While Gov. Bill Lee’s universal school voucher proposal is clearly a key issue this election year, there is less agreement on where Tennessee voters stand on the contentious education policy, incentivizing many state legislative candidates to avoid discussing the matter.
Numerous voter polls have generated wildly different results this year, depending on which organization was behind the survey and how the questions were asked.
As a result, rural Republican candidates, whose legislative votes would be pivotal in deciding the issue, aren’t generally trumpeting their positions on what would amount to a major policy change.
And when they do comment, the candidates are choosing their words carefully by using the language of “school choice” over “vouchers,” even though they’re essentially the same thing when it comes to letting parents use taxpayer money to send their children to private schools.
The divergent poll results, based on representative samplings of voters, underscore that vouchers remain a hot-button education issue as Tennesseans try to understand a complex idea that was the most divisive of the recent legislative session.
Supporters say the statewide voucher proposal, which the governor vowed to bring back to lawmakers next year after it failed to reach the Senate and House floors in April, would put parents in charge of their children’s education by giving them more choices. Critics say it would destabilize public education, bust the state’s budget, and further segregate schools by race, income, and students with special needs.
Now in his second term, Lee has characterized GOP support across Tennessee as solidly favoring his proposal, which is especially important in a red state where the winner of the Republican primary typically wins the general election.
The Republican governor, who campaigned on the promise of giving parents more education choices for their children, recently told Fox News that school choice is “a very popular idea among Republican primary voters.” He added that voters support it “by an overwhelming margin.”
“Legislators understand that; they know their voters want this,” Lee said.
But while vouchers have steadily gained support through the years, surveys of voter attitudes don’t necessarily bear out Lee’s claim.
Three pro-voucher groups — The Beacon Center,Americans for Prosperity, and the American Federation for Children — released findings early this year declaring broad support for expanding school vouchers in Tennessee as they sought to build momentum ahead of critical voucher votes in the General Assembly.
During the same period, the Tennessee Education Association, the state’s largest teachers organization and a voucher opponent, released results of its own poll showing only 30 percent of Republican primary voters supported the governor’s plan.
When asked if they approve of the policy, 45 percent were in favor of vouchers, 46 percent opposed them, and 9 percent said they neither supported nor opposed the idea.
“These results show that vouchers remain a controversial issue,” said John Geer, the Vanderbilt poll’s co-director and a distinguished professor of political science.
“It is a complex and complicated topic,” he added. “That makes the issue difficult to measure in a poll.”
The uneven findings of various polls stem, in part, from how the questions were framed.
For instance, Americans for Prosperity asked voters: “Governor Lee is proposing a school choice program that will enable parents to take back control over $7K of their education tax dollars to educate their child in a private or home school environment if they choose to, giving parents more control over how and where their children are educated. Do you agree with the program Governor Lee is proposing?”
More than 70 percent responded ‘yes.’
By contrast, the TEA’s survey asked a series of questions delving into the structural and financial impacts that universal vouchers would have on the state’s public education system.
Among them: “Other states that have enacted statewide vouchers saw that 95 percent of students who benefitted were from wealthy families who had the resources to send their children to private schools or already attended private schools, mostly in rural areas, instead of providing resources to middle-income families and students from across the state. Does knowing this make you more or less likely to support school vouchers?”
More than 70 percent responded that they were less inclined to support the policy.
On vouchers, Vanderbilt pollsters asked: “Do you support, neither support nor oppose, or oppose Tennessee giving all parents tax-funded vouchers they can use to help pay for tuition for their school-age children to attend private or religious schools of their choice, instead of attending local public schools?”
“We don’t have an ax to grind, so we tried to be as straightforward as we could,” said Geer.
About 49 percent of responding voters also said they were likely to use vouchers if they became available, and 50 percent said they would not. By a wide margin, Republicans who support former President Donald Trump were the group most likely to use them, while only 26 percent of Democrats said they would take advantage of the option.
“The outcome of the poll on vouchers was very partisan in nature,” Geer said.
That partisan lens, he added, was more significant than whether the voter lived in a rural, urban, or suburban district, where access to private schools varies significantly.
“I think it’s another statement about our political climate and the polarization of our country. We really weren’t able to get past the partisanship,” he said.
This year’s uneven polling results may help explain why many rural Republican candidates aren’t discussing vouchers or promoting where they stand on the issue when seeking to secure their party’s nomination. In suburban and urban districts, which are home to more private schools, both Republican and Democratic candidates are more likely to weigh in or use vouchers as a campaign issue.
“Rural Republican legislators got some pushback over the governor’s voucher proposal, so I can understand why they would skirt the issue with primary voters,” Geer said. “I can understand why they would just say: ‘I’m for public education because that’s what’s important to my rural district.’”
Debby Gould, president of the League of Women Voters in Tennessee, said legislative candidates can easily cloak their voucher stance by saying they support public education, especially since the House’s 2024 voucher bill bundled the creation of a statewide voucher program with public school reforms.
“That muddied the waters a bit, but voters deserve a clear answer to whether they plan to vote ‘yes’ or ‘no’ on universal vouchers,” Gould said.
“Vouchers aren’t a secondary election issue,” she added. “Gov. Lee has said it’s a priority for his administration, so it will be front and center next legislative session.”
All 99 seats in the state House and half of the Senate’s 33 seats are on the ballot this year. Aug. 1 is Tennessee’s primary election day, with early voting July 12-24. The general election will be on Nov. 5.
This is a story about nazis, the rock group Paramore, a folk singer, and the GOP members of the Tennessee State House. Bear with me. It all comes together in the end.
