PLANTATION CAPITALI$M
Watch: Expelled Tennessee Rep. Justin Pearson delivers epic sermon to Memphis church
Sarah K. Burris
April 09, 2023

Photo: Screen capture

Rep. Justin Pearson was one of the "Tennessee Three" that Republicans sought to expel from the state Assembly last week. Ultimately, it was just Reps. Pearson and Justin Jones that were expelled. Rep. Gloria Johnson was saved by a single vote, leading her to say that it was likely due to the color of her skin being different than that of her two colleagues. Jones and Pearson are both Black while Johnson is White.

Pearson was invited to be a guest pastor at Easter Sunday services for Church of the River, where he preached on the downfall of American democracy.

He began by thanking "all of our loved ones who've journeyed — who've wiped these tears from these eyes, lifted up my chin and also my heart."

"The Republican-led supermajority of the Tennessee assembly sought to have a political lynching of three of its members because we spoke out of turn against the status quo of the government after the tragic deaths of six people at the Covenant school in Nashville," Pearson said.

He went on to cite those who lost their lives at the hands of yet another mass shooter. This time the six killed were at Covenant School. Evelyn Dieckhaus, William Kinney and Hallie Scruggs were nine years old.

"Because we walked to the well of the house out of turn, resolutions were unjustly and undemocratically filed against us on these trumped up charges," Pearson continued. "Because we spoke out against the empire of the NRA of the gun lobbyists; because we demanded an end to gun violence, an end to the proliferation of weapons on our streets, an end to the funerals we attend day after day and week after week and month after month and year after year — because we did that, the Republican-lead general assembly with the support of folks even in this district like Mark White, from our own community, thought it better to get rid of our democratic representation in district 86 than to actually solve the problem."

Jones, who represents part of Nashville, could be reappointed by the city council as early as next week.

See the full video of the sermon below or at the link here.

Pearson's sermon beings at the 54-minute mark.