The city of Nashville’s governing council on Monday afternoon voted unanimously to return the expelled Black lawmaker Justin Jones to the Tennessee state legislature.
The body’s Republican majority state lawmakers had expelled Jones and fellow house member Justin Pearson late last week because they led protests in the chamber demanding gun control after yet another mass shooting in an American school, this one at an elementary school in the city days before.
Moments later, Jones marched to the capitol several blocks away. He took the oath of office on the steps and entered the building while supporters sang This Little Light of Mine.
A loud round of applause erupted as Jones walked into the chamber with the Democratic representative Gloria Johnson, who was also targeted for expulsion, but spared by one vote.
“To the people of Tennessee, I stand with you,” Jones said in his first statement on the house floor. “We will continue to be your voice here. And no expulsion, no attempt to silence us will stop us, but it will only galvanize and strengthen our movement. And we will continue to show up in the people’s house.
“Power to the people,” he shouted, to cheers.
The other lawmaker, Justin Pearson, could be reappointed on Wednesday at a meeting of the Shelby county commission.
There was uproar last week and the act was condemned by many as an extraordinary act of political retaliation. Thousands of protesters flocked to the Tennessee state capitol to support the three Democratic members and their expulsion was slammed as racist. Joe Biden had called the move “shocking, undemocratic and without precedent” in a statement.
And US vice-president Kamala Harris rushed to Nashville on Friday evening and praised the lawmakers, whom she said “chose to show courage in the face of extreme tragedy”.
Jones’s appointment is on an interim basis. Special elections for the seats will take place in the coming months. Jones and Pearson have said they plan to run in the special elections.
Before the special council session was to begin, a couple of hundred people gathered in front of the Nashville courthouse, and more were pouring in. Some held signs reading “No Justin, No Peace”. Inside the courthouse, a line of people waited outside the council chambers for the doors to open.
Rosalyn Daniel arrived early and waited in line to get a seat in the council chambers. She said she was not in Jones’s district but was a Nashville resident and concerned citizen.
“I grew up in Birmingham, Alabama, during the civil rights movement, so I understand why this is so important,” she said.
Doug Kufner, a spokesperson for the Republican house speaker, Cameron Sexton, indicated that whoever was appointed to the vacancies by the Nashville and Shelby county governments “will be seated as representatives as the constitution requires”.
The house majority leader, William Lamberth, and Republican Caucus chairman, Jeremy Faison, said they would welcome back the expelled lawmakers if they are reinstated.
“Tennessee’s constitution provides a pathway back from expulsion,” they said in a statement. “Should any expelled member be reappointed, we will welcome them. Like everyone else, they are expected to follow the rules of the house as well as state law.”
“The world is watching Tennessee,” attorneys for Jones and Pearson wrote to Sexton in a letter on Monday. “Any partisan retributive action, such as the discriminatory treatment of elected officials, or threats or actions to withhold funding for government programs, would constitute further unconstitutional action that would require redress.”
Johnson, the third Democrat targeted for expulsion, also attracted national attention.
She had suggested race was probably a factor in why Jones and Pearson were ousted but not her. Johnson told reporters it “might have to do with the color of our skin”.
GOP leaders have said the expulsions – a mechanism used only a handful times since the civil war – had nothing to do with race and instead were necessary to avoid setting a precedent that lawmakers’ disruptions of house proceedings through protest would be tolerated.