First, the nazis: Last Saturday afternoon, a group of 30 or so white men demonstrated on the grounds of the state capitol in Nashville. They carried nazi flags, wore face masks (naturally), and red T-shirts proclaiming that they were members of a group called “Blood Tribe.” They then walked in loose formation down Broadway, along sidewalks filled with tourists.
The march was videoed by dozens of people, including by one brave stalwart who walked alongside the group, screaming, “Cowards!! Cowards!! Show your faces!!” They didn’t because — duh — they’re cowards. That video was posted on X and went viral.
According to the Anti-Defamation League, Blood Tribe members exalt Hitler as a deity, a reincarnation of the Norse god Wotan. They are “a hard-core white supremacist group, that sees themselves as the last remaining bulwark against enemies of the white race and the only path to a white ethno-state.” Blood Tribe members “emphasize hyper-masculinity,” and the group does not allow female members.
Here’s my favorite part: Once accepted into the Blood Tribe, “members take part in an initiation ceremony during which they cut themselves using the group’s ceremonial spear and then rub their blood on the shaft of the spear.” Uh huh.
Also possibly notable is the fact that the group’s first public demonstration was in March 2023, when they protested a drag queen story hour in Wadsworth, Ohio. According to news reports, attendees “wore matching red sweaters, waved swastika flags, and held a banner that read, ‘There will be blood.’” No word on whether their shoes matched their outfits.
But there’s really nothing funny about nazis, no matter how un-self-aware they are, unless hyper-toxic masculinity and ignorant racism amuse you. These guys are evil thugs, even if they are afraid to show their faces.
Among many others catching the nazis on phone video last Saturday were state Representative Justin Pearson of Memphis and state Representative Justin Jones of Nashville — the two Black members of the “Tennessee Three” who were excommunicated from the state legislature last summer for advocating for gun reform in the House chamber. Pearson and Jones (who were reinstated by special elections) both denounced the Blood Tribe march and referenced their GOP colleagues in their X posts about the group.
Jones said: “This is exactly what my Republican colleagues’ hate speech is fostering and inviting.” Pearson said: “Tragically, [the Blood Tribe’s] views are shared by many who I serve alongside on the other side of the aisle.”
Too harsh, you say? This is where Paramore and the folk singer come in. The Nashville-based rock band won Grammys for Best Rock Album and Best Alternative Music Performance. The folksinger, also from Nashville, was Allison Russell, who won a Grammy for Best American Roots Performance. Jones made what is typically a perfunctory consent calendar resolution — noncontroversial motions that the legislature passes en masse — to honor both artists for their awards.
But, oops. Nope. GOP House Speaker Jeremy Faison removed the resolution honoring Russell from the consent calendar, saying he had been approached by other GOP members with questions about Russell “which made it appropriate for us to press pause on that particular resolution.”
What questions? He couldn’t say. Here’s a guess: Russell is Black. The members of Paramore are white. The GOP reps decided to “press pause” on the Black woman because as they have shown time and time again, they are country-ass, cousin-humpin’ racist tools. In a real democracy, you could put that resolution on the consent calendar and take it to the bank.
Too harsh? I’m pretty sure Faison doesn’t like it when people bring up the 2022 incident in which he ran onto a basketball court during a game (between two “Christian” academies, no less) and attempted to “de-pants a referee” because he disagreed with a call. Probably should have pressed pause on that move, Jeremy.
To their credit, the lead singer of Paramore said the group would decline the “honor” from the legislature unless Russell was also honored. Oh, and if you’re still wondering about that “press pause” business? Last year, Russell criticized GOP legislators for enacting legislation targeting LGBTQ rights and banning drag shows.
Yep, another election is coming up, and this one, a primary election scheduled for Tuesday, March 5th, involves just two offices — one of them being the presidency of the United States, the other being the clerkship of Shelby County’s General Sessions Court. (Note, early voting has already begun and ends on February 27th.)
Where the presidential primaries are concerned, there is not much suspense. Those voters selecting a Republican ballot will have eight choices, and that old saw about the value of a name being high up on the ballot list can safely be discarded.
Of the eight available GOP alternatives, one Donald J. Trump is last on the list. Those preceding the former president, in alphabetical order, are Ryan Binkley, Chris Christie, Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, Asa Hutchinson, Vivek Ramaswamy, and David Stuckenberg.
Of these, only Haley, a former UN ambassador and the ex-governor of South Carolina, is still an active candidate opposing Trump, and she may be the only person in America or anywhere else who believes she has a ghost of a chance.
(It’s not against the law to believe in ghosts, but it’s certainly against the oddsboard.)
On the Democratic primary ballot, there is only one name — that of the incumbent president, Joe Biden.
Of course, voters who don’t cotton to the idea of a Biden-Trump repeat in the November 5th general election are free to fantasize and write in whomever they please on whichever ballot they choose.
Now, for the General Sessions clerk’s race: The two party candidates selected on March 5th will vie for the position in a general election on Thursday, August 8th. The same date holds for various elections in the county’s suburban municipalities and for primaries for state and federal positions on the November ballot.
Lisa Arnold, a former employee with the clerk’s office, is the only Republican on the March 5th GOP ballot, while Democratic voters have four candidates to choose from.
The Democrats are: Rheunte Benson, who is currently serving as criminal administrator with the clerk’s office and is making her second race for the clerk’s position, having run for it four years ago; Shelandra Ford, who served as Shelby County register of deeds from 2018-22 and was defeated in a reelection bid for that office four years ago by current register Willie Brooks; Joe Brown, the incumbent Criminal Court clerk, who previously served several terms as a member of the city council and who won out in a crowded primary for the clerk’s office four years ago.
