Justin Jones Assault Video Shows Violent Tennessee Republican

Democratic state Rep. Justin Jones enters the Home chamber forward of a session as protesters chant demanding motion for gun reform legal guidelines within the state on the Tennessee State Capitol on April 3, 2023, in Nashville. | Supply: Seth Herald / Getty

A Democratic lawmaker in Tennessee dealing with expulsion over his advocacy for tighter gun legal guidelines within the wake of final week’s Nashville elementary college capturing was bodily assaulted by a Republican on the State Home flooring on Monday, video footage reveals.

State Rep. Justin Jones, a Democrat who’s Black and Filipino, was struck by Rep. Justin Lafferty as chaos broke out within the Tennessee capitol constructing amid a Republican-led effort to maintain state gun legal guidelines unchanged.

As Jones recorded the raucous scene of residents chanting “fascists!” at Republicans, he centered on Lafferty, who was additionally holding his telephone to doc the protests. Jones continued to report from the Home flooring, exhibiting folks chanting from the balconies whereas being faraway from the premises by legislation enforcement. However when he panned his digital camera telephone again towards Lafferty, the Republican appeared to take a swing towards Jones’ head, knocking the Democrats’ telephone from his hand.

“Lafferty pushes me and grabs my telephone,” Jones stated in a tweet exhibiting the video footage. He known as it “a tragic day for Tennessee.”

Native information outlet the Tennessee Lookout described Lafferty as “grabbing Jones’ telephone and shoving the freshman lawmaker.”

Lafferty’s violence got here as Jones and two different Democratic state lawmakers are dealing with expulsion from the Home due to their roles in main a protest within the capitol constructing final week. A vote is scheduled to happen on Thursday when Jones and fellow State Reps. Justin Pearson and Gloria Johnson may discover themselves formally faraway from their positions.

The Home Democratic Caucus and Tennessee Black Caucus known as the unprecedented transfer “political retribution” that’s each “unconstitutional” and “morally bankrupt,” contemplating the context of the protests.

Home Democratic Caucus Chief John Ray Clemmons additionally stated Lafferty is responsible of “assault.”

Home Republicans, then again, have argued that Jones, Johnson and Pearson “did knowingly and deliberately deliver dysfunction and dishonor to the Home of Representatives via their particular person and collective actions.”

Conservatives have been busy deflecting blame for final week’s lethal capturing rampage on the Covenant Faculty, the place three 9-year-old kids and three adults have been killed by a gunman.

In a single obtrusive instance of conservatives inexplicably refusing to acknowledge the function weapons play in mass shootings, a Fox Information contributor blamed the mindless violence on the Covenant Faculty on an “unlocked” door that was really locked in spite of everything.

“We have to bear in mind, the aspect door, I don’t know the precise information of this second however from what I perceive a aspect door was unlocked,” Fox contributor Nicole Parker, who’s a former FBI agent, stated within the hours after the capturing. “That appears to be a typical sample in lots of of those shootings. A aspect door.”

In fact, Parker’s evaluation was utterly unsuitable as surveillance footage from the college later confirmed 28-year-old former Covenant Faculty pupil Audrey E. Hale utilizing one of many a number of highly effective weapons they needed to shoot via the locked door.

To not be outdone, Florida Republican Congressman Byron Donalds advised searching for tighter gun legal guidelines in Tennessee was the results of “emotion” and never logic.

“In the event you’re going to speak concerning the AR-15, we’re speaking politics now…Let’s not get into emotion,” Donalds stated in reference to an occasion that concerned three nine-year-olds being ruthlessly gunned down. “As a result of emotion feels good, however emotion doesn’t clear up issues.”

Donalds then advised the subject of psychological well being be prioritized, not weapons, as if each can’t be achieved on the identical time.

“Persons are allowed to own firearms,” Donalds went on to say. “Want is within the eye of the beholder. I don’t query why you want a blue go well with, however you bought one.”

That is America.