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Disgraced Former Speaker’s N Word-Using Chief: “Send KKK Bust To Museum”

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On August 2nd, speaker Glen Casada became former Speaker Glen Casada. Cameron Sexton will be stepping in to fill his very small shoes during a special session August 23rd.

The disgraced now-former Tennessee speaker’s downfall can be traced back to his refusal to meet with activists who insisted the bust of Nathan Bedford Forrest – the KKK’s first Grand Wizard – be removed from the capitol. This week, Casada’s also disgraced former chief of staff Cade Cothren, who was outed for using the N Word and calling black people “idiots”, among other things, joined them in their call to move the bust, saying in a Twitter conversation it should be “sent to a museum”.

The list of Casada’s transgressions is long – we did our best to list them in video form HERE – but the beginning of his downfall can be traced back to one very specific issue: The bust of the KKK’s first Grand Wizard Nathan Bedford Forrest, which sits prominently in Tennessee’s state Capitol, and Casada’s refusal to meet with the activists who have long been calling for its removal.

Casada’s predecessor Speaker Beth Harwell Met with the activists, many of which are students. Casada would not. Instead, he gave them the runaround, dodging them in the halls of the Capitol and having his chief of staff Cothren lie directly to their faces about misspelled emails.

Eventually the frustration of activists Justin Jones and Jeneisha Harris boiled over and resulted in Jones throwing a paper cup of iced (not hot) tea (not coffee) at Casada as he fled into a private elevator.

The assault & disorderly conduct charges filed against Justin Jones and Jeneisha Harris respectively in the aftermath are still pending. (The next hearing is August 15th at 9AM in courtroom 4D)

Another issue still outstanding is that of Casada’s former Chief of staff Cade Cothren, who resigned amid numerous scandals of his own, and whether or not he falsified the date on an email date to make it look like Jones contacted Casada in violation of a court order, which would have landed Jones in jail.

Casada and Cothren claim the date discrepancy can be chalked up to an issue with the legislature’s SPAM filters delaying the email, and special prosecutor on the case Craig Northcott – the D.A. in Coffee County, who himself is under fire for open Islamophobia, homophobia, and a refusal to respect the authority of the Supreme Court – appears to be taking their word for it. Despite calls by Jones, and even Cothren himself, for Northcott to bring in the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation for an independent investigation about the possibly fraudulent emails, Northcott has refused.

The possible framing of a civil rights activist aside, Cothren resigned due to numerous other scandals – many of which Casada was complicit in – including lewd, sexist texts and behavior, an admission that he was doing cocaine at his desk during work hours, and racism. Lots of racism. 

Cothren used the “N Word” to describe quarterback Jameis Winston. He said “black people are idiots.” The list goes on.

A lot has happened since the beginning of Casada and Cothren’s downfall, and so many Phil Williams stories later it’s hard to remember how it all started… but it can all be traced back to one thing: That bust of the KKK’s first Grand Wizard in the legislature.

Casada has not expressed a willingness to move the bust, instead saying that adding “historical context” would be more appropriate (without specifying what that means).

Govenor Lee says a “conversation needs to be had” about the bust, again without providing specifics, and just recently agreed to take action to stop celebrating July 13th as “Nathan Bedford Forrest Day” after nationwide backlash – including from Republican Senator Ted Cruz – in the wake of his signing a proclamation to reaffirm it.

While Casada and Lee remain noncommittal, Casada’s “N Word”-using Former Chief of staff Cade Cothren has now changed his tune, conceding in a conversation on Twitter with Nashville native @AliceRolli1 that the bust should indeed be moved:

The comment comes as part of what appears to be an effort by Cothren to repair his image, an effort that has mainly consisted of joining Twitter and sending Taylor Swift memes to his critics while using Taylor Swift lyrics to challenge them to a fight in his Twitter bio.

