Free Republic

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Congressman Steve Cohen, who has represented Tennessee’s 9th Congressional District for more than 19 years, announced he is withdrawing from the race Friday morning. Cohen says his majority-Black district was gerrymandered into three Republican-leaning districts by the state General Assembly last week. The deadline to file to run in the redrawn District 9, as well as Districts 5 and 8 in the Memphis area, is noon Friday.

The Tennessee Legislature has sent Gov. Bill Lee a narrow but important reform to the state’s deadly-force law, and the fight over SB1847/HB1802 shows how much can change between a bill’s introduction and the final version that reaches a governor’s desk.The Tennessee Legislature passed SB1847 on April 23, the last day of the legislative session. SB1847 includes the legal justification to use deadly force to protect property under certain limited circumstances. In this correspondent’s reading of the law, the legal ability to use deadly force under the bill is not very wide or broad. In the previous law, residents could...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - A Tennessee judge has denied a request for a temporary restraining order in a lawsuit over the state's new congressional districts, court documents show. Judge William L. Campbell, Jr., the Chief U.S. District Judge for the Middle District of Tennessee, issued the order on Thursday. In it, Campbell said the reasons for the denial would be in a "forthcoming Memorandum." Additionally, Campbell's order also canceled a hearing set for May 20. The lawsuit was filed by multiple Tennessee Democrats, including the current representative for District 9, Steve Cohen, as well as the Tennessee Democratic Party following the...

In a refreshing display of backbone, Tennessee House speaker Cameron Sexton delivered a clear message to the Democrat caucus: Political terrorism will not be tolerated in the Volunteer State. As Sean Davis of The Federalist reported Tuesday, every single member of the House Democratic Caucus has been stripped of all standing committee and subcommittee assignments following their disgraceful conduct during last week’s special session on congressional redistricting. The offenses? Coordinated disruptions inside the Capitol, including setting fires, attacking law enforcement officers, and turning the legislative chamber into a circus. Tennessee Republicans, wielding their well earned supermajority, moved swiftly after the...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WSMV) - All members of the House Democratic Caucus have been removed from their committees and subcommittees, according to a letter obtained by WSMV. The letter, signed by House Speaker Cameron Sexton (R) and addressed to Leader Camper, states that “members of the Democratic Caucus will receive individual letters removing them from all standing committees and subcommittees of the House, except where membership is required.” Sexton’s letter states that the committee removals are “due to actions taken” by the members during last week’s special session over redistricting across Tennessee. Those actions, Sexton said, “aimed at disrupting the democratic...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) — Tennessee lawmakers in the House of Representatives have passed the bill that will split Memphis along new congressional lines. Memphis will be split into three congressional districts per the new map, which passed in the Tennessee General Assembly’s special session on redistricting Thursday, May 7. Democrats in the state house have railed against the push to redraw congressional lines outside of the decennial census, calling the move a “grave, grave rollback of rights” for Black Tennesseans and especially for Memphians. The proposed new map, only released to the public about 24 hours before they passed the...

CARROLL COUNTY, Tenn. (WZTV) — A school bus carrying students and staff from the Clarksville-Montgomery County School System was involved in a deadly crash in Carroll County while traveling to a field trip, authorities said. Officials said the bus, from Kenwood Middle School, was headed to Jackson when it was involved in a crash with another vehicle near the intersection of Highway 70 and Cedar Grove. The Tennessee Highway Patrol is leading the investigation. Families of everyone on board have been contacted, according to school officials, who said they do not yet have additional confirmed details about the crash.

On March 16, 2026, the Tennessee Legislature transmitted Bill SB0350 to Governor Bill Lee. Governor Bill Lee is expected to sign the legislation. Governor Lee signed a Constitutional Carry Bill in 2021. Bill SB0350 guarantees renters’ rights to keep and bear arms will not be subject to cancellation by rental contracts. The bill does not apply to state and federal government leases or rentals of property. The bill applies to both residential and commercial renters. While Governor Lee is expected to sign SB0350, if he does not veto the bill by the 28th of March, the bill will become law...

The Tennessee Senate passed legislation Monday allowing patients to sue their doctor for “coercing” them into seeking gender reassignment some 30 years after treatment. Republican Sen. Adam Lowe of Calhoun passed Senate Bill 2031 24-5 although he was unable to provide evidence that physicians are persuading people to seek transgender care. Responding to questions from Democratic lawmakers, Lowe said the law would apply when someone is “de-transitioning” from previous gender treatment “under some sort of premise of wellness that they didn’t achieve.” He explained that a similar private cause of action exists in a Tennessee law enacted three years ago...

State Rep. Aftyn Behn (D-Nashville) says "the recent discovery of a podcast from 2020 where I said 'I hate the city, I hate the bachelorettes, I hate the pedal taverns, I hate country music, I hate all of the things that make Nashville. I hate it.' Won't stop me from winning this election." "This election" is a special election to fill the congressional seat vacated by former Rep. Mark Green (R) earlier this year. Her opponent for the seat Matt Van Epps suggested that "this district cannot be well-represented by a person who hates everything about it." Behn disagreed, saying...

