Here’s the Jake Tapper/Victor Blackwell CNN segment on Speaker Casada’s support for Rep. David Byrd, who sits as chair of an education subcommittee even after apologizing for sexual misconduct with girls he coached.
This story is finally getting the national attention it deserves. Please watch and share. Byrd must go. Holler at Casada and Byrd if you agree.
This morning in Williamson County at a Town Hall event Speaker Casada was billed to be attending, Casada was a no-show.
The rest of the Williamson delegation – Senator Jack Johnson, Rep. Sam Whitson, and Rep. Brandon Ogles -were all there, as were some CNN cameras, but Casada was nowhere to be found.
Had he been there he would’ve been confronted by survivor Ashley Massey of Lawrence County, who bravely spoke up anyway about Casada’s support for David Byrd, who can be heard admitting on tape to sexual abuse with his former high school basketball players.
Here’s the video:
NEW VIDEO: Survivor Speaks Out At Williamson Town Hall, Speaker Casada A No-Show@SenJohnson, @ogles4staterep,Sam Whitson, even @CNN was there… but no Speaker @GlenCasada ??
Watch @ashleymassey90 bravely speak truth to power about Casada’s support for Rep. Byrd. @stopbyrd pic.twitter.com/uk6cbdPFFa
— The Tennessee Holler (@TheTNHoller) February 22, 2019
Sam Whitson got up and left, and Brandon Ogles attempted to perpetuate the false notion that anything in the Casada video posted earlier this week was being taken “out of context”.
Please share the video on Twitter and Facebook, and if you have a problem with the way they reacted, holler at Sam Whitson HERE and Brandon Ogles HERE.
Yesterday House Bill 77, the “heartbeat bill”, cleared the Public Health Subcommittee and has been referred to the Health Committee. The Senate version of the bill – SB1236, carried by Sen. Pody – was referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee last week.
Yesterday we posted a video, picked up by the Tennessean, News Channel 5, Slate, and the Huffington Post, where former congressional candidate Justin Kanew confronted Tennessee Speaker of the House Glen Casada about his support for Rep. David Byrd – who has admitted on tape to sexually assaulting players he coached at Wayne County High School.
Here’s a higher quality version of the @NC5 report on our video of @Kanew confronting Speaker @GlenCasada about his support for and promotion of admitted sex offender Rep. David Byrd.
Casada: “If I were raped, I would move.” #YOUMoveCasada @stopbyrd pic.twitter.com/7YHZJ2TGRx
— The Tennessee Holler (@TheTNHoller) February 20, 2019
Former Speaker Beth Harwell asked Byrd to step down. Speaker Casada instead ran attack ads against the victims, then promoted Byrd to chair of the education subcommittee when he was re-elected with 78% of the vote.
In the video, Kanew asks Casada if he has heard the victims’ side of the story. Casada says that he has, and that in fact he met with the victims:
“They came into my office and spoke.”
Turns out that’s news to the victims.
Christi Rice, who has been the most outspoken of the three women who have leveled the allegations at Byrd, responded to Kanew’s video on twitter saying:
Justin, I knew that I had never spoken to Casada in any way; verbal, text, letter, messenger, carrier pigeon, etc but I also confirmed with the other 2 women and none of us have spoke to Glen Casada, ever. Period.
— Christi Rice (@51christi) February 19, 2019
Meanwhile Robbie Cain said in a message to Christi Rice obtained by The Holler that she had no idea who Casada was:
The 3rd victim has remained anonymous apart from the initial WSMV interview. Christi Rice is in contact with her and says she is “absolutely” sure she has not spoken with Speaker Casada:
The Holler has reached out to Casada’s office for comment, and so far has not heard back. We will update the story if we do.
So not only did Casada attack the victims, he also didn’t even take the time to talk to them to hear their stories- then lied about whether or not he did.
There’s nothing defensible about any of this. Since posting the original video the Holler has heard from countless women of all political stripes who have stories like this of their own.
Meanwhile a reliable source has told us they saw Channel 4’s Jeremy Finley and a crew being escorted from the building by security, after going down to Casada’s office to ask around about Byrd. And we also heard CNN is down there knocking on Byrd’s door.
If you agree we don’t need an admitted sex offender in the state legislature chairing the education subcommittee, holler at Casada and Byrd, and lend your support to Enough is Enough.