And there is Tami Sawyer, the former activiste par excellence, county commissioner, and 2019 candidate for mayor. This is not the same Tami Sawyer who could “not wait” to seek the city’s highest office in what seems, in retrospect, to have been a premature move.
This is a new Sawyer, inclusive rather than confrontational, a solid organizer, and backed by an impressive chorus of Establishment Democrats while maintaining her woke base.
Her main obstacle to election might be the ritual name-ID advantages of opponents Ford (not a member of the well-known political clan but possessor of the same surname) and Brown (whose election in the first place was probably due to voters’ familiarity with his TV-judge namesake).
Sawyer is, in any case, widely regarded as the favorite, and she is expected, if elected, to use the new perch not as a sinecure but as the springboard for further political action.
Tennessee lawmakers are making things harder on the poor and easier on the rich, and those old-timey class frictions are heating up in the rifts.
Republicans blame technical glitches and piles of red tape they created as obstacles to get millions of dollars to help low-income families here. Meanwhile, they cut taxes for the business class last year, plan to cut even more this year, and hope to free up more of everyone’s tax dollars to help everyone — no matter how much money they have — pay for private schools.
Gun violence dominated debate and headlines around the Tennessee General Assembly in 2023. Many vow to keep the issue in front of lawmakers in 2024. But if a school shooting in Nashville during last year’s regular session and an entire special session on gun violence last summer won’t move GOP lawmakers to act, rays of hope on the issue seem faint.
It’s way too early to predict what issue(s) may dominate discussions at the State Capitol in the coming weeks. But money seems an early leader, especially as news came late last year that once-hot state revenues are cooling thanks in large part to those 2023 GOP tax cuts.
Money matters have not seen center stage in Tennessee for awhile. The state’s budget has been pushed up and up in recent years with nary a cut in sight. That’s partly due to the new-ish ability to collect online sales taxes and a major surge in revenues from those business taxes in the past. But that won’t likely be the case this year.
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee is expected to unveil his new budget for Tennessee on Monday, during the annual State of the State address. Projected revenues — how much money officials think we’ll have to spend in the next year — will likely flatten.
This could present some difficult decisions for lawmakers, especially some on the House side, who may have not yet dealt budget cuts. If cuts come, it will be especially interesting to see where the state’s GOP-dominated purse-string-holders will make them (especially since they made the cuts necessary). This could also likely flatten the state’s ability to fund any new initiatives. (Think of it like this, if you quit a job, you might not have the money to pay for your existing car and you damn sure can’t buy a new one.)
Budgets are more than numbers. Budgets are priorities. For a household, that could mean the difference in saving for college later or going on vacation now. For local governments, that could mean the difference in more police or better parks. With its tax cuts last year, the Tennessee GOP prioritized at least one thing: more long-term money in the bank for the state’s businesses.
Now, as money matters begin to creep into the state spotlight once again, some old, tense questions are rising. Who pays for the government? Who does the government work for? Who wins? Who struggles?
So many of these questions have root in Tennessee’s overarching economic development model. That is, basically, how do we organize our economy? How do we build it?
Republicans here love to tout Tennessee as one of the most “business-friendly” states in the union. But don’t just take their word for it. Yahoo! Finance put the state in its top 10 for business friendliness last year and MSNBC ranked it in the top 3, both using different methodologies.
Tennessee’s economy, like many other Southern states, works on the basic trickle-down theory that lower business taxes will attract more businesses, which will hire more people and create more wealth that will “trickle down” to the lower classes.
Except it doesn’t, according to a new report from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI). The high tide promised by this economic theory does not lift all boats, it said. For a more in-depth look at how this plays out in Tennessee and across the South, see below (Economic Policy Institute Report).
Here, we’ll look at some issues and opinions on money and class that might shape debates as the legislature heads back to Nashville.
The lowest 20 percent of earners in Tennessee spend 12.8 percent of their total annual household income on taxes. (Chart: Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy)
The poor and hungry
Back in 2019, The Beacon Center, a free market think tank in Nashville, discovered the Lee administration quietly sat on a stockpile of $730 million meant to help working poor families in Tennessee. For years, Tennessee got $190 million from the federal government to help these families get on their feet with monthly checks for childcare, transportation, and more.
Instead of finding ways to getting all of the money to needy families, Lee just did not. The initial discovery of the funds in 2019 led some on social media to decry Lee’s money management. Others saw GOP disdain for the poor.
“This is why [I march for universal basic income] today, because of villainous shit-holes like the governor of Tennessee who is hoarding $732 M in TANF [Temporary Assistance for Needy Families] money instead of spending it on reducing poverty,” reads a tweet from the time from Scott Santens, founder of the Income to Support All Foundation.
By 2021, the fund ballooned to nearly $800 million. Thanks to Beacon, a plan is now in place to spend that money down.
However, Lee’s plan puts a hurdle between those needy families and the money. Rather than go directly to families in need, the funds will in large part go to organizations or health departments that will give them temporary aid.
Lee administration officials said it has found a home for $717 million of the TANF reserve. But state Sen. Heidi Campbell (D-Nashville) wants more in the hands of actual needy families. Introduced last week, her bill would increase TANF payments to cover rising inflation costs each year.
Meanwhile, thousands of families in Tennessee have less literal food on the table thanks to Lee administration computer problems. Last summer the Tennessee Department of Human Services (TDHS) updated some computer software. A glitch in the system resulted in a backlog of benefits for 35,000 recipients of the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), sometimes called food stamps.
