Tennessee lawmaker briefly ousted last year is silenced as new session begins

[January 11, 2024]   (Reuters) - One of the Democratic Tennessee state representatives who was briefly expelled from the Republican-controlled state house last year was barred from speaking at the state legislature on Wednesday after calling the House speaker "drunk with power."  

U.S. Tennessee State Representative Justin Jones gestures during a protest, as the Tennessee House of Representatives debates new rules that passed a day earlier in the Tennessee state legislature, at the state capitol in Nashville, Tennessee, U.S., January 10, 2024. REUTERS/Seth Herald

Lawmakers ruled Justin Jones out of order following a chaotic start to a legislative session where gun laws are in the spotlight.

His comment concerned the Republican House speaker who opposed efforts by Jones and fellow Democrats last year to impose firearm restrictions after a Nashville school shooting threw Tennessee into the center of the U.S. gun control debate.

Jones spoke out on Wednesday after a new ticket system barred some of the public, among them gun-control campaigners, from watching the session from the gallery. He accused the security team of speaker Cameron Sexton of blocking him and the House Republican majority leader from getting into an elevator with Sexton.

"These rules are not about Democrats versus Republicans but it's about each of us as members and a speaker who is drunk with power," Jones told the House, leading to an immediate vote to silence him.

The 2024 session began on Tuesday with a heavy police presence after Jones and his fellow Democratic Representative Justin Pearson, both of whom are Black, were briefly expelled for leading a protest for gun control on the House of Representatives floor in 2023.

A third Democratic representative, Gloria Johnson, who is white, was not expelled for her role in the protest, leading to accusations of racism.

"I would just hate to be my colleagues across the aisle who wake up in fear of everything that doesn't look like them," Johnson told progressive news website the Tennessee Holler on Wednesday when asked about the heavy presence of state police at the legislature.

Spokespeople for Sexton, Jones and Pearson did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

(Reporting by Andrew Hay in Taos, New Mexico; Editing by Donna Bryson and Matthew Lewis)

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