Emily Tseffos is a mom, a teacher, a volunteer and community organizer with Enough is Enough Tennessee… and a survivor. She wrote this in response to a video we posted yesterday, where Speaker Glen Casada defended his support for admitted sex offender Rep. David Byrd, who he has now made chair of an education subcommittee while attacking Byrd’s victims and questioning why they didn’t come forward sooner.
This piece, of course, is purely hypothetical, and not at all about the allegations leveled against Rep. “Coach” David Byrd by 3 of his former players.
——
In a 2018 report, 3 women publicly alleged Tennessee State Representative David Byrd (Wayne, Lewis, Hardin, Lawrence counties) had sexually molested them when he was their women’s basketball coach at Wayne County High School.
The report included a recording of Byrd apologizing for it, expressing remorse, and saying he had been praying for forgiveness for it every Sunday.
Most reacted with disgust. Even members of Byrd’s own Republican party, including now-Senator Marsha Blackburn and then-Speaker Beth Harwell. Harwell even asked Byrd to step down.
Byrd refused. He ran for office again in 2018, and won in a landslide with 78% of the vote.
Newly-elected Speaker Glen Casada then promptly promoted him to chair of an Education Subcommittee, of all things.
You truly cannot make this stuff up.
Since Casada’s decision, very little has been made of Byrd’s continued presence in the legislature. A group called “Enough is Enough” has done all they can, showing up at big events like Governor Lee’s swearing in to remind Lee and Casada they’re watching, and supporting one of the victims – Christi Rice – at the Women’s March. But fellow legislators have been silent, and the media has stopped covering the matter.
Nobody has pinned Casada down for his decision – until now.
Recently, former congressional candidate Justin Kanew went to a town hall in Franklin where Speaker Casada was appearing with other members of the Williamson County delegation, and confronted Casada about his decision not only to ignore Byrd’s transgressions, but to run attack ads against the victims and elevate Byrd to chair of an education subcommittee.
Here’s the 6 minute video:
In the video Casada makes it clear he doesn’t believe Byrd did it despite his obvious admission of guilt, and even goes so far as to say if HE had been raped he would’ve come forward long before now.
As if he can possibly know what it would be like to be a young teenage girl in Wayne County who is being sexually molested by her basketball coach.
The entire situation is appalling. If you agree, please SHARE this video on FACEBOOK and TWITTER, and holler at Casada and especially Byrd and tell them you want this admitted sex offender removed from our legislature.
This column is the opinion of Chris Rowe, 2020 candidate for Congress in Tennessee’s 1st District. Follow Chris on Twitter here.
Friday, we saw our president appear on national television and declare a state of emergency for an artificial border crisis. At the same time, he admitted that not only was it unnecessary, but that he knew it was an abuse of his power.
He asked the supreme court to support his decision anyway.
Many members of congress, regardless of their party affiliation – including our own Republican Tennessee Senator Lamar Alexander – saw this for the blatant “unconstitutional” act it was and decided not to back him.
Rep. Phil Roe on the other hand, in a move that added to a string of questionable decisions recently, has come out in support of the president’s illegal power play.
This is not a decision that should be taken lightly by Tennessee’s voters. We need to hold him accountable for his actions, particularly as a member of the party that purports itself to be in favor of the “Rule of Law.”
Therefore, Congressman Roe, I have an important issue to address: If law is to rule, then the onus falls to you to take the president to task for this action, and publicly rebuke it. We cannot simultaneously advocate for “law and order” while condoning the highest office in the land making a mockery of the same.
You’ve already supported multiple unconscionable actions by our president, including holding hundreds of thousands of hard-working Americans hostage for an unnecessary wall. But declaring an unconstitutional “state of emergency” that will divert funds from actual emergencies and cost American lives should be a firm red line for anyone.
Many members of your party have already seen this for what it is, so I ask you now: can you somehow not see for yourself how damaging this is to our union? Or are you simply too afraid to stand up and fight for what’s right just because it may cost you a handful of votes?
Whichever it is, you’ve let your constituency down, you’ve let your country down, and it’s time to step up or move aside and let someone else show you how it’s done.
It’s this type of abdication of your responsibility to protect and uphold the Constitution which has directly led to my challenge for your seat, and I intend to be certain that voters remember your failure to serve them come election time.
