Column: Tennessee was long defined by its unique culture. Then came toxic redistricting, poisoned social media, parties polarized on race and other pathologies, writes jmart.
State Rep. Justin Jones, with his fist in the air, marches with supporters to the Tennessee State Capitol on Monday, April 10. | George Walker IV/AP PhotoJonathan Martin is POLITICO’s politics bureau chief and senior political columnist. His reported column chronicles the inside conversation and big-picture trends shaping politics.
The weather and Bird-riding tourists, however, masked what has been a searing spring in Tennessee, a horrific school shooting in Nashville that begot days of protest and the stunning defrocking of a pair of young, Black lawmakers who carried those demonstrations, bullhorn in hand, onto the floor of the House chamber.
Today, Tennessee represents the grim culmination of the forces corroding state politics: the nationalization of elections and governance, the tribalism between the two parties, the collapse of local media and internet-accelerated siloing of news and the incentive structure wrought by extreme gerrymandering. Also, if we’re being honest, the transition from pragmatists anchored in their communities to partisans more fixated on what’s said online than at their local Rotary Club.
The coalition that backed the lottery, which has poured over $8 billion into education funding, reflected the state’s political makeup: There were Black lawmakers, a few moderate Republicans, an exurban conservative who knew her Nashville area constituents wanted more money for schools and a rural conservative Democrat who was nudged along with the promise of some road projects by the state’s Republican governor, Don Sundquist, who signed the bill.
Lamar Alexander became governor of Tennessee by being sworn in early after the outgoing Democrat, Ray Blanton, was found to be selling pardons. | Pool photo by Alex Edelman This has been well-documented. What’s been less covered is how the Republican majority did much the same in state legislative seats across smaller cities. Yarbro is now the farthest-east Democratic senator in the state. In fact, there’s six Senate Democrats left in the 33-member chamber: three from Nashville and three from Memphis.
There were rural white Democrats in the Legislature, and the congressional delegation included Davis, Bart Gordon and John Tanner. None of the three lawmakers returned after 2010, and gerrymandering and realignment eventually killed off nearly all their contemporaries in the state Capitol. In addition to erasing the city’s congressional seat, legislative Republicans have also sought to halve the size of the metro government’s council and shift control of the city’s convention authority and airport from the city to the state. They’re the kind of power plays the state’s Republicans used to, understandably, rage about when they were done by the state Legislature’s old Democratic leaders.
Information is gleaned from social media or national cable networks. “Everywhere you go, all you see is Fox News,” said Tanner, the old West Tennessee Democrat.“When you’re in Nashville, it’s all you hear,” said Johnny Garrett, a GOP state representative, of the faculty club-style chatter on Twitter. But Garrett noted how his colleagues often tell him that when they’re back in their districts “they don’t hear a lot that stuff, the social media.
Haslam, I’m told by Republicans and Democrats alike, has been calling state lawmakers, urging them to work together on the gun issue and counseling restraint in the partisan wars.
日本 最新ニュース, 日本 見出し
Similar News:他のニュース ソースから収集した、これに似たニュース記事を読むこともできます。
Republican Who Called for Tree Hangings Removed from Justice CommitteeTennessee State Rep. Paul Sherrell wanted lynching-style capital punishment to return to his state.
続きを読む »
Behind the Expulsions of Two State Representatives in TennesseeTo understand why Republicans are pushing for laws to make it more difficult for young people to vote, you need only to look at recent events in Tennessee.
続きを読む »
Tennessee Republican governor calls on state lawmakers to toughen gun restrictions | CNN PoliticsTennessee Republican Gov. Bill Lee on Tuesday urged the state's legislature to pass additional gun control measures, an especially charged subject in a state that recently suffered a school shooting and the acrimonious expulsion of two Black Democratic lawmakers who called for greater firearm restrictions.
続きを読む »
Governors State University Faculty and Staff Go on Strike, Joining Chicago State and Eastern IllinoisFaculty and staff at Governors State University went to the picket lines Tuesday, making the school the third public university in Illinois to go on strike this month — joining Chicago State University and Eastern Illinois University.
続きを読む »