(The Center Square) – Tennessee Democratic leaders announced the first leg of their statewide gun reform bus tour Tuesday as discussions remain heated heading into a planned Aug. 21 special session of the Tennessee Legislature on public safety.
The tour will begin at 5 p.m. on Wednesday at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, move to the West Tennessee Farmers Market in Jackson at 11 a.m. on Thursday and then Mulberry Mill in Dickson at 2:30 p.m. on Thursday before heading to Patriots Park in Clarksville at noon Saturday.
The second week of the tour will be announced later, concluding on Aug. 21 at the Tennessee State Capitol in Nashville.
Sen. London Lamar, D-Memphis, said a large reason for the tour was to build public pressure for gun reform.
“Gun violence is a public health crisis. After a decade of Republicans eliminating gun safety laws, shootings are now the leading cause of death for children in Tennessee and innocent people are dying everyday,” Lamar said. “Ending gun violence has always been one of my top priorities and I will keep fighting for gun safety until we finally restore some sanity to our laws.”
The tour comes as Rep. John Ragan, R-Oak Ridge, requested and shared a study from the Tennessee Comptroller’s Office showing there have been 49 school shootings with 12 fatalities in the state over the past 25 years with 75% coming at high schools and half of the non-shooter fatalities coming earlier this year at Nashville’s Covenant School.
“No one seems to be crying out to ban hypodermic needles because of overdose deaths,” Ragan wrote in a letter to fellow lawmakers. “Likewise, nobody is demanding a ban on Corvettes and Mustangs because of drunk-driver-caused fatalities. Guns, like hypodermic needles and automobiles, have legitimate uses other than causing criminally-inflicted deaths. Consequently, logic seems to require a focus on something other than the inanimate object involved in a criminally-inflicted death.”
One of the most controversial bills expected to come in the special session is a red flag law proposed by Gov. Bill Lee, which he calls a temporary mental health order of protection.
The bill, opposed by many Tennessee Republican leaders in the Legislature and interest groups who have voiced their disagreement, would prevent an individual from having firearms or ammunition for up to 180 days if a law enforcement officer or agency issues an order.
