Tennessee State Representatives Justin Jones (D-Nashville) and Justin Pearson (D-Memphis), who were expelled from the state House of Representatives last month, protested in Washington D.C. over the weekend.
A powerful message from @Justinjpearson of the #TennesseeThree, who just joined us on the blockade line at the White House Correspondents Dinner.
“In this fight for justice, we must remain unmovable in our belief in a clean planet!”
That’s right. It’s time to #EndFossilFuels. pic.twitter.com/IlVMOuxGZw
— Climate Defiance (@ClimateDefiance) April 29, 2023
Jones and Pearson were expelled last month after they, along with State Representative Gloria Johnson (D-Knoxville), commandeered the House Floor to demand gun control in the wake of the Covenant Presbyterian School shooting three days prior.
Both Jones and Pearson have since been reinstated to their positions by the Nashville Metro City Council and Shelby County Commission on an interim basis.
@Justinjpearson also making an appearance pic.twitter.com/T3xjdc7Xq7
— Mia Camille McCarthy (@Reporter_Mia) April 30, 2023
On Saturday, Jones and Pearson were spotted in Washington D.C., taking part in a protest organized by the environmentalist group Climate Defiance. The group attempted to blockade the White House Correspondents Dinner.
The group was protesting the Biden administration’s recent approval of a 30-year Alaskan oil drilling project, known as the Willow Project. The protesters alleged that through the move, the Biden administration was committing “ecocide.”
Jones and Pearson’s appearance at the protest came less than one week after they, along with Representative Johnson, visited the White House and met with both President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
It was my pleasure welcoming the Tennessee Three to the White House.
Thank you, Representatives Justin Jones, Justin Pearson, and Gloria Johnson, for your leadership and courage to stand up for safer communities and democratic values. pic.twitter.com/oFRsQ19kCo
— President Biden (@POTUS) April 28, 2023
Climate Defiance’s Saturday protest in Washington D.C. may not be its last. According to its website, the group’s D.C. protest marked the first “nonviolent direct action” in wake of President Biden’s “failure” to deliver on promises regarding ends to “new leasing on federal lands.”
The group’s website states:
WE WILL START WITH A SERIES OF NONVIOLENT DIRECT ACTIONS CASCADING WITH A MASS TURNOUT BLOCKADE OF THE WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENTS DINNER.
The President promised us an end to new leasing on federal lands but failed to deliver. Now, he needs to hear from the voting block that delivered him the 2022 midterm elections.
We will provide direct action training to all participants.
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network.
Photo “Justin Jones” by Climate Defiance.
These climate activists need to grow up and realize how many products are produced as a direct result of oil or as a byproduct of oil. The US drills for oil in the cleanest way possible while other countries produce oil in a more environmentally harmful way. These people have no clue how this country would change without oil. They obviously don’t know why the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. It was because the US put a blockade of their oil imports. They didn’t produce their own and that made them vulnerable. The world isn’t full of peace and love. That’s a fantasy world.
I think that the environmentalists should be sent to China and India where they can do more good for the environment, where the world pollution is actually coming from!
More grandstanders without a clue. Just like AOC.
Good to see Dems backstabbing Dems
Expelled Tennessee Democrats Turn on Biden Days After Being Welcomed to White House
Well, those Tennessee Democrats may have turned on Biden; but, then, Biden has turned on America.
All these climate defiance/change Democrats are ignorant of the fact that the earth’s climate has been changing continually for over 4 billion years. They don’t really know what they want, and they’ll fight like they devil to get it. What they should really be noticing are the deteriorating conditions brought about Biden’s policies concerning border security, government spending, public safety and health, bank and student loan bailouts, national security and the weaponization of federal judicial agencies to harass people who disagree with Biden and his acolytes in Congress.
One can be quite certain that Jones and Pearson and the rest of the protesters did not travel to D.C. in a true carbon free manner. Thus they were committing “ecocide” by their very protest.