Metro Council voted unanimously to reinstate Jones, and two days later the Shelby County Commission voted unanimously to reinstate Pearson. “Is it right to say that the faults of a small percentage of long-past generations must be borne by all of today’s Americans? It’s never right to punish an innocent person for an act committed by another,” Ragan said Wednesday.
By expelling the members, the chamber could meet its majority threshold more easily. Before this week, the two most recent expulsions in Tennessee's House came via overwhelmingly bipartisan votes to excise members on criminal or ethical grounds, rather than a supermajority imposing its will. It's rare for any legislative body in the U.S. to expel a member — most states have reportedly never done so. Even in that context, the circumstances in Tennessee — where the Republican-led House expelled two Black lawmakers — stand out. Jones was temporarily banned from the Tennessee Capitol in 2019 after throwing a cup of liquid at former House Speaker Glen Casada and other lawmakers while protesting the bust of Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest inside the Capitol.
State Rep. Justin Pearson, of Memphis, was sworn in Thursday outside the Statehouse. The day before, Shelby County commissioners unanimously voted to reinstate him. Republican Reps. Bud Hulsey, Gino Bulso, and Andrew Farmer filed the resolutions. They successfully requested Monday that the House expedite the process and vote on the resolutions Thursday.
How Different Factions Voted
The expelled lawmakers conceded they didn't follow decorum by walking on the floor — what is called the well — and speaking without being formally recognized. The people of @brotherjones_ and @Justinjpearson’s districts were disenfranchised today. I’m proud that Metro Council is meeting Monday to fill the vacancy left in Nashville by today’s vote, & I believe they’ll send @brotherjones_ right back to continue serving his constituents. The Metro Council of Nashville called a special meeting for Monday, April 10, to fill Jones' seat and unanimously voted to reinstate him. Prior to the vote, Nashville mayor John Cooper said he was "proud" that the council was meeting and would "send (Jones) right back to continue serving his constituents."
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First, he argued that as a freshman representative, he has not been made aware of all of the House rules and to what and when they apply. He called the majority Republican membership, many of whom have said they would vote to expel the members, a "lynch mob" that is eager to enact the "ultimate punishment" against himself, Johnson and Pearson. President Joe Biden issued a statement Thursday night calling it "shocking" and "undemocratic." The forced expulsion of lawmakers from any state legislative body in the United States is a rare event.
The General Assembly last year funded school resource officer positions at all Tennessee schools, with the ability for SROs to go armed. Staffing issues have complicated hiring for those positions and nearly 600 schools do not have an SRO in place. "Most expulsions have involved criminal conduct or abusive behavior, not suppression of dissent or targeting of political opponents," state constitutional law expert Miriam Seifter told NPR in an email. In his address outside the Capitol, Pearson read the names of those killed and referenced another mass shooting on Monday at a bank in Louisville, Kentucky, in which five people were killed and eight others were injured. Republicans banished Pearson and state Rep. Justin Jones last week over their role in the protest on the House floor over the shooting, which left three children and three adults dead. The extraordinarily rare move resulted in a chaotic and fiery confrontation between lawmakers and supporters opposing the move and has further fractured an already deep political division inside the Tennessee Legislature.

And with Republicans holding a supermajority that provides the necessary two-thirds majority for expulsion, Democrats have little recourse to stop the vote. NASHVILLE — As teenagers and demonstrators flooded the Tennessee state legislature last week to call for lawmakers to toughen access to guns after a deadly shooting at a Christian school, three Democrats headed to the well of the House chamber. Hundreds of people came to the Tennessee State Capitol on Thursday to protest the vote and call for gun control, as WPLN's Lexi Marshall reports. Due to the three votes against Jones, he will not be allowed to speak in House proceedings for two days, House ethics counsel Doug Himes confirmed on Tuesday.
"Antidemocratic actions are far easier to pursue if state institutions receive limited scrutiny," Seifter said. “Our members literally didn’t look at the ethnicity of the members up for expulsion,” Majority Leader William Lamberth added. He alleged Jones and Pearson were trying to incite a riot last week, while Johnson was more subdued. “You have a lot to offer, but offer it in a vein where people are accepting of your ideas,” Kumar said.
A week after Republicans ousted two Democratic lawmakers over a gun control protest, both returned to their seats. Jones and Pearson led chants through a bullhorn as legislators instituted a recess. Video filmed by a Republican on the house floor during the event — also a violation of the legislature's rules, Democrats contended on Thursday — showed the three speaking on the floor as demonstrators could be heard in the background. Controversy has surrounded the vote by Tennessee lawmakers to expel two members from the state legislature after they and a third member — all Democrats — took part in a protest against gun violence from the floor of the chamber.
The Tennessee Constitution's Article II, Section 12 empowers the House to "punish its members for disorderly behavior," and to expel members with a two-thirds majority vote. Pearson also disputed the fact that he and the others disrupted the day's proceedings with their protest. State Rep. Justin Pearson, D-Memphis, listens to remarks on the floor of the House chamber, Thursday, April 6, 2023, in Nashville, Tenn.
In Tennessee, Republican lawmakers have been supportive of the idea to strengthen school safety, but they have largely rejected calls for stricter gun controls with only weeks to go in the legislative session. The Tennessee House voted on Thursday to expel two Democrats one week after they interrupted debate by leading protesters in a call for stricter gun laws in the wake of a shooting that left six dead at a Christian school. Before the expulsion votes, House members debated more than 20 bills, including a school safety proposal requiring public and private schools to submit building safety plans to the state. The bill did not address gun control, sparking criticism from some Democrats that it only addresses a symptom and not the cause of school shootings. In an extraordinary move, Tennessee's Republican-led House voted Thursday to expel two of three Democratic lawmakers who recently led a raucous protest from the House floor calling for gun law reforms.
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