On August 22, 2025, a three-judge panel of the Gibson County Chancery Court in Tennessee struck down two Tennessee statutes as unconstitutional under both the Second Amendment and the Tennessee state Constitution. The two statutes were Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-17-1307 and Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-17-1311. Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-17-1307A person commits an offense who carries, with the intent to go armed, a firearm or a club.Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-17-1311It is an offense for any person to possess or carry, whether openly or concealed, with the intent to go armed, any weapon prohibited by § 39-17-1302(a), not...

When Tennessee’s Republican governor, Bill Lee, dispatched his National Guard troops to Washington to support President Trump’s crackdown on crime, Democrats and other critics wondered why he didn’t keep them within state lines. Memphis, after all, has long been one of the most dangerous cities in the country, with a murder rate about twice as high as the nation’s capital, according to F.B.I. statistics. Nashville has a higher rate of violent crime than Washington as well. The same questions could be asked of other Republican governors like Greg Abbott in Texas, Mike DeWine in Ohio and Mike Kehoe in Missouri,...

KNOXVILLE, TN — Local Libertarian Steve Kocot was unsure about how best to invest his money and was torn between investing in shiny rocks or some of those newfangled magic computer coins. Kocot's dilemma reportedly came about as soon as he heard on the internet that the collapse of his government-manipulated fiat currency was imminent and that he needed to preserve his wealth in a more stable form before the American empire disintegrated. "It's only a matter of days or weeks or months or years or decades," he said. "Everything our government's Keynesian economic house of cards is built upon...

On January 23, 2023, Tennessee was required by court order to allow individuals aged 18-20 to carry handguns under the Tennessee permitless carry (Constitutional Carry) law, and to obtain carry permits under the law governing the issue of handgun carry permits. On May 8, 2025, the government of Tennessee reduced the age requirement to obtain a handgun carry permit from 21 to 18. HB1332 became Public Chapter No. 356.SECTION 2. Tennessee Code Annotated, Section 39-17-1351(b), is amended by deleting the language and substituting:(b) Except as provided in subsection (r), any resident of Tennessee who is a United States citizen or...

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — A court affidavit identifies the two Booker T. Washington High School students who were killed in a broad-daylight shooting in South Memphis — Christian Brown, 17, and Darrius Wadley, 18. One of four suspected gunmen was arrested after he was shot and dropped off at a hospital, according to new information from the court system. Valdemar Patterson, aka Valdemar Richards, 18, is so far the only suspect in custody. He is charged with two counts of first-degree murder. Police say last Thursday, an Infiniti pulled into the South City apartment complex at Mississippi Boulevard and Lauderdale. Surveillance...

Thursday, April 17, the Crockett County Sheriff’s Department responded to a shooting on Chestnut Bluff and Maury City Road. According to the sheriff’s department, John King III was shot and killed in the 6000 block of Chestnut Bluff-Maury City Road. We learned on April 18 that it appeared to be domestic violence-related, and no charges were filed at the time. Wednesday, we spoke with District Attorney General Frederick Agee. He told us this was self defense and that his office would not be pursuing any charges. “She is six months pregnant and there were two other children in the household,”...

The feds suspected alleged MS-13 gangbanger Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was deported to El Salvador in an error, was engaged in human and labor trafficking in 2022, according to an internal memo obtained by The Post. The DHS intelligence report noted that Abrego Garcia was pulled over by the Tennessee Highway Patrol on Dec. 1, 2022, after he was caught speeding. Officers found eight other individuals in the car with Abrego Garcia, who said he was driving “three days ago” from Houston, Texas, to Temple Hills, Maryland, “to bring in people to perform construction work,” according to the memo. The...

Audrey Hale, 28, left behind 16 notebooks filled with deranged writings detailing self-loathing and racial hate, repeating how she wanted “kill my own race” and “destroy all the white people who are teachers.” “Being white sucks, but being black is so cool. Black people should rule. White people should fall, every white person who lived and died. I hate you all,” wrote Hale, who was white.

Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) said he is 100% sure that the federal government is covering up documents about UFOs — and he’s not alone among members of Congress in trying to push for more information about what could be out there. “We’ve requested documents, we’ve gone to interview pilots and been stonewalled by our Pentagon. It’s ridiculous, it’s been going on since the ‘40s,” Burchett said Saturday afternoon on Fox News. “We are taking the gloves off.” Public interest in the possibility of extraterrestrial life, officially labeled as unidentified aerial phenomena (UAPs) in government circles, has bubbled for decades —...

Tennessee Rep. Tim Burchett, a Republican on the House Oversight Committee, warned that new information brought by an IRS whistleblower who is seeking protection to testify before Congress, could force a Biden impeachment. The investigation into the Biden family crimes has now revealed that at least 9 members of the family were involved in the family’s money laundering schemes. At least 9 Biden family members sold access for profit around the world. They are the definition of a crime family. Rep. Tim Burchett, told Maria Bartiromo on “Mornings with Maria” on Friday, “This is just the very tip of the...