TDHS Commissioner Clarence Carter said his team hopes to have the backlog cleared by March. He also said he’s not dragging his feet, telling state lawmakers last week that his team has “an almost desperate sense of urgency to get this right.” Tennessee Lookout editor Holly McCall pointed out this “kicker” from their story on the matter: “DHS officials noted that the staff brought in to help are keenly aware of the importance of the work: some department staff rely on food stamps themselves.”
Who pays?
Tennessee has the third-most regressive tax system in the country, according to the seventh annual “Who Pays?” report from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP). Regressive taxes are those paid equally by all, no matter how much money they make. These, of course, hit lower-income taxpayers the hardest.
In Tennessee, this means the lowest 20 percent of earners (those making less than $21,000 each year) spend 12.8 percent of their total annual household income on taxes. The top 1 percent (those making over $661,600 each year) spend just 3.8 percent of their total income on taxes here. The poorest pay more than three times as much as the wealthy.
“States such as Florida, Tennessee, and Texas are often described as ‘low tax’ due to their lack of personal income taxes,” reads the report. “While this characterization holds true for high-income families, these states levy some of the nation’s highest tax rates on the poor.”
State Senator London Lamar (Photo: Dawn Majors | US capitol)
A tale of two tax cuts
State Sen. London Lamar (D-Memphis) can go back to 2011 and rattle off a list of GOP-sponsored policies “that have truly benefited the wealthy and big corporations.” The repeal of the millionaire estate tax. The repeal of the luxury gift tax. A repeal of income tax on stocks and bonds. A reduction of the jet fuel tax. Corporate exemptions to the sales tax. Exemptions for corporate income taxes.
“Our tax policy is incentivizing businesses for keeping people poor,” Lamar said. “I say that because since 2011 and when the Republicans got in office, the main tax reform and benefits have truly benefited the wealthy and big corporations.
“So, the question is, where are the priorities for those citizens who are working the hardest to contribute to our economy?”
Well, the GOP cut taxes for working-class families just last year. Well, kinda sorta. And it wasn’t much. And it wasn’t forever. But …
Remember that odd, three-month cut on the state’s grocery tax last year? It was a $273 million part of the $400 million Tennessee Works Tax Act, “the largest single tax cut in Tennessee history.” It cut the 4 percent tax for everyone from August to October. Then, the tax went straight back onto receipts.
It was a head-scratcher to many and seemed a solution to a problem that didn’t exist (except, y’know, that Tennessee is one of only 13 states that still tax groceries). Why? Where did this cut come from? Even folks on Reddit couldn’t pin the motivation on some coarse design to win votes because there was no upcoming election.
But it was the remaining cuts in the Tax Act that smarted some working-class taxpayers. While they got a one-time deal that put about $100 in their pockets, the state’s business class got a permanent tax cut worth about $127 million that would put thousands of dollars in their bank accounts each and every year.
The Tax Act seemed to prove Lamar’s notion. Meaningful, permanent cuts for those with means; shallow, temporary cuts for everyone else. (Though, legislation has been filed for this year’s session to permanently cut Tennessee’s grocery tax.)
This might all come into sharper focus later, especially if revenues continue to fall. Because it’s lost revenues from those business tax cuts knocking multi-million-dollar holes in the state budget.
So, should lawmakers indeed need to make cuts to programs it offers Tennessee’s taxpayers, it won’t be because the majority of them got a brief respite from grocery taxes.
Chart: Economic Policy Institute
#VoucherScam
Capitol-watchers have said Lee’s controversial plan to expand his school voucher program could be the biggest fight in Nashville this year. Lee eventually wants to expand the program to every student for any kind of school — public, private, charter, or home.
But the program would allow the vouchers, worth about $7,075 per student each year, for all students, with no income requirements. This means wealthy parents — who now pay taxes for public schools and tuition at private schools — could divert funds from the public school system.
The fight over the legislation may prove to be another class battle that could heat up in Nashville this year. For proof, dig around X for #LeesVoucherScam.
“The voucher scam takes tax dollars from our neighborhood public schools to pay for the private school education of the wealthy,” tweeted Teri Mai, a Democratic candidate running for a House seat in Middle Tennessee. “Simply put, the school voucher scam defunds public schools by funneling your tax dollars to private and religious schools.”
Economic Policy Institute Report
Southern politicians tout the region’s “business-friendly” economic development policies, but a new study finds those policies are rooted in racism and have failed most people who live here.
The October study is from Washington, D.C.-based Economic Policy Institute (EPI), a nonpartisan think tank focused on “the needs of low-and-middle-income workers in economic policy discussions.” The study looks at job growth, wages, poverty, and state GDP. The data, EPI said, “show a grim reality.”
The group characterized the Southern economic development model as one with “low wages, low taxes, few regulations on businesses, few labor protections, a weak safety net, and vicious opposition to unions.”
The state of Tennessee basically agrees with this and shouts it in all caps (literally) on its website under the “business climate” section.
“We believe in high expectations, low debt, and a pro-business regulatory environment,” reads the page from the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development. “Tennessee is proud to be a right-to-work state [also noting Tennessee’s low union participation] with no personal income tax. Our state and local tax burdens are among the lowest in the country, and our state budget operates with a healthy surplus, rather than a deficit.”
The EPI study said this does not work for everyone.
“While this economic model has garnered vast amounts of riches for the wealthiest people across the region, it is leaving most Southerners with low wages, underfunded public services, a weak safety net in times of economic downturns, deep racial divisions, and high rates of poverty,” said report author Chandra Childers, a senior policy and economic analyst for EPI’s Economic Analysis and Research Network.
Here are a few key takeaways from the report:
• Job growth across the South has failed to keep up with population growth. The share of prime-age workers (ages 25–54) who have a job is lower than the national average in most Southern states.
