general assembly is set to convene for a special legislative session on august 21st to address gun safety. and how much is the republican supermajority control of the debate in the tennessee legislature going to allow that to be a real discussion? that s a question raised by veteran tennessee investigative reporter phil williams after analyzing the debate from this year s legislative session. quote, what we discovered is evidence that republicans have enormous power to control the entire conversation on hotly contested issues, or, as democrats see it, to silence debate. republicans have in some cases cut of democratic committee, even refusing to consider their amendments. joining me now, democratic state representatives justin j. pearson and justin jones of tennessee. gentlemen, good to see you again. thank you for being with me. you too. i want to ask you a bit about this, justin jones. phil williams was referring to
and that perspective is starting to have a fact. we have a special session coming up on august 21st, we have legislation that is being advocated for by people that are republicans and conservatives, who are in place in parts of tennessee that i haven t been yet. but who are thing that we need to do something about gun violence that s our right to life is more important than the units ability of the second amendment. so that gives me a lot of hope in this moment that the people are rising. have any of the republicans who spoke against do that day, or voted against you that come to the realization of what a mistake it was for them? because of the way it exposed them literally around the world. i don t know of them have told me that they have had an awakening moment, but what we do know is my attention that has been brought on tennessee, and the tennessee general assembly, the ways that they are behaving, the ways that they are acting cannot continue to go on without people holding
not only in mass shootings but also in our communities that we experience every day, and that perspective is starting to have effect. we have a special session coming up on august 21st, we have legislation that is being advocated for by people that are republicans and conservatives, who are in place in parts of tennessee that i haven t been yet. but who are thing that we need to do something about gun violence that s our right to life is more important than the immutability of the second amendment. so that gives me a lot of hope in this moment that the people are rising. have any of the republicans we spoke again see that day or voted against you that come to the realization of what a mistake it was for them. because of the way it exposed them literally around the world. i don t know of them have told me that they have had an awakening moment, but what we do know is my attention that has been brought on tennessee, and the tennessee general assembly, the ways that they are behaving,
judiciary committee and separately the senate finance committee ron wyden are requesting information on crowe s gift to thomas. president biden is calling for what he calls, quote, a fair deal for those striking hollywood writers. at a film screening at the white house on monday, the president talking about that strike for the first time. nights like these are a reminder of the power of stories and the importance of treating story tellers with dignity, respect, and the value they deserve. i sincerely hope the writer s strike in hollywood gets resolved and the writers are given the fair deal they deserve as soon as possible. tennessee s governor now calling for a special legislative session this summer in hopes of passing a public safety bill. you might recall efforts to pass a red flag style law failed after that national school shooting back in march. the republican governor, though, bill lee, announcing that he wants the legislature to meet august 21st. thanks for your time tod
she is. i was very interested in these hearings, brian, because i m a mother of five young children. so i lived through this pandemic like the whole rest of my fellow americans did, and i know exactly what happened. she s trying to dish out falsehood after falsehood, and thinks we ll swallow this. we know in 2020, as you said, she said those of us, not just president trump, but private schools, other red states, who wanted to open schools were callous, reckless, and cruel. we take that personally. we love our kids more than anything. we knew we could look at the studies coming out too. we knew that our kids were perfectly safe going back into these schools. it s really offensive she would gas like this before congress. and le lie, let s be honest. on august 21st, she celebrated when a judge struck down florida was going to open up the schools, and a judge stopped them from doing it. she celebrated.