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Tennessee GOP expels 2 Black Democratic lawmakers for anti-gun violence protests.

Early on Monday morning, March 27, 2023, an assassin armed with two AR-style weapons, a handgun and significant ammunition, used force to break into a private Christian school in Nashville, taking the lives of three 9-year-old students and three adult school staffers.

Within days, mass protests broke out across Nashville and the entire state of Tennessee calling for stricter gun safety measures.

At the state capital in Nashville, several elected officials joined with citizen protesters to help amplify the need for immediate action on stricter gun control by the Tennessee General Assembly.

Tennessee Speaker of the House Cameron Sexton (R—Crossville) said that the actions of some of his colleagues inside the State Capitol were like that of an insurrection.

Today, April 6, 2023, a Republican majority in the Tennessee General Assembly – led by Speaker Sexton — voted to remove two Democratic legislators for participating in “an unauthorized gun safety protest” last week on the House floor.

22 years ago, it took an act of war orchestrated by insidious foreign nationals using aircraft to attack the American people in iconic American locations, to rally our country to solidarity and action.

Today, those same insidious and dangerous forces seem to have infiltrated main-stream America, poisoning our political structures, our institutions, our entire raison d’être.

This is 2023, folks.

The phrase, “United we Stand, Divided we Fall” is often attributed to Abraham Lincoln, and he did make it into a mainstream rallying cry.  Yet, it has been used by great leaders since the dawn of time.

We have a choice.  We can fight over petty differences, or we can unite around our common interests.

The train has left the station, and it’s well past time for America to stand up and demand that elected officials – at the local, state and federal level – stop creating divisive rhetoric; begin to listen to each other and the people they represent; return to the purpose for which legislators are elected to serve.

I do hope we can find a peaceable way to Unite.