“Sure, send it to the museum” is clearly a flippant, dismissive way to come around to a position on a serious topic concerning a statue much of Tennessee’s African-American population considers to be a painful reminder of a dark past. That being said, it’s also a clear departure from the official position his disgraced boss Casada’s office held when the then-speaker was dodging Jones & Harris in the halls, turning a deaf ear to protestors who were imploring Tennessee leadership to listen to Tennessee’s black citizens and move the symbol of hate.

Cothren is clearly trying to make himself employable in the state of Tennessee again so his motives can’t be viewed as entirely altruistic, but if a Republican speaker’s chief of staff who once said “black People are idiots” and called Jameis Winston the N Word is now willing to publicly call for the bust to be sent to a museum… well, these days in Tennessee, that certainly counts as progress.

Holler at Governor Lee and soon-to-be Speaker Sexton if you agree it’s time to “send the bust to the museum”.

Casada Ex-Chief Cothren “FOR” Independent TBI Email Investigation

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Speaker Casada’s Chief of staff Cade Cothren has just joined twitter, and has responded to us on Twitter saying he welcomes an independent investigation into the possibly falsified emails he’s suspected of sending to Nashville D.A. Glenn Funk to get civil rights activist Justin Jones thrown in jail.

As you know by now, speaker Glen Casada is stepping down among a whirlwind of scandals, and will soon be replaced by Cameron Sexton in a special session August 23rd.

Aside from the lying, racism, sexism, cocaine-snorting, misuse of campaign funds, the list goes on… the one thing that has stood out as potentially the ugliest of all was the possibility Speaker Casada’s office had falsified the date on an email they received from civil rights activist Justin Jones in an attempt to revoke the terms of his bail and have him thrown in jail.

This came on the heels of an incident where Jones threw an iced tea cup at the speaker in frustration after Casada’s aide Cade Cothren had lied and said Jones was getting his email wrong when requesting a meeting (he wasn’t).

Casada’s office was asked about the discrepancies in the email dates by Channel 5’s Phil Williams, and were silent at first, before then saying the confusion was the result of the emails being stuck in the SPAM folder at the legislature – odd considering even the font seems to have change in the screen shot presented to the District Attorney.

Nashville D.A. Glenn Funk recused himself from the case since he was the recipient of the email, which is when Coffee County D.A. Craig Northcott entered the picture. We have since revealed that Northcott is an open Islamophobe and Homophobe who refuses to recognize the Supreme court’s authority and won’t treat LGBT people equally under the law.

Jones and his attorneys have tried to get Northcott removed from the case because of his clear disdain for the constitution, but so far that hasn’t happened.

In the meantime Northcott has used his prosecutorial discretion to not take the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation up on the offer to perform an independent investigation into the possibly falsified emails, instead taking the IT department at the legislature’s word for it – a group that serves at the behest of Speaker Casada.

If indeed the issue was something as simple as an email being stuck in a SPAM folder, why not call for an independent investigation? Why not clear the names of Casada and Cothren and let Tennesseans know that those two may be liars and sexist and crude and in Cothren’s case (at least) deeply racist, but they may not have actually tried to used their power to get Jones thrown in jail?

This shouldn’t be a partisan issue. Knowing what really happened to those emails from an impartial source would be a step toward healing for Tennessee, and judging by his tweets Cothren himself seems to agree, at least on the surface.

He has just joined Twitter and has taken time out from answering months-old mentions of himself with Taylor Swift memes…

….to say that he is “FOR” an independent investigation by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation.

So what’s the hold up?

If you believe Northcott should take Cothren up on that offer, holler at him HERE: 931-723-5057

Jones’ next hearing is August 15th at 9AM. Watch our new VIDEO from the last hearing:

John Oliver Gloriously Roasts Casada & Cothren

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Beyond our wildest dreams we never would have imagined the great John Oliver shining his light on the ugliness that is Casadagate, but that glorious day has arrived.

If you’ve ever wanted to hear John Oliver say the words “Cade Cothren’s Rapidly-Expelled Ejaculate”, now is your chance.

