Expelled Lawmaker Justin Pearson Reappointed to Tennessee House

It’s been less than a week since Tennessee Republicans expelled Democratic Representatives Justin Jones and Justin Pearson from the House. The Nashville Metro Council reappointed Jones on Monday, having the Democrat miss not even a moment of House business. And now, two days later, the Shelby County Commission has voted to send Pearson back along with him.

On Wednesday, the Shelby County Commission voted 7–0 to send Pearson back to represent the constituents who already elected him. The 13-member commission is made up of nine Democrats and four Republicans; only seven members were present for the vote, all Democrats.

Jones, Pearson, and their colleague Gloria Johnson were targeted by House Republicans last week in wake of the Nashville school shooting that left three children and three adults dead. The three Democrats were repeatedly silenced by Republican leaders, including House Speaker Cameron Sexton, as they tried to speak on the issue of gun violence. Finally, in solidarity with thousands of children, teachers, parents, and other residents protesting against gun violence outside the state Capitol, the trio interrupted House proceedings. The Republicans then led an effort to expel the three on grounds that they had broken “decorum.”

Johnson, who is white, survived an expulsion by just one vote. But Jones and Pearson, who are both Black, were expelled.

Other members with more severe offenses, such as child molestation, have not been expelled or charged with breaches of decorum in the same fashion the three Democrats were. Another member, Justin Lafferty, who once defended the three-fifths compromise, assaulted Jones on the House floor while Republicans advanced the expulsion votes. Lafferty was not found to be breaching decorum.

Both Jones’s and Pearson’s seats will still have special elections in the coming months, and both have expressed their plans to run and officially retake their seats.

Despite Jones’s and Pearson’s return, and massive public pressure both state- and nationwide, Republicans have still reportedly been trying to find a way to impose their anti-democratic desires on the process. Republican state lawmakers have allegedly been toying with taking away government funding for Memphis projects if Pearson is reappointed. The funds specifically are reported to have been set aside for schools and sports stadiums, like NBA team Memphis Grizzlies’ FedExForum or the University of Memphis’s Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium.

Attorneys representing Jones and Pearson sent a letter to Sexton on Monday, however, warning Republicans of potential constitutional violations if they dig in their heels.

“The world is watching Tennessee,” they wrote. “Any partisan retributive action, such as discriminatory treatment of elected officials, or threats or actions to withhold funding for government programs, would constitute further unconstitutional action that would require redress.”

Twitter faces a possible $33 billion in fines, more than the entire company is reportedly worth, in Germany, for failing to remove hate speech. Meanwhile, owner Elon Musk continues to insist hate speech isn’t increasing on the platform.

Germany’s Federal Justice Office, or BfJ,  announced on April 4 that it had begun the process to fine Twitter for repeatedly failing to address complaints about content that violates Germany’s Network Enforcement Act. Known as NetzDG, the law requires social media platforms with more than two million followers to remove content that includes hate speech, abuse, threats, and antisemitism. Under the law, each individual case can result in a fine of up to 50 million euros.

More than 600 cases of illegal hate speech on Twitter have been reported to the BfJ, according to TechCrunch. The German government is only acting on a handful, but if it expands its investigation to all of them, the fines could reach an eye-popping total of 30 billion euros, or about $33 billion.

Musk bought Twitter in October for $44 billion, but in a recent email to employees, he said the company is worth just $20 billion. Since taking over, Musk has scrambled to cut costs and increase revenue. This apparently includes letting everyone come back on Twitter, including Nazis, and purchase verification badges; firing 75 percent of staff; selling everything in the company’s San Francisco headquarters; and just not paying rent.

Hate speech has also flourished on Twitter since Musk took the reins. Aside from the potential German fines, a report released in December by Media Matters and GLAAD analyzed tweets from nine prominent right-wing figures and accounts and found that in the first month under Musk’s leadership, there was a 1,200 percent increase in retweets of posts that use the word “groomer,” a homophobic slur. The social media research group National Contagion Research Institute found that in the 12 hours after Musk bought Twitter, use of the n-word increased almost 500 percent.

But in a bizarre Wednesday interview with the BBC, Musk insisted that hate speech has not increased on Twitter. “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he told reporter James Clayton when asked about the abusive language.

“I hate him passionately,” Tucker Carlson once wrote about twice-impeached and now criminally indicted former President Donald Trump. But on Tuesday night, the Fox host bent over backward, forward, and sideways to try cleaning up his errant comments on the radical leader of the Republican Party. Carlson hosted the suddenly “sensible and wise” Trump in an hour-long special, in which the Fox host barely got a word in, giving the former president open rein, perhaps as an apology gift.

In fact, most of Carlson’s presence was felt during interluding clips of him lobbing any favorable adjective he could to describe Trump.

“His descriptions of a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping at Mar-a-Lago were remarkably nuanced and even affectionate,” Carlson said of Trump.

On the actual substance of the interview, it was fairly standard Trump form: incoherent ramblings ranging from self-aggrandizing fantasies to geopolitical grievances.

For instance, apparently, when Trump was arraigned last week, people who worked at the courthouse had tears streaming down their faces as they offered assurances to him: “2024, sir.”

Carlson chummily giggled at Trump’s joke that the Wharton School of Finance didn’t teach him about being arraigned.

Trump, who has been debased by numerous Fox anchors including Carlson himself, cited numerous Fox personalities defending his innocence amid being arraigned for 34 counts of falsifying business records while coordinating a hush-money payment to Stormy Daniels, with whom he allegedly had an affair.

