"Tennessee Three" Fiasco highlights link between Racism and Gun Violence

“We won’t be bent, we won’t be bowed, and we won’t be ordered to ignore the hearts and minds of the people who elected us, demanding commonsense gun safety in a state that has nearly none.

The GOP of the Tennessee House of Representatives attempted to obstruct me and my colleagues from these goals; and shred our democracy. Instead, Republicans have only fanned the flames of hope that illuminate our movement, helping it to grow more powerful and glow more brightly.” – Tennessee State Rep. Justin J. Pearson

The crowd of more than 1,000 that gathered at Tennessee’s Capitol to demand safer gun policies was mostly white.

The three 9-year-old children and two of the three staff members who died in the mass shooting that inspired the protest were white.

The group of legislators who stood at the House podium with a bullhorn to lead protestors in the galleries was multiracial.

Only the Black legislators were expelled. The Tennessee lawmakers who voted to expel House members Justin Jones and Justin Pearson while sparing Gloria Johnson shifted focus away from the outcry against gun violence – which cuts across every demographic – toward their own appalling racism.

In the eyes of the nation, when the House convened on the morning of April 6, the Tennessee Three were facing expulsion because they protested gun violence. When it adjourned that evening, the Justins had been expelled because they are Black.

The reality is that racial resentment and gun extremism are inexplicably linked.