We wish he would have mentioned his support for Rep. Byrd, and possibly framing Justin Jones, but hey- we’ll take what we can get.

Casada Talks To Phil Valentine, Defends Racist Staffer, Calls Out Phil Williams

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Speaker Glen Casada recently went on Phil Valentine’s radio show on 99.7 to address the recent situation(s) with his racist chief of staff. It was the longest Casada has spoken about the issues, so we figured we’d break down what he said here…

They started by talking about the dust-up at the legislature on the final day, where Democrats were kept off of key committees then locked inside the house by Casada when they attempted to leave in protest during a recess.

Valentine asks:

“Let’s start with this whole notion Democrats were locked inside the house floor, is there any truth to that?”

He seems to expect Casada to say “nope, no truth at all”. Casada does not:

“They were elected to serve the people, and to vote. State law is very clear that if you’re not there in the chamber the speaker has the authority to come get you by state trooper… if they had left the building I was going to have state troopers come get ’em.”

In other words, yes, he did that.

Valentine then recalibrates, calling it “routine”. Casada agrees, saying the law is if you’re going to be a state legislator “you cannot leave with no cause” and “We’re not going to forcefully hold someone in a room. But we were reminding them of their duties.”

Welcome to Glen Casada’s Tennessee.

Anyway, moving on… next Valentine brings up Speaker Casada’s $200,000 chief of staff Cade Cothren’s text messages, which call Tampa Bay QB Jameis Winson a “thug nig*er” and says “black people are idiots”, among other things.

Here are some screen shots from Channel 5’s Phil Williams, who broke the story:

Valentine:

“The text messages – You’ve seen those. Are they real?”

Casada:

“You know, I asked my chief of staff point blank: ‘Did you do this?’ He said, ‘Glen, you know me. You know my character… Phil, I’ve worked with him for 10 years. I have never heard him make a derogatory, racist, or bigoted statement.”

Well, if you asked him and he said “no” Glen, that should be good enough for anyone!

This seems like a good time to point out that we uncovered Cade’s Venmo account which also has racist *digital blackface* emojis, as well as some blatant homophobia:

Also, Cade Cothren has now deleted all of his social media accounts. Not quite the actions of an innocent man.

Casada then turns to the issue of whether or not his office falsified evidence by changing the date on an email to frame civil rights activist Justin Jones and get him thrown in jail for violating a no-contact order, as Channel 5 reported.

To Recap: Jones sent an email to Casada’s office on February 25th. Casada’s office says they received it March 1st, which would violate a no-contact order put on Jones by the D.A.’s office in the wake of an assault charge for throwing iced tea at the speaker, who was avoiding meeting with Jones about removing the bust of the first KKK Grand Wizard sitting in the capitol.

Casada’s Chief of Staff had previously lied to Jones, telling him he was misspelling the word “capitol” in his emails, when he wasn’t.

Upon receipt of the email with the March 1st date from Casada’s office, D.A. Glenn Funk’s office filed a motion to have Jones thrown in jail, before eventually circling back to Casada’s office about the date discrepancy and dropping the motion.

Here’s the latest explanation for what happened, from I.T. at the legislature – which says the email was held by them before releasing it days later.

But forgive us for remaining skeptical, since we’ve heard from state reps who say they’ve received pornography from outside the legislature without it being caught up in the system.

Questions remain:

Why would a REPLY from someone Cothren was already emailing with get caught up in the system?

And would the date on a “quarantined” email say when it hit the Speaker’s office, or when it initially hit the system? (We’ve heard from many IT people who say the latter)

And why would these messages from Phil Williams, which contain no inflammatory content, not have made it through to Casada’s office?

All due respect to the I.T. department at the legislature, we’re going to need to hear from someone who doesn’t work for Speaker Casada about all of this.

D.A. Glenn Funk’s office needs to investigate.

We’ve asked Funk’s office what the scope of the special prosecutor’s investigation is – are they looking into all of this? Or are they just looking into the actions of Justin Jones?

