Tennessee State Senator Charlane Oliver (D-Nashville) warned state Republicans on Thursday moments after the Tennessee General Assembly passed a bill prohibiting local governments from inhibiting law enforcement that her Democrat constituents may respond with riots.
@FoxNashville posted footage of the Thursday press conference at which Oliver and other Democrat legislators held at the Capitol in which they announced their disapproval of the bill.
The legislation easily passed in the State Senate on Thursday in a partisan vote 26 to 6. The previous week, the Tennessee House passed the bill in a partisan 68 to 24 vote.
KWAM posted footage of Oliver’s remarks to X Friday.
“So yeah, we’re gonna fight,” said Oliver (pictured above), co-founder of a Tennessee-based social justice activist group called the Equity Alliance. “Dr. King said the riots are the language of the unheard. You [sic] ain’t seen nothing yet. If you keep silencing us like this, what do you think our districts [sic] gonna do?”
“Gloves off,” she continued. “Like, we’re gonna fight like hell, you don’t expect us to respond when you gaslight us every single day with these bills?”
She went on to call the legislation a “Jim Crow bill” and the lawmakers who voted for it “Confederates.”
State Senator Brent Taylor, who sponsored the legislation, responded to Oliver’s comments in a thread on X. Taylor lamented the continued opposition from Democrats and said he has had many people in Democrat-represented districts thank him for his work.
At the same presser, State Senator London Lamar (D-Nashville) claimed Tennessee Republicans were engaging in “a form of slavery,” according to more footage posted to X by KWAM.
Lamar claimed that people were being silenced in the General Assembly and equated such behavior with enslavement.
“I feel like a slave sometimes in this building,” Lamar said. “I am tired of [sic] Republican Party expecting us as minorities to do what they want to do but treat us disrespectfully. Nah, we’re not doing that [sic] no more… We’re at the time of the session where [sic] gloves off.”
Lamar in particular was slammed for her comments comparing her service as a state senator to slavery.
“Holy Cow!!” wrote Newsmax host and author Todd Starnes on X. “Are the Republicans forcing you to lift that bale or pick cotton? This is an international story! Who knew that slaves were still working Tennessee’s plantations?”
“I can assure you that her position is nothing like slavery,” wrote Young Republicans National Committeeman Luke Cymbal, also on X. “She is an elected Senator who was just heralded by state press for bringing her baby (illegitimate BTW) on the Senate floor during session.”
The bill, SB2572/HB1931, would prohibit local governments from restricting the ability of law enforcement officers to carry out their duties of preventing crime, detecting crime, and apprehending offenders, provided they do so in a legal way. Existing local laws that contradict SB2572/HB1931 would become null and void upon the bill’s passage.
A recently passed Memphis City Council ordinance barring the Memphis Police Department (MPD) from initiating pretextual traffic stops would be affected. The council passed the ordinance in view of Tyre Nichols, who died after a brutal encounter with five MPD officers during a traffic stop in January 2023.
Matthew Giffin is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Matthew on X/Twitter.
