Memphis rallies for progressive Democrat after four fatal shootings by taskforce: ‘Fight of our lives’ | US politics
More than a thousand people rallied for Democratic state Rep. Justin Pearson, who is running for Congress, following four deadly shootings by members of the Memphis Safe Task Force in the past two months.
The crowd packed New Direction Christian Church in the city’s Hickory Hill neighborhood to support Pearson, who is running in the Democratic primary for the now-fragmented ninth congressional district.
“Today, we are fighting the fight of our lives to make this region, our state, and this nation better for ourselves and those who come after us,” Pearson said.
“If God is for us, it doesn’t matter if all the white supremacists in the Tennessee General Assembly are against us and nothing can separate us from the love of God found in Jesus Christ. No matter what they call us, no matter where they red-line us, no matter how they try to lynch us, no matter what. Grandma said: “‘If God’s for us, it doesn’t matter who or what is against.'”
He was joined by progressive U.S. representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Summer Lee of Pennsylvania.
“Justin came to the aid of a neighbor in need in quiet moments,” Pressley said. “It’s revealed at pivotal moments when our rights are at stake. It’s revealed when the nation is watching Tennessee.”
Pearson is one of two legislators expelled from the Republican-controlled Tennessee legislature in April 2023 after protesting the lack of gun control legislation following the Covenant school shooting in Nashville earlier that year. The Shelby County Commission later reappointed him to his seat.
Tennessee lawmakers quickly redrew the state’s congressional districts in May following the U.S. supreme court’s blockbuster Callais decision, which effectively struck down the Voting Rights Act. The redistricting split the ninth district, the state’s only Democratic district covering a city of 400,000 Black residents, into three, none of which have a Democratic voting majority.
“Memphis, I hope you know that you are at the epicenter of a storm coming across every part of this country,” Lee said, likening redistricting to the Jim Crow South. “When I can’t afford gas, I don’t need a white paper on affordability… There are a lot of people who keep our heads down and hope we can get back to a normal that didn’t work in Memphis. That normal didn’t work for Pittsburgh, and I know that normal doesn’t work across this country.”
Pearson, 31, has emerged as a progressive firebrand during her short tenure as an elected official. He had planned to challenge Steve Cohen, Memphis’ long-serving Democratic congressman before redistricting, but Cohen retired rather than run in the reshuffled district.
Pearson hopes to leverage the volunteer military and the power of progressive politics in the Democratic primaries, as recent victories for democratic socialists in New York and elsewhere show.
“When I think about where my first political consciousness was formed, I see that it did not actually come from a book written by Marx,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “It came from watching what happened in Memphis, Montgomery, Selma and Atlanta.”
Dr. He cited the writings of Martin Luther King Jr. and his ambitions for the country in the days before his assassination in Memphis, and said the speed with which Republicans redistricted in Memphis was not an accident of timing. “We’re here to pick up where King left off 50 years ago.”
He touched on the environmental damage caused by the xAI data center on Memphis’ south side and Elon Musk’s wealth, which were recurring topics at the rally.
“Long before Justin fought for dignity on the floor of the Tennessee House, he grew up in Southwest Memphis, the most polluted part of the city,” Ocasio-Cortez said, noting how Pearson was an environmental activist before running for public office. “He scheduled public meetings with his neighbors and against all odds, together with the people of this incredible city, they forced not one but two billion-dollar companies to abandon their projects.”
Pearson will face M LaTroy A-Williams, London Lamar and Jim Torino in the August 6 Democratic primary.
Hickory Hill has seen disproportionate attention from state and federal law enforcement in the police raid. Teams of state, federal and local police officers frequently stage traffic stops and arrests at the mall and school near the New Direction church.
Families of some of those killed by special forces agents also joined Pearson on stage.
Recently, the death of 20-year-old Tywin Johnson began to spark outrage among Memphians. Johnson was a musician with no criminal record who was killed by National Guard soldiers responding to a report of a suspected robbery downtown.
While task force spokespeople said Johnson was armed, they declined to elaborate on the circumstances that led troops to open fire on a civilian and refused to release video footage captured by a Memphis police street camera hanging almost immediately above the scene of the shooting, even as Johnson’s family urged authorities to release the footage. Soldiers were not wearing body cameras.
Pearson said the deaths were foreseeable when Donald Trump ordered federal agents into the city last year.
“Our worst fears have come true,” he said. “Let us remember these beloved families whose lives were changed forever.”