Chris Rowe is a Democratic Candidate for Congress in Tennessee’s 1st District. Chris is a 6 year veteran of the Air Force, and a current graduate student at East Tennessee State University.
Chris has decided to take money only from real people and small businesses, not from large corporations or super PACs, to ensure he remains free of any obligation to “big” anyone.
This week a group of Democratic state representatives met with Governor Lee to implore him to reconsider his stance against expanding Medicaid in Tennessee, as most states already have.
Studies show the states that have expanded Medicaid have seen better health results, economic benefits, and fewer rural hospital closures.
Tennessee is losing $26 Billion over 10 years by not accepting billions in federal Medicaid expansion dollars that would cover hundreds of thousands of Tennesseans, including 30,000 veterans, and as a result currently leads the country in rural hospital closures per capita. The 13th rural Tennessee hospital just announced closure in Celina this week, and Democrats held an emotional press conference in the state capitol about it on Monday.
The group of Democrats calls itself the House Democratic Caucus Medicaid Expansion Task Force. They weren’t sure what kind of impact they had on Governor Lee, but said they’ll continue to try.
The general feeling was that the Williamson County-based governor doesn’t seem to understand how desperate for care some Tennesseans are, many of which don’t have another year or two left to wait for a new plan.
They did however say one thing Lee agreed with was preserving the provision of the Affordable Care Act that guarantees the protection of those with pre-existing conditions from discriminatory insurance company practices, which a Republican lawsuit in Texas seeks to undo.
From Rep. Gloria Johnson:
“We will try to continue the conversation, but it’s going to take the people rising up. The current Block Grant bill the Republicans have only takes current TennCare and turns it into block grants, probably serving fewer people than we even do now.”
The Block Grants proposal is something Tennessee Republicans are starting to push hard, with Senate leader Jack Johnson talking to the Tennessean about it this week.
Medicaid expansion is popular in Tennessee.
Block Granting Medicaid is not popular in America:
President Trump is trying to find a way to provide states like Tennessee with a block grant waiver, since they are currently illegal. Even if the president does manage to push that legislation through, it would instantly trigger lawsuits.
Meanwhile the details of the Tennessee Republicans’ Block Grants plan are “vague”, and nobody seems to be sure how it would solve the problem of covering MORE people who aren’t currently covered.
If anything the opposite would be true. The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimates recent Republican block grant proposals could cut Medicaid spending by as much as a third over the next decade. The cuts would start small, growing larger over the years.
Rep. Gloria Johnson also had this to say about Block Grants:
“Any waiver will instantly be challenged in court. This is not a good faith solution. This is folks who know they are getting hammered and want to appear as if they are doing something.”
It should also be noted that Children’s Hospitals, which rely heavily on Medicaid, are extremely against Block Grants, which they say would lead to cuts in coverage. Jim Kaufman, vice president of public policy for the Children’s Hospital Association, explained that proposals to simply block grant or shift costs to the states are the wrong way to go:
“Block grants cause cost-shifting that further burdens the financially strapped state budgets. Instead, children’s hospitals want to improve access to care while reducing costs.”
And as Republican Senator John Chafee said in opposition to Medicaid block grants back in 1996:
“As states are forced to ration finite resources under a block grant, governors and legislators would be forced to choose among three very compelling groups of beneficiaries.
Who are they? Children, the elderly, and the disabled. They are the groups that primarily they would have to choose amongst. Unfortunately, I suspect that children would be the ones that would lose out.”
Just this week House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy was heard on a phone call explaining to donors that health care issues like this are the reason Republicans got shellacked in November, and that the pre-existing conditions issue was a particular weakness.
Republicans claim to be the ones protecting the provision, but since they are also suing to undo the provision at the same time nobody seems to be buying it.
Even if you aren’t covered by Medicaid, you probably know someone who would be affected by block granting Medicaid.
To encourage Governor Lee to start listening, holler at him HERE.
It’s been known for a number of years that people who In amazon Investieren (invest in Amazon) are going to come out of the other side with a profit. It’s one of the biggest companies in the world and its growth doesn’t look to be slowing down any time soon. However, there has been an increasing number of calls for Amazon to pay tax and contribute more to society. The same have been said for people who invest in Amazon and for them they may have to read articles such as wie Plus500 mit Steuern umgeht (how the stock broker, Plus500 deals with taxes) to understand how tax may apply to any investments they make.