• Workers in Southern states tend to have lower earnings. Median earnings in nine Southern states are among the lowest in the nation, even after adjusting for lower cost of living in the South.
• Poverty rates are above the national average in most Southern states. Louisiana and Mississippi have the highest poverty rates in the nation, with nearly one in five residents living in poverty.
• Child poverty is highest in the South compared to any other region. At 20.9 percent, child poverty rates in the South are 3.7 percentage points higher than the region with the next-highest child poverty rate — the Midwest (17.2 percent).
• Southern states are among the lowest-GDP states. Nine of the 15 states with the lowest per-worker GDP are in the South.
The racist remnant of the Southern economic development model, according to EPI, is that business owners in the South continue to rely on “large pools of cheap labor,” particularly Black and brown people. The study points back to slavery in the South when Black people were not paid at all and then to Pullman porters who were “forced to rely on tips” after slavery ended. Now, incarcerated individuals can be required to work with no pay at all, the study said.
“The racist roots of this model have been obscured and have been replaced by a more acceptable ‘pro-business’ narrative,” reads the study. “The pro-business narrative suggests that low wages, low taxes, anti-union policies, a weak safety net, and limited regulation on businesses creates a rising tide that ‘lifts all boats.’”
Tennessee policies fit into this model, the study said, as the state has no minimum wage, no income tax, a high sales-tax burden for all residents, no expanded Medicaid program, a low per-worker GDP, and more.
Poverty is higher in Tennessee than in other parts of the country. This is especially true for people of color and particularly women of color, according to the data. The highest rates of poverty across the South are experienced by Black women. One in five lives in poverty, but it’s not due to an unwillingness to work, the study says. Black women have a higher employment-to-population (EPOP) ratio than women from any other racial or ethnic group in the South.
“One reason Black women’s poverty rates remain high in the South — despite a relatively high EPOP — is that they are disproportionately employed in jobs consistent with the occupations they were largely limited to during and after the end of slavery: care work, cleaning, and food production, including agricultural and animal slaughter work,” reads the study. “Because this work is largely done by Black, brown, and immigrant workers, consistent with the Southern economic development model, these jobs pay very low wages.”
Wages are lower in Tennessee than in other parts of the country, and again it’s especially true for people of color and particularly women of color, according to the report.
“On average, Black women in the South are paid $35,884 at the median and Hispanic women just $30,984, compared with $58,008 for white men,” reads the report.
If the Tennessee economic model is working like politicians claim, where does the money go? The study says it goes to the wealthiest Tennesseans. The top 20 percent richest Tennesseans share more than half (51 percent) of the state’s total income. The top 5 percent share 23 percent of the state’s aggregate income. The bottom 20 percent share just 3.4 percent.
“Many Southerners may believe their politician’s arguments that the Southern economic development model will deliver good, well-paying jobs,” reads the report. “However, the data presented here show clearly and emphatically that this model has failed those living in Southern states.”
I’ve been a member of an email chain gang for a year or so. The other emailers are, like me, older guys with a little time on their hands. And, like me, they love to discuss (read: argue about) politics. The basic drill is that someone emails an interesting or provocative link to a story from, say, The Washington Post or Vice or The Daily Beast, and the commenting and kvetching ensues.
Everyone in the group is relatively progressive. Nobody likes Trump, and everyone’s biggest fear is that he’s going to snare the GOP nomination and somehow stumble his way back into the presidency. You wouldn’t think six or seven guys on the same side could find that many things to argue about. You would be wrong. For example, a couple of the gentlemen are dead-certain that Trump will win the nomination. They see no way for anybody else in the GOP to take it away from him and they savor being the no-nonsense, realpolitik adults in the room. “Trump will be the nominee,” they say. Period.
Others in the group aren’t so sure. They speculate that the publicity surrounding Trump’s numerous legal difficulties will grow, and as evidence against him becomes more specific and more damning, it will become increasingly difficult for him to waltz to the nomination. The “maybe not Trump” contingent also likes to point out that Trump’s mental acuity appears to be waning of late and that his 90-minute rambles are losing their zip. How, they ask, do you win the presidency with no policy proposals, and with a campaign based on a platform of “it’s not fair”?
Then there are those who raise the possibility that Trump might encounter a major health issue. He and Biden are both of an age when they should think twice before ordering a multi-year magazine subscription. Or buying green bananas. How, they ask, can anyone state with certainty that these two geezers will be the nominees?
Finally, there’s my old friend, “Kevin,” the Sir Lancelot of the group, who delights in swashing the buckles and tugging the short-hairs of the realpolitikers with ire-provoking predictions. His favorite lately is that Trump will at some point realize the jig is up, that Jack Smith and/or Fani Willis have him dead to rights, and that all his lawyers and supplicants have flipped and will provide detailed evidence of his schemes to subvert the 2020 election and conceal top secret documents. According to Kevin’s theory, Trump will then see no way to bullshit himself out of his self-created mess and, confronting the likelihood of prison time or losing his fortune or both, will decide to fly off in his private jet … to Oman. Or as Kevin likes to write: “Trump will become the Werewolf of Oman.”
No doubt it’s a phrase that has a ring to it, but why Oman? According to Kevin, it’s because of a June 30th New York Times story that centers around a multibillion dollar Trump business deal with the government of Oman. From the Times article: “The Omani government is providing the land for the development, is investing heavily in the infrastructure to support it, and will get a cut of the profits in the long run. …
“Mr. Trump was brought into the deal by a Saudi real estate firm, Dar Al Arkan, which is closely intertwined with the Saudi government. While in office, Mr. Trump developed a tight relationship with Saudi leaders. Since leaving office, he has worked with Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund to host the LIV golf tour and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner received a $2 billion infusion from the Saudi fund for his investment venture. Under its terms, the Trump Organization will not put up any money for the development, but will help design a Trump-branded hotel, golf course and golf club, and will be paid to manage them for up to 30 years, among other revenue.”
