‘‘If Republicans are going to be the party of Big Tech, Big Oil, Big Pharma and Big Tobacco, giving tax breaks to the billionaires, let us be the party of the farmer and the factory worker, the nurse and the nail tech, the innovator and the immigrant. Let us be the party of the people, the people who still believe, the people who still hope, the people who still seek to make the American dream real in our lifetime.’
State Rep. Justin J. Pearson won an overwhelming victory in the Democratic primary for U.S. House in Tennessee’s 9th Congressional District in early August. His win was one of a number by progressive candidates in primaries across the South and elsewhere in the country. These victories are a bright spot in a midterm election year that has been marked so far by escalating government attacks on voting rights and huge spending by corporations and billionaires trying to buy the elections.
“The political dilution and degradation of our rights is happening,” Pearson said after his primary victory. But, he added, “We’re one step closer to Washington, D.C.”
The attack on voting rights, which included redrawing the lines of the district in which Pearson is running in November, apparently helped spark a big voter turnout, especially among Black voters. “Democratic turnout for House primaries in a majority-Black Tennessee county surged to the highest level in a decade Thursday [Aug. 6], the latest sign that redistricting may be energizing Black voters across the South,” the Washington Post reported.
The 9th Congressional District where Pearson ran had been Tennessee’s only majority-Black congressional district until it was redrawn by the state Legislature back in May. With the redistricting, the district went from being roughly 60% Black to being 58% white. The new district also contains a majority of voters who favored Trump in 2024. The Tennessee Legislature carried out the redistricting after the U.S. Supreme Court’s April 29 decision in the case of Louisiana v. Callais, in which the court further weakened the Voting Rights Act and set the stage for just the kind of anti-minority redistricting that was then enacted in Tennessee and a number of other states.
Fittingly, Pearson’s victory came 61 years to the day after the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was signed into law.
Pearson pointed to the issues he ran on as the basis for his primary win. He told Democracy Now!, “We won the Democratic nomination, and the reason we’re going to win the general election, is because we’re focusing on the issues that people care about here in the state of Tennessee and, honestly, all across the country. Costs are too high. Gas is too expensive. Groceries are too high. People need access to healthcare. And people don’t want toxic data centers polluting the air that they breathe. And so, those are the issues that we’re focusing on: pass Medicare for All, increase the minimum wage, tax the billionaires and make sure that we stop toxic data centers from popping up in our communities, whether they be in Memphis, Tennessee, or in Lawrenceburg, Tennessee. And we’re finding Democrats, Republicans and independents are all supporting that message, because we believe that the best days for Tennessee are still ahead of us.”
He also said, “I think people are responding to a need for our democratic institutions to actually stand up and to fight for our people.”
Pearson won the primary with just under 66% of the vote, beating three other candidates. His nearest competitor was state Sen. London Lamar, who got just over 24% of the vote. Pearson has a history as an environmental justice organizer and advocate, and is known for vocally taking on the powerful and for criticizing the Democrats for taking corporate PAC money. Lamar described herself as a more traditional Democrat, though she was addressing many of the same issues as Pearson in the primary. “I think the difference between he [Pearson] and I is that instead of fighting the system, I want to use the system in order to benefit the people that I serve,” Lamar told Memphis outlet MLK50 before the election.
The Nov. 3 general election is seen by many as a referendum on Trump’s handling of the economy, the war, the ICE raids, and the growing dictatorship, and thus on Republican control of the Congress. The Democratic primaries are seen as a referendum on progressive vs. corporate Democrats, and the Republican primaries as a referendum on Trump, with some Trump-endorsed candidates losing their races. In the Nov. 3 general election, Pearson’s opponent will be Republican State Sen. Brent Taylor, who is a Trump supporter.
Pearson, 31, gained national prominence in 2023 when he was expelled along with two other legislators from the Tennessee House after helping lead protests in the state capitol demanding the Legislature enact gun control legislation in the wake of a school shooting in Nashville. He was reinstated to the Legislature a week later by the vote of a local government body.
In a recent speech to the Texas state Democratic Convention, Pearson said, “If the Republican Party is going to be the party of AI taking away our jobs, the party of corporate handouts and blank checks for foreign wars, let us be the party to deliver an increase to the minimum wage. Let us be the party to deliver universal healthcare. Let us be the party to deliver a federal jobs guarantee, so Americans can put food on their table and a roof over their head. And let us be the party that demands a moratorium on data centers be passed by the United States Congress.
“If Republicans are going to be the party of Big Tech, Big Oil, Big Pharma and Big Tobacco, giving tax breaks to the billionaires, let us be the party of the farmer and the factory worker, the nurse and the nail tech, the innovator and the immigrant. Let us be the party of the people, the people who still believe, the people who still hope, the people who still seek to make the American dream real in our lifetime.”
Bob Lee is a professional journalist, writer and editor, and is co-editor of the People’s Tribune, serving as Managing Editor. He first started writing for and distributing the People’s Tribune in 1980, and joined the editorial board in 1987.