So far we haven’t heard back.

The racists texts from Casada’s Chief of Staff are one thing, but if his office was intentionally falsifying evidence to get a man thrown in jail, that’s something that must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Back to the interview, Casada then tried to use the technical defense of the date discrepancy to turn the tables on Channel 5’s Phil Williams, essentially saying that if the falsification of evidence story was explainable, that then calls the racist text messages part of the story into question:

“Here’s what we know about this Phil Williams story – the emails he alleged that we doctored is false, and our I.T. department has contacted Channel 5 and said here’s the timeline, here’s the evidence that it went into Casada’s office on March 1st… they still allege we tampered with it. The evidence shows we didn’t. If Channel 5 is willing to run a story they know isn’t true – or at a minimum, misleading – could the rest of the story be false? Did someone feed Phil Williams false text messages that were not real?”

See what Casada’s doing there? He’s using a maybe plausible explanation for the email date discrepancy to then cast aspersions on the veracity of the racists texts from his Chief of Staff Cade Cothren – and, in turn, Phil Williams of Channel 5.

Here’s the problem though: As you can see above, Cothren wasn’t responding to Phil Williams when he was asking for an explanation. He also didn’t respond when Williams showed up with a camera, and neither did Casada, whose only answer was “I know nothing, about that.”

Then, hours later, they had their story straight.

So to act like Williams didn’t give them every opportunity to explain themselves is simply disingenuous.

As for the veracity of the texts – again, this is something that is easily proven or disproven by whoever has the texts. But knowing what we know about Cothren’s Venmo account (see above), it’s hard to believe they aren’t real.

And in the background of all of this is the fact that this started because the speaker refuses to move the bust of the KKK’s first Grand Wizard, and that the speaker supported and promoted admitted child sex abuser Rep. David Byrd – while lying about the easily disprovable fact that he had met with Byrd’s victims, when he had not.

You can see why anyone who’s paying attention would have trouble taking Casada’s word for anything these days.

Casada then goes on to tell Phil Valentine he has “full faith and confidence” that his chief of staff is not a racist:

“I am convinced in this environment that we live in, because we as conservatives are winning the intellectual battle, I’m convinced some liberal guy living with his mom and dad in their basement created this to frame my chief of staff… I can’t prove it, but it’s the only thing that makes sense.”

No, Glen – your chief of staff being a racist also makes a lot of sense.

Also, racism and forgery are not partisan issues. Casada would like to politicize this, but Every Tennessean who isn’t a racist should be deeply concerned if Casada’s #1 guy is using the N word and calling black people “idiots”, and his office framing people.

The callback to President Trump’s “guy living in a basement” excuse is cute, but let’s not forget Trump used that to say Russia was NOT hacking and tampering with our election, which we now know from Mueller they WERE.

May want to choose a better example next time, Glen.

Valentine then asks Casada what he’ll do if he *finds out* the text messages are real (reminder: he knows they are, so take this with a grain of salt).

Casada:

“There is no room for anybody at the state capitol to be bigoted or a racist or a hatemongerer. So no matter who it is they would be either resigned or let go. But that’s how much confidence I have in my chief of staff that he did not do this.”

He’s on record: If they’re real, Cade’s gone.

Valentine asks Casada if he’ll require Cothren to turn over his phone. Casada says it’s his personal phone so he can’t compel him to turn it over:

“That would be a bar we ask no one else to comply with… he in front of me typed in key words to see if it would pop up on his phone, and it did not.”

As we all know, all you need to do is delete the text conversation for the words to disappear, so this is a really bad excuse. Hiring Mobile Phone Forensic Experts to properly analyze the phone and recover any deleted texts would be the best way of investigating these rumors.

Casada then goes on to poke the hornets nest that is Phil Williams:

“Phil Williams gets sued for slander about every other day. So this is not the first time he’s run that kind of story… he knew it wasn’t true, and they still ran the story.”