Quite the tempting retirement option, you must admit. Trump spends his final years in Mar-a-Oman, golfing, schmoozing, and sending out social media posts about how he was hounded from the country he loves by “crooked Joe Biden and thug Jack Smith and racist Fani Willis.” No foreign policy decisions or immigration messes or economic headaches. Just mid-day tee-times and endless sunshine. Sing it with me, now … “Ahhh-ooooo, Werewolf of Oman.”
You are about to enter a column with math, which I’m not usually great at, but this is important stuff. According to a recent Tufts University study, there were an estimated 8.3 million voters who were newly eligible for the 2022 midterm elections — “newly eligible,” meaning those who had turned 18 since the previous general election in November 2020. They are members of what’s commonly referenced as Generation Z (those born between 1997 and 2012).
The newly eligible voters — approximately 4.5 million of them white and 3.8 million people of color — turned out in historically high numbers, and voted overwhelmingly (by 27 percent) for Democrats in the 2022 midterms. Tufts reported that young voters swung results in Georgia and Nevada, and tilted races toward Democrats in Arizona, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania.
Another report, published by NPR in February, polled Gen Z-ers about their political concerns. They ranked “protecting abortion access” at a higher level than any other age group. It’s worth noting that Gen Z voters will be the most educated group in our history, statistically, and the higher a voter’s education level, the more likely they are to vote. And the majority of Gen Z college graduates are female.
Using this data, you could predict that women and young people are going to have an increasing say in electoral outcomes in the U.S. Or you could just look at recent statewide elections, where it’s already happening. Start with the abortion referendum in 2022 in blood-red Kansas, where abortion rights prevailed by a nearly 60 percent to 40 percent margin, thanks to an unprecedented turnout by women and young people. There were similar results in Michigan a few months later, where abortion rights prevailed 57 to 43 percent, and last week in Ohio, where pro-choice voters also won by a 57 to 43 percent margin.
Along with abortion rights, Gen Z voters cited racism, the environment, gun violence, and LGBTQ/gender issues among their top concerns. They are the least traditionally religious generation in our history.
It’s almost as if the Republican Party read that NPR report, saw the recent state election returns, and said, “You know what? Let’s see what we can do to really piss off young voters. Maybe we should start something like ‘a War on Woke,’ where we force women to have babies against their will and demand open-carry laws and suppress LGBTQ rights and drill for oil in baby seal habitats. That’ll show ’em we mean business!” I don’t know how else you explain what appears to be a GOP death-wish agenda for 2024.
It’s enough to make a logical person think that the upcoming election will be a walkover for the Democrats, but these coots ain’t made for walkin’. In the midst of this epic demographic swing toward youth, the Democrats are stuck ridin’ with Biden, an 80-year-old who Republicans are painting as a barely sentient geezer who can’t tie his own shoes. It’s ageist, unfair, and unfortunate, but it’s where we are.
Fortunately for the Democrats, in addition to the genius strategy of going against every policy favored by young people and women, the GOP seems hellbent on renominating a multiple-indicted 77-year-old loon with a Grateful Dead-like following of cosplaying cultists. He’ll be running for president in between court appearances and possible jail time for witness tampering. The media will consume and regurgitate Trump and his lies ad nauseam. Orange will be the new gack.
Frankly, given mortality tables, the odds of both of these Boomers getting through a stressful, yearlong presidential campaign without a health crisis seem slim. It seems more likely that we’ve got 14 months of chaos of one kind or another looming ahead.
This is when it helps to remember that even though the candidates might look the same as four years ago, the electorate will not. In the four years between the 2020 and 2024 elections, the country will have gained another 16 million young eligible voters. And in each of those four years, 2.5 million older Americans will have died, meaning there will be 10 million fewer older voters. That’s a net swing of 26 million younger eligible voters. I may not be good at math, but I know how to count change when I see it.
Floyd Bonner, here receiving Sheriff of the Year award last week from Tennessee Sheriffs’
Association, is one of several mayoral candidates hopeful of getting GOP votes in October. (Photo: Courtesy Floyd Bonner)
UPDATED: As is generally known, Memphis city elections are not subject to partisan voting. There are no primaries allowing our local Republicans and Democrats to nominate a candidate to carry the party banner.
Nor, in the case of citywide office (mayor or council super districts 8 and 9), does there exist machinery for a runoff election when no candidate for those offices commands a majority of the general election vote.
There are runoff circumstances for districts 1 through 7, each of them a single district contributing to the pastiche of city government, by electing, in effect, a council member to serve a smaller geographical area or neighborhood.
The aforementioned super districts encompass the entire city. Each of them, in theory, represents a half of the city’s population — the western half being predominantly Black, as of 1991, when the first super-district lines were drawn, the eastern half being largely white. (Though population has meanwhile shifted, those distinctions are still more or less accurate.)
Runoffs are prohibited in the super districts as well as in mayoral elections in the city at large because, in the Solomonic judgment of the late U.S. District Judge Jerome Turner, who devised this electoral system in response to citizen litigation, that’s how things should be divided in order to recognize demographic realities while at the same time discouraging efforts to exploit them.
Each citizen of Memphis gets to vote for four council members, one representing the single district of their residence, the other three representing the half of the city in which their race is predominant. Runoffs are permitted in the smaller single districts, where racial factors do not loom either divisive or decisive, while they are prohibited in the larger areas, where, in theory, voters of one race could rather easily league together to elect one of their own (as whites commonly did in the historic past).