On global politics, Trump had glowing praises for rulers for whom, if any Democrat had shared equal sentiments, Fox would sic every host and anchor onto them for months.

“They’re great people,” Trump said on Saudi Arabia—a state guilty of an array of human rights abuses, no less of killing Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

The Chinese president, Trump said, was not only “brilliant” but also someone you could never find a good casting for in Hollywood.

Trump also went out of his way, while offering prefaces for why he shouldn’t say it, to talk about Xi’s “beautiful female interpreter.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin, meanwhile, is “very smart,” despite having a “bad year,” not having taken over all of Ukraine. “And what are we going to do? Because Biden is so committed to Ukraine,” he continued.

Trump, however, insisted that he stood up to Putin’s desires, on Ukraine and the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. “I was the worst thing that ever happened to him,” Trump said.

Amid all this, Trump said his biggest problem was not any other nation but “sick radical people” who live within the United States.

“We’re all pretending we’ve got a lot to show for [Trump’s presidency], because admitting what a disaster it’s been is too tough to digest,” Carlson wrote in a text message, just two days before the January 6 attack on the Capitol. “We are very, very close to being able to ignore Trump most nights. I truly can’t wait.”

Instead, two years later, Carlson is back to pretending.

Elon Musk insisted that hate speech and misinformation have decreased on Twitter since he took over, in a bizarre and rambling interview with the BBC.

The Tesla CEO bought Twitter in October. Since then, all hell seems to have broken loose, with Musk firing about three-quarters of all employees, gutting content moderation guidelines, and scrambling to find funds. He admitted to the BBC that it’s been a “rollercoaster” and “quite painful.”

But when BBC reporter James Clayton asked about an increase in hate speech on Twitter, Musk became defensive. He repeatedly asked Clayton to give him a specific example, and when the reporter couldn’t, Musk said, “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You just lied,” Musk said.

It’s disappointing that Clayton was unprepared to offer examples, considering there are so many—including on Musk’s personal Twitter profile. A report released in December by Media Matters and GLAAD analyzed tweets from nine prominent right-wing figures and accounts and found that in the first month under Musk’s leadership, there was a 1,200 percent increase in retweets of posts that use the word “groomer,” a homophobic slur.

The social media research group National Contagion Research Institute found that in the 12 hours after Musk bought Twitter, use of the n-word increased almost 500 percent. Musk has let Nazis back on Twitter, given blue verification check marks to the Taliban, and shared transphobic memes and Nazi photos himself.

Musk also said there is less misinformation on Twitter since he took over, due in part to his efforts to crack down on automated accounts. But a study by the WHO-backed fact-checking organization Health Feedback found that “misinformation superspreaders,” or accounts that repeatedly share misinformation, have seen a major rise in popularity since Musk took over.

When asked if he prioritizes free speech on Twitter over facts, Musk—a self-described “free speech absolutist”—countered with what he probably thought was a real zinger: “Who’s to say something is misinformation?” Considering his own Twitter profile is rife with conspiracy theories and misinformation, he may not know.

During the interview, Musk insisted Twitter was close to being “cash-flow positive,” despite reportedly telling employees in March that the company is now worth $20 billion, less than half what he paid for it. He also claimed that his dog is now the company CEO.

So maybe things will run a little more smoothly now.

Harvard’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences announced Tuesday it will be renamed for a Republican billionaire megadonor who is one of Ron DeSantis’s biggest financial backers.

Hedge fund CEO Ken Griffin graduated from Harvard in 1989. The school praised his $300 million gift, saying it will help it advance its research and expand its ability to provide students with financial aid.

But people were confused by the fanfare over his gift and the decision to give Griffin such a prominent reward. Harvard’s endowment fund is $53.2 billion, the largest academic endowment in the world, so Griffin’s gift is a drop in the bucket for them.

But more than the money, people are pretty mad about Griffin himself. The billionaire is currently the third-biggest individual political donor in the country, having given a total of $71,050,000 to exclusively conservative causes, according to OpenSecrets.

A report published in November by the group Americans for Tax Fairness found that Griffin gave $66.1 million to several Republican super PACs and candidates during the 2022 midterm elections. That election cycle was the most expensive midterms ever, as billionaires rushed to exert influence over the outcomes.

Griffin actually was one of Barack Obama’s biggest fundraisers when he first ran for election in 2008. But by 2012, Griffin had flipped, transferring his vote and his money to then–Republican nominee Mitt Romney.

He alleged the Obama administration had “embraced class warfare as being politically expedient” and argued that wealthy people had “insufficient influence” in politics.

Most recently, Griffin has thrown his weight behind Ron DeSantis. He was the Florida governor’s biggest donor during the 2022 election, giving $5 million to DeSantis’s reelection campaign.

Griffin has repeatedly said he would “love” to see DeSantis run for president in 2024. During a March interview with Bloomberg, Griffin said he disagreed with DeSantis on a few points, such as the governor’s going after Disney for criticizing Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law or spreading doubt about Covid-19 vaccines.

To be clear, Griffin didn’t say he disagreed with DeSantis’s motivations. Instead, Griffin said he thought the Disney retaliation was government overreach and the vaccine disinformation was poorly worded and framed.

Meanwhile, DeSantis has come under fire recently for going after educational freedom in Florida. He has promised to defund diversity, equity, and inclusion programs on college campuses; limited what can be taught or read in schools; and even had his allies force out the president of a liberally minded college.