Today I picked up papers to run for the Tennessee General Assembly. That’s the state legislature, which meets in Nashville and makes our laws.

When I ran for this seat the first time in 2022, I was the only Democratic challenger to a Republican state legislator in Hamilton County. Three Republican state reps and one Republican state senator ran unopposed. 

I’m running to represent Tennessee State House District 26. If you live in a different district and no Democrat steps up to run by mid-March, please consider running too.

Right now the Republicans who hold the majority in our state legislature operate like driverless cars. They’ve been programmed by lobbyists to go in a certain direction. If you want to go where they’re going, good for you. But if you don’t, too bad. Nothing you say will alter their course a bit.

Ask the Covenant School moms who went to Nashville begging for basic gun safety laws. They had every reason to believe their legislators would listen to them and respond. They were on the same team, right? Team R? It didn’t matter. 

Most Tennesseans aren’t being represented in the State House. We’re being taken for a ride. 

We want basic gun safety laws? Thanks to lobbyists, the only gun law we got last year was civil indemnity for gun makers. We want reasonable access to abortion. Thanks to lobbyists, we got a total ban.

If you think you’re not qualified to sit in the Tennessee General Assembly, think again. All our Republican lawmakers do is take money and marching orders. Lobbyists write their laws. And half of them ran unopposed in 2022.

To run for the TGA, you have to be at least 21, a Tennessee resident for three years, a resident of the county where you’re running for one year, and a registered voter in your legislative district.

You can pick up a petition to run at your county elections office. Get 25 signatures from registered voters in your district, plus some extra to be safe, and return the petition by noon April 4. Boom. You’re on the ballot.

Yes, it feels like jumping out of airplane. Do it anyway.

Considering a run and want to talk? Email me at [email protected].