Mayoral elections are winner-takes-all, and Willie Herenton’s victory in 1991 as the first elected Black mayor is regarded as having been a vindication of the system.
Got all that?
Yes, it’s a hodgepodge, but it’s what we’ve still got, even though Blacks, a minority then, are a majority now. And, in fact, race is irrelevant in the 2023 mayor’s race, there being no white candidate still participating with even a ghost of a chance of winning.
Political party is the major remaining “it” factor, and the failure of either party to call for primary voting in city elections has more or less nullified it as a direct determinant of the outcome.
But, with the withdrawal last week from the mayoral race of white Republican candidates Frank Colvett and George Flinn, speculation has become rampant as to who, among the nominal Democrats still in the race, might inherit the vote of the city’s Republicans.
Sheriff Floyd Bonner, whose law-and-order posture is expected to appeal to the city’s conservatives?
Downtown Memphis Commission CEO Paul Young, who has several prior Republican primary votes on his record in non-city elections?
Businessman J.W. Gibson, who once was a member of the local Republican steering committee?
Only NAACP president Van Turner and former Mayor Herenton, among serious candidates, are exempt from such speculation, both regarded as being dyed-in-the-wool Democrats.
In a close election, the disposition of the Republican vote, estimated to be 24 percent of the total, could be crucial.
We woke up to the startling revelation that New York City was basically paralyzed, hazed over by dense smoke from forest fires in Canada, our supposed “ally.” Eh?
Then it was announced that the Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Whiskey company had won its case over a dog-toy manufacturer that had created “poop-themed” chewies with a “Jack Spaniel’s” label. Justice was fetched. Woof!
Next we learned about the earthly departure of “Christian” broadcaster Pat Robertson, who made a career of claiming that LGBTQ folks caused hurricanes, earthquakes, and even the 9/11 attacks. Sadly, ol’ Pat missed out on a chance to blame extra-polite, denim-clad Canadian homosexuals for the smoke invasion, but he did have the good taste to leave us during Pride Month. Enjoy the eternal smoke, Pat.
Oh, and I almost forgot one other tiny bit of news from last Thursday: Former President Donald Trump announced that he was going to be indicted by the U.S. Department of Justice for mishandling classified documents after leaving office.
Trump, no doubt intentionally, preempted the DOJ’s official announcement of the indictment with his own, and quickly began grifting funds for his defense. It was all so unfair! Send money!
The messaging from the usual GOP piss-pots and pundits was remarkably consistent. They bemoaned the country’s “two-tiered justice system” and “selective prosecution.” They raged about “Joe Biden’s Justice Department,” and alleged that the coming Trump indictments were just a distraction from the ever-imminent prosecution of Hunter Biden for giving his father a $5 million bribe, or something, which the GOP could prove if only they didn’t keep misplacing “FBI whistleblowers.”
In fact, the Trump World response was so uniform that one could almost imagine it had been coordinated. Either that, or grievance and what-about-ism was the only ammo they had left. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s reaction was typical. He said “the indictment of Donald Trump was a dark day for the United States,” and that he “stood with” the former president, adding that “House Republicans will hold this brazen weaponization of power accountable.”
It’s worth noting that more than 30 elected Republican officials — including several congressmen and senators — are reputed to have exchanged texts and voice messages with former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows on January 6, 2021. Indictments for the January 6th insurrection case are presumably forthcoming, so there may be some understandable anxiety among those on Meadows’ speed-dial list.
Unsurprisingly, those defending Trump have it precisely backwards. President Biden didn’t indict Trump; the Department of Justice did, and only after months of investigation by a special counsel and his team. (Fun fact: When the feds prosecute somebody, their win rate is 99 percent.) The first-ever indictment of a former president is a huge deal, and the DOJ is not about to file a frivolous case. As the Friday release of the indictments made clear, Trump mishandled and resisted returning hundreds of government documents, even after being subpoenaed for them. There is no parallel with President Biden’s — or Mike Pence’s — handling of the same situation; both cooperated with investigators.
A true dark day for this country would be if the DOJ did not investigate a former president for criminal behavior. It would put presidents above the rule of law, giving them a privilege granted to no other American, creating a true two-tiered justice system.
There was one other piece of news from last Thursday that was overshadowed by Trump’s indictment revelation — but it was potentially as important. The Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling that Alabama’s Congressional Districts had been gerrymandered to minimize that state’s African-American vote. Only one of the state’s seven districts had a Black majority in a state with a 27 percent Black population.
In what most legal analysts considered a surprising ruling, the Court preserved at least a vestige of the 1982 Voting Rights Act by ruling that Alabama must redraw its district maps. It’s a decision with potential ramifications for similar cases in Louisiana, Georgia, and Texas. When future historians look back at June 8, 2023, they may see this SCOTUS decision — a blow to the plague of gerrymandering — as more consequential for the country than Trump’s whiny announcement. The years have a way of clearing the smoke.
Some weeks ago in a year-end article in the Flyer we speculated on the unlikelihood of there being a white Republican candidate for Memphis mayor. At the time a few names in that category had been floated — those of former Sheriff and County Mayor Mark Luttrell and City Councilman Frank Colvett prominent among them.
As of this writing, there is little reason to believe that either one of those personages will become a candidate, but a new name has surfaced — that of John Bobango, who served a term on the Memphis City Council and is well-known as a lawyer of some eminence and as a donor and broker of numerous successful political campaigns on the part of others.
Bobango is known to have been making numerous phone calls of late, notifying friends and potential supporters of his potential availability to make a mayoral race. And, given his own past and current immersion in the political sphere, he has to be taken seriously as a possible entrant.