The same week that Amazon was called to pay tax we saw New York rise up behind Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez against $3 Billion in corporate giveaways to Amazon, forcing Amazon to change its mind about setting up shop there, we now have a report from the Institute of Tax and Economic Policy which tells us that despite doubling their profits to $11 Billion last year, Amazon will still pay an incredible 0% in Federal taxes this year.]
Must be nice! Whereas many of us are scrambling for how to file a tax extension with accountants like http://daveburton.nyc/irs-file-tax-extension, Amazon has gotten away tax-free.
This is the 2nd year in a row the Trillion-Dollar company will pay 0%. Here’s a good thread on what Amazon was getting and why the backlash happened.
The report goes on to say this about the Republican “Tax Cuts and Jobs Act”, which made the claim that despite cutting the corporate tax rate almost in half from 35% to 21%, it would somehow incentivize corporate citizenship and investment:
“The tax law failed to broaden the tax base or close a slew of loopholes that allow profitable companies to routinely avoid paying federal and state income taxes on almost half of their profits… included lavish new giveaways… a huge revenue loser.”
Meanwhile the federal debt, which Republicans claim to be very concerned about despite the fact that their new tax law exploded the deficit, has just crossed the $22 Trillion mark, and many Americans are reporting that they’re feeling it in their tax refunds.
All while inequality is at levels not seen since the days leading up the The Great Depression, CEO pay has skyrocketed, and corporate stock buybacks – not investment and wages – are at all-time highs. While there has been an increase of everyday people investing in corporate companies, this nowhere near rivals the number of stock companies are buying back from their investors. Anyone who wants to try and invest in amazon could find this website useful https://www.etf-nachrichten.de/aktien-kaufen/in-amazon-investieren/ which will hopefully help to slow down stock buybacks, giving power back to investors.
If you’re wondering why things like the Green New Deal are being proposed, look no further.
Instead of mocking ideas that seek to fix these problems, maybe those people should focus on the fact that most economic incentives are given to the biggest corporations while monopolization and the centralization of wealth are killing the everyday American, especially in rural America.
And let’s not forget about Wisconsin’s disastrous FoxConn boondoggle, where Koch brother favorite GOP Governor Scott Walker gave away billions to a company that has now had a change of heart, leaving Wisconsin taxpayers holding the bag.
This is something to keep an eye on as Amazon comes to Nashville, causing prices to spike for the people who are already there. The Republicans like to say we have low unemployment in Tennessee, which we do, but we’re also toward the bottom in how well our jobs pay.
$7.25 simply isn’t enough to live on, and Tennessee Republicans are the ones who refuse to raise the wage to a living one.
As Rep. Jason Hodges talked about in our interview with him, incentives may be necessary sometimes, but if companies want our support, they should have to pay our people a living wage.
Holler at the mayor and the governor to let them know we have our eye on the situation.
Last year Senator Sara Kyle (D-Memphis) carried a bill in the Tennessee legislature that would have added gender identity and expression to the Tennessee hate crime law, making sure Transgender individuals were covered when targeted. Legislators decided not to move forward with the bill, in part because they thought “gender” already included transgender people.
With the help of Rep. Mike Stewart (D-Nashville), LGBT advocates recently asked the Tennessee Attorney General’s office for an official opinion about whether the law in fact cover transgender people as a hate crime, which would mean harsher sentences for anyone who targeted them.
The Verdict: Yes, the law covers them.
Attorney General Slatery’s opinion uses the Oxford definition of “gender” to explain that:
“A defendant who targets a person for a crime because that person is transgender has targeted the person because of his or her gender”
Meaning that a court CAN “enhance” a sentence if the defendant has targeted a transgender person.
The opinion was delivered by Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery III’s office to Rep. Mike Stewart this week.
The LGBT community has received this as great news, calling it a “good, solid victory.
From Chris Sanders of the Tennessee Equality Project:
“After hearing testimony in a legislative committee and considering the need to make sure transgender people have more protections, we followed a hunch and it worked. We are grateful to Rep. Mike Stewart for working diligently with us on this and to Sen. Sara Kyle, who carried the trans-inclusive hate crimes bill last year.”
Despite this win, there are still a number of discriminatory bills snaking their way through the legislature. Read about them here, and holler at your state reps to let them know hate has no home in Tennessee.
And while we’re here, some facts and myths about transgender people with regard to those bathroom bills, which are still around.