It is true that Phil Williams has had a run-in with a defamation lawyer more than once, but in a truth-off between Glen Casada and Williams, we’ll ride with Williams 10 times out of 10.

We’re not sure going at Williams like this is in the Speaker’s best interest, but time will tell. In the meantime we’ll have our DVR set for Channel 5 at 6pm for the foreseeable future.

Casada also added:

“When we found out the next day, we opened it up and read it, and in the body of the email from Justin Jones it did say February 25, we contacted the D.A.’s office and we said look we said this but we don’t know why it says February 25th… our I.T. Department can 100% say it didn’t go into my inbox until March 1st.”

It’s unclear who initiated the dialogue about the date discrepancy. Some emails seem to show it was actually the D.A.’s office who caught it, not Casada’s office. Also, “the next day” is an interesting phrase to use, since the motion to revoke Jones’ bond was filed on March 4th.

Casada then closes by saying:

“I’ve done a little research. These messages can be created and made to look authentic. That’s why I’m convinced this is a hatchet job by liberal activists.”

Again, Cothren has deleted all social media. He was racist and homophobic on Venmo. He lied to Justin Jones about misspelling “capitol” in emails, and Casada himself lied about meeting with Rep. Byrd’s victims.

Casada has repeatedly shown us his relationship with the truth is distant. Regardless of party, everyone should be concerned about what it says about Tennessee’s speaker of the house that he’s so willing to support admitted child sex offenders and blatant racists.

Valentine then asks about Cothren’s $200,000 a year salary, and asks Casada to commit to lowering it to something more reasonable, but Casada refuses:

“What he does is invaluable.. it’s a very high stress job. The better people are paid well. When you do that you don’t get someone who’s top-notch.”

Let’s remember that Cothren was working for Casada for $60,000 just last year. And “Better People” don’t use the N Word and say “black people are idiots”.

District Attorney Funk, if you’re listening, please investigate the actions of the Speaker’s office. Tennessee deserves to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that he isn’t harboring racists who are willing to falsify evidence to have a man thrown in jail. And they need to hear it from someone other than his own I.T. department.

If you think Cade Cothren needs to be fired, holler at Speaker Casada here: [email protected]

If you think District Attorney Funk needs to investigate all of the above, holler at him here: [email protected]

CASADA’S OFFICE FORGES EVIDENCE, USES “N” WORD, SAYS “BLACK PEOPLE ARE IDIOTS”

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News Channel 5’s Phil Williams has a BOMBSHELL report airing TONIGHT AT 6PM that shows Speaker Casada’s office forged evidence to get civil rights activist Justin Jones thrown in jail.

Channel 5 also has text messages from Casada’s $200,000 chief of staff using the word “n**ger” and saying “black people are idiots”.

Jones has been a regular protestor at the capitol, where he and others have been mobilizing to try to get the bust of the KKK’s first Grand Wizard removed from the capitol, where it’s still featured prominently to this day.

Jones and others protested peacefully, but things reached a boiling point after Casada’s office lied about not getting emails from Jones asking for a meeting – saying he had been misspelling their email addresses (we have them, they were correctly spelled).

Jones eventually threw iced tea at Casada in frustration, and was charged with assault.

He was released on bond on the condition he have no contact with Casada, and followed the no-contact order, so he was surprised when D.A. Funk’s office filed a motion to revoke Jones’ bail.

From Channel 5:

Funk cited an email Jones had allegedly sent to Casada’s chief of staff that was copied to the House Speaker, thus violating his bond conditions.

Jones knew it wasn’t true.

“It was a shock because it was my freedom,” he said. “If this would have went through to revoke my bond, I would be in jail right now until my court date. So this is not something I take lightly.”

Turns out the motion was based on a photo of an email with the date of March 1st — just one day after the no-contact order. But Jones had the original email. The real date was February 25th, which was before his arrest.

