On The Road To Fascism

One-party control... A number of states are dominated by supermajorities in their legislatures, and one such state is Tennessee.

Tennessee House speaker suspends all Dems from committees, citing decorum violation

Minority leader says it’s like being ‘stabbed in the back’

Tennessee Lookout

By: Sam Stockard

May 13, 2026

Tennessee’s Republican House speaker is punishing Democrats for participating in a chaotic end to the special session lawmakers used to redraw congressional maps to bolster a GOP candidate in the midterm election.

House Speaker Cameron Sexton sent a letter Tuesday to House Minority Leader Karen Camper notifying her that Democratic Caucus members will be removed from all standing committees and subcommittees except in cases where their membership is required by House rules. Letters to individual members told them to contact Camper for information.

All 24 House Democrats are barred, including Reps. Justin Jones of Nashville and Justin Pearson of Memphis, a congressional candidate. They both were ousted, then reinstated, after  vocal Democratic pushback in 2023 following a House chamber protest over gun laws in the wake of The Covenant School shooting that claimed the lives of six people, including three children.

So what got the Republicans in a tizzy?

The Crossville Republican cited the incident in which House Democrats gathered at the front of the chamber as Republicans voted to redistrict the state’s congressional map last week and locked arms in a show of solidarity against the GOP plan.

Similarly, Senate Speaker Randy McNally is considering possible action against six Senate Democrats who locked arms in the well at the end of their session in a “blatant violation of civility and decorum,” according to spokesperson Adam Kleinheider.

Were they screaming and yelling? Nope.

Did they disrupt the session? Nope.

WJIL Ch 11 reported that,

I just got an official letter from Speaker Cameron Sexton stripping me of all my committee assignments for protesting their white supremacist agenda.

Just as my white Republican colleagues chose racial retaliation against Tennessee’s Black voters, the Speaker of the House is now choosing retaliation against a Black lawmaker for standing up against their Jim Crow racial gerrymander. This is not new. This is the same pattern of racial discrimination and authoritarian abuse we have come to expect. His assault on our democracy is not about me, but silencing the voices of the people who democratically elected me, the 70,000 people who call District 52 home.

This will not deter us from the fights ahead, but instead strengthen our resolve to keep pushing. As my mentor Diane Nash taught me, “we can judge the effectiveness of our opposition by the response of our opponents.” The white supremacist Speaker is terrified that people around the country have seen through their lies, and that their attempts to drag us backwards in history have drawn nationwide rebuke.

We will not stop fighting.

We will not stop getting in good trouble.

We will not go back!

State Rep. Justin Jones (D-Nashville)

Jim Crow is back!

So now, in Tennessee, the Republicans have disenfranchised half of the voters in the state—let that sink in.

Because the Democrats are no longer on any committees, all those who voted for these legislators no longer have a functional say in government. This isn't just punishing the Democrats; it is punishing the voters.

This is what fascist governments do.