Should he become a candidate, Bobango’s name would not be as fresh with Memphis voters as either of the aforementioned names. His term of active political service ended in 2001; whereas, Luttrell’s term as county mayor was as recent as 2018, and Colvett is still serving on the council, having served a term as its chair.
What Bobango has in spades is financial resourcefulness, stemming from his own hugely successful career as a lawyer and investor, and from his presumed high potential to raise additional money from his extensive network of associates.
What he lacks, like all other potential white candidates, is membership in the city’s demographic majority. In theory, American politics is color-blind. In actuality, it is not, given the clear tendency of voters, in Memphis as elsewhere, to vote within the confines of their own ethnic connections.
The chances of any white mayoral candidate would be problematic. A white Republican like Bobango would face another disadvantage, that of belonging to a political party that clearly has minority status locally.
It is obviously meaningful that, in last year’s Shelby County election, Democrats prevailed so totally that not a single Republican was able to win a countywide race. And the Democratic base of Memphis is proportionally even larger — a fact that is relevant even in what will be a technically nonpartisan city election.
To be sure, a white candidate in this year’s mayoral race would be running against several African-American candidates and in theory would benefit from a voter-base split among them. The current incumbent mayor, Jim Strickland, undoubtedly benefited from such a split in his initial 2015 victory, and, to go with his identity as a Democrat, he had the kind of support from the city’s Republican voters that Bobango would hope to have.
But Strickland, at the time, was an active office-holder on the city council, and his mayoral ambitions had been known for years. Bobango’s active service in office was a generation ago.
But he was a factor in the city’s politics then, and, should he run, it would be instructive to see what he can make of the long-odds challenge that would confront him.
• Meanwhile, stop the presses! Another Republican, this one an African American, is apparently ready to join a mayoral field that is already rife with entries. This would be former County Commissioner James Harvey, who changed party affiliations some years back and has long meditated on a mayoral race, whether of the county or the city kind.
Harvey has sent out a notice under the letterhead “James Harvey – Mayor 2023” announcing a “Call to Action Campaign Meeting” scheduled for Friday evening of this week at the Southwind country club.
Over the past couple weeks, we’ve seen a fresh incarnation of a game we’ve all become familiar with during the last seven years. It’s called “Will You Denounce This?” The game begins when Donald Trump says or does something that used to be thought of as outrageous. The media then jump into action by asking any Republican they can get in front of a microphone to denounce Trump. As in:
Reporter: “Senator Leghorn, Donald Trump said this week that the United States should bomb Puerto Rico to keep Democrats from making it the 51st state. Puerto Rico is an American territory and Puerto Ricans are American citizens. Will you denounce Trump’s statement that the United States should bomb American citizens?”
Leghorn: “Well, President Trump says a lot of things, and I don’t think anything is gained from addressing these ‘gotcha’ questions from the media.”
Reporter: “But Mr. Trump is saying we should bomb one of our own territories, which could kill thousands of American citizens. Surely you don’t condone such a thing.”
Leghorn: “Look, I work for the American people, and the American people are concerned about high taxes, inflation, drag queens, and Hunter Biden’s laptop. The kind of questions you’re asking are irrelevant, premature, and based on speculation.”
Reporter [incredulous voice]: “So you won’t denounce the bombing and killing of American citizens by American armed forces?”
Leghorn: “Well, of course I don’t personally approve of bombing Puerto Rico, but the president is privy to information we don’t have, and he has a right to express his opinion.”
Reporter: “So, if Mr. Trump gets the GOP nomination in 2024, will you support him?”
Leghorn: “It’s a long way to 2024 so I don’t want to play that game, but, as a Republican, I will of course support our nominee. Also, Hunter Biden’s laptop.”
So yeah, that wasn’t exactly what happened recently, but Trump did roll out three doozies. First, he vowed that when he became president again, he would pardon anyone involved in the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol. Then, he had dinner with musician Kanye West, who just last week on Alex Jones’ InfoWars, expressed his admiration for Adolf Hitler and his disdain for Jews. Having this guy to dinner was not a great look for Trump. But “Ye” upped the ante and brought Nick Fuentes, a white supremacist, anti-Semite, and avowed Nazi boot-licker who makes Ye look progressive.
When word got out about the dinner, the media began a fresh round of “Will You Denounce This?” And they actually found a few Republicans willing to say that Trump was wrong to host these assholes for dinner, including Mike Pence, Chris Christie, and Mitt Romney. Progress, right?
Not exactly. Before the ruckus ensuing from his dinner could die down, Trump posted the following on his Truth Social network: “With the revelation of MASSIVE & WIDESPREAD FRAUD & DECEPTION in working closely with Big Tech Companies, the DNC, & the Democrat Party, do you throw the Presidential Election Results of 2020 OUT and declare the RIGHTFUL WINNER, or do you have a NEW ELECTION? … A Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.”
No one knows for sure what provoked this latest Trump outburst. Perhaps the weirdness of those Hunter Biden penis pictures coming out via a Twitter story? Surely we don’t need to terminate the Constitution for that, do we? I mean, unless that thing was really huge.
It’s tempting to dismiss all this as the ranting of a delusional fool, but bear in mind that this is a man who could still become the GOP nominee — and that most Republicans are still afraid to stand up to a guy who pledges to release convicted January 6th rioters, has dinner with two Hitler-lovers, calls for the overturning of the 2020 election, and says we should terminate the U.S. Constitution.
There’s an adage that you should never play chess with a pigeon because they knock over all the pieces, shit on the board, and then strut around like they won. If the Republicans don’t pick a new king soon, they’re going to need another board. This game is getting old.