Cothren had originally sent Funk an email with a different date, then blamed that on an IT problem and sent the forged date.

And he says black people are stupid? Yeesh.

It’s not just stupid, it’s criminal. Forging evidence is a crime, and doing it to get someone thrown in jail is itself a felony.

More from Channel 5:

The DA’s office now admits their evidence came from the Speaker’s chief of staff.

“You have some of the most powerful people in this state who are willing to file a false report and to file a false paperwork and to manipulate paperwork to take your freedom away,” Jones said.

The Speaker’s reaction?

“I know nothing of that — nothing,” Casada told NewsChannel 5 Investigates.

But anyone who knows Casada knows you don’t do anything without his permission if you work for him.

Not only did they try to Frame Jones, Casada’s office has also been found to be using horribly racist language concerning black people.

Text messages provided by a former acquaintance show an exchange with Casada in which Cothren appears to refer to a West Tennessee district with a “black people” meme.

In a text with other friends, Cothren said “black people are idiots.”

He also insisted that Tampa Bay quarterback Jameis Winston be called a “thug n***er.”

Horrific.

It goes without saying that Cothren should be fired immediately, but more importantly D.A. Glenn Funk MUST get to the bottom of Casada’s involvement in framing Jones, which is a crime.

Nobody is above the law. If Casada knew which we’d bet the house he did, time for the Speaker to Go.

Funk recently apologized for this yearbook photo where he’s posing with a confederate flag (Governor Lee apologized for a confederate yearbook photo of his own also). Hopefully he understands what the right thing is to do here.

He has brought in a special prosecutor to handle the investigation. Probably a good idea.

Holler at Speaker Casada HERE.

REACTIONS: BIPARTISAN BLOWBACK TO CASADA’S BLOATED BUDGET

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Yesterday the Tennessean put out a scathing report of the skyrocketing cost of running the Tennessee State House under Speaker Glen Casada, who fancies himself a “fiscal conservative” but clearly does not walk the walk.

From the Tennessean:

“Since House Speaker Glen Casada became the chamber’s leader, the size and cost of running the Tennessee General Assembly is increasing, forcing the lower chamber’s leader to ask the governor for an additional $7 million.”

The report from Joel Ebert points to staff fees like the $130,000 raise (!) he gave his Chief of Staff Cade Cothren, an outrageous number by any stretch of the imagination.

Cothren now makes just shy of $200,000 to run the Speaker’s office. As a reminder, the legislature is in session for approximately one-third of the year each year.

From Ebert’s report:

“Cothren earns $199,800 a year. Last year, when Casada was the House majority leader, Cothren made $68,400 as an executive assistant and policy researcher… 31-year-old Cothren is the third-highest paid legislative employee, behind Senate Clerk Russell Humphrey and Rick Nicholson, McNally’s chief of staff… Cothren has worked for state government since 2013. Nicholson and Humphrey first started working for the state in 1995 and 1998, respectively… Cothren makes more money than Lee’s chief of staff and all but three commissioners in the governor’s 23-member Cabinet… And his salary is significantly higher than the last three House chiefs of staff.”

(Cothren was last seen lying to the face of a protester of the bust of the first KKK Grand Wizard Nathan Bedford Forrest about misspelled emails.)

Regarding the office of the Speaker, the article goes on:

“It costs more than $5.1 million to pay for the salaries of employees in those offices, the analysis found. At this time last year, salaries for those same House offices cost taxpayers about $3.8 million.

If you have an issue with this, holler at Casada HERE.

In the meantime, here are some reactions from Tennesseans from both parties across the state… Despite Majority Leader William Lamberth playing the good soldier and calling the increased size and cost of operations in the House “extremely conservative” (apparently forgetting what words mean) the reaction to the article on both sides of the aisle has been one of shock and disgust:

Rep. Mike Stewart, the House Democratic caucus chairman, had this to say:

“It sounds like fiscal conservatism means about as much with Tennessee Republicans as it does with the Republicans up in Washington.