Jason,
Tennessee Republicans just passed one of the most brazen acts of racist voter suppression we’ve seen in decades.
Both chambers voted to carve up Tennessee’s 9th Congressional District — the only Black-majority district in the entire state. The district that our endorsed candidate, State Representative Justin J. Pearson, is currently running for.
They called a special session specifically to disenfranchise Black voters, splitting District 9 into thirds. It’s racist, it’s anti-democratic, and it’s bullshit.
These are the consequences of SCOTUS’ recent gutting of the Voting Rights Act in real time. Within days of the Supreme Court’s decision, Tennessee Republicans started redrawing the maps. They limited public comment, they rushed the bills through both chambers, and when Tennesseans filled the gallery to make their opposition known, state troopers removed them one by one.
Generations of Black Americans fought and marched for the right to have their voices heard in Congress. They were beaten bloody on the Edmund Pettus Bridge for it. The Voting Rights Act was a hard-fought protection, and today, Tennessee Republicans disrespected the long legacy of Black civil rights leaders as well as the voters and made it clear they no longer feel bound by anything other than their insatiable hunger for political power.
Leaders We Deserve endorsed-candidate Justin J. Pearson was on the floor fighting like hell for his district. He spoke truth to power, and called these maps exactly what they are: “Racist tools of white supremacy at the behest of the most powerful white supremacist in the United States of America, Donald J. Trump.”
The district Justin is running to represent — the one that has given Black Memphians a voice in Congress for over half a century — is being erased out of existence. Tennessee’s Republican Governor signed the new maps into law yesterday.
This is a moment where the work we do at Leaders We Deserve is mission critical. The only real answer to a system that keeps finding new ways to silence Black voters is to put everything we’ve got behind the leaders who refuse to be silenced and make it clear that this movement isn’t going anywhere.
We are deeply proud to back Justin J. Pearson. The resilience, conviction, and moral courage he showed in that Chamber is exactly what makes him the kind of generational leader who will be remembered long after this dark chapter in American democracy.
Thank you,
David Hogg
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