Posted on 04/12/2020 4:08:15 AM PDT by Libloather
A day after the Tennessee Democratic Party voted to remove Memphis Rep. John DeBerry from the party's Aug. 6 primary ballot, the legislator hit back at the party, saying it no longer valued a diversity of ideas.
“The so-called party of inclusion is everything but inclusive. It’s all about thinking with one brain, marching in step and following the company line, sitting there like a brainless idiot and letting them tell you what to do,” he said in an interview Thursday morning.
In recent years, DeBerry, who represents District 90 - a gerrymandered district that weaves from north of Interstate 40, through parts of Volllintine Evergreen and into South Memphis - has come under fire from Tennessee Democrats for voting with Republicans on issues including abortion and school choice.
**SNIP**
DeBerry, an ordained Church of Christ minister, has been opposed to abortion his entire legislative career and in 2019 said he believed a lack of "personal responsibility" was a contributor to the number of abortions. He said Thursday that his values - passed on from his parents - had not changed since he was first elected 26 years ago. He scorned the party for kicking him off the ballot for not aligning with party values, saying he believed he still represented the values of his constituents.
(Excerpt) Read more at commercialappeal.com ...
A couple of my aunts were nurses in the US Army with service spanning across WWII, Korea and Viet Nam. They were Eisenhower republicans all their lives, despite having grown up in a small, western PA coal town that was decidedly a democrat stronghold from Roosevelt forward.
Dad clung to the democrat party through the first Carter term, but in 1980, he voted republican for the first time in his life based almost exclusively on the Pro-Life platform of the party, and he never turned back.
Democrat Party = hive brain
“... these demons not only kicked him off the ballot, they assured that he will lose his current job.”
Well, they didn’t hang him, like Democrats used to do to runaway slaves.
As a member of a church of Christ myself, I never heard of an “ordained” minister. We don’t do ordination ceremonies. You don’t even have to graduate from a religious graduate school, although a lot of our preachers do. However, I am only speaking from my experience. There may be some other tradition out there, or maybe the newspaper just got it wrong.
This man has conservative values and a democrat politician at the same time. Something on the order of what used to be called Blue Dog Democrat. Basically good people of the Truman/JFK era of politics that just do not blend at all with the hard left.
He’s a natural fit for the Trump era Republican party.
My grandfather was sort of a bigshot in the local Democrat Party. Walking away was a rather traumatic experience for him. But he had concluded that they had left him no choice.
” . . . has come under fire from Tennessee Democrats for voting with Republicans on issues including abortion and school choice.”
As Mr. DeBerry has learned the hard way, when it comes to the agendas of radical feminists, the teachers unions, and other special interests, blacks are expected to sit in the back of the bus.
” the (Dem) party, saying it no longer valued a diversity of ideas.”
When did it ever?
The guy needs to relocate. That’s why we in eastern TN consider Memphis to be another state.
I would suspect the newspaper got it wrong. This is probably the closest the reporter has been to a church since Great aunt sally died when he was five.
They usually don’t know enough to know that there are different terms. I’ve seen referrals to Baptist “mass” and “parishoners” at the local community church
The Borgocrats will eliminate any thought other than that which originates from the Collective. You must comply.
Liberalism is the product of an orchestrated intellectual inbreeding program.
No outside thoughts, rationale, debate or queries are permitted.
Never understood how anyone “ conservative “ could be a dem if one had an inkling of the party platforms
“He also protested how he was removed from the ballot. The party’s primary board meetings are subject to the open meetings act, but the meeting was not publicly noticed.“
That’s pretty serious. If Tennessee’s Open Meetings Act is like Texas’s, that would mean the board’s action is void. He should absolutely sue to appear on the ballot.
There is a large twitter movement called #walkaway. This fellow needs the hashtag #tossedaway.
Excellent response!
As far as I know, in any primary election with which I have ever had contact, there are rules for getting on the ballot. You file a notice of candidacy. You circulate nominating petitions and gather signatures. If you get enough signatures -- provided these stand up to challenge if anyone gets pushy -- you are on the ballot. You may be a nuisance candidate. You may be a disruptor working on behalf of the other party. You may be an angry dissident. You may be the biggest fool on God's green earth. Heck, you might even be a black man trying to run as a Democrat in Tennessee in 1960, with the intent of breaking the racist stranglehold on the party. Dot the i's and cross the t's, and you have a right to run.
Party organizations will often officially endorse incumbents, but that shouldn't affect how a name appears on the ballot.
I have never heard of a party committee denying ballot access to someone who had filed properly, submitted enough signatures, and otherwise dotted the i's and crossed the t's.
John is not “ordained”... That is just the only way the writer knew to say he is a Church of Christ preacher. The writer wanted to make it seem more “formal” than the church actually does it. You and I both know that the elders, while listening to the needs of the congregation, select the preacher... John was an old school conservative democrat that became a victim of the socialist/baby killer movement within the party.
Ronald Reagan would say today that:’I didn’t leave the Democrat Party, The Communist Party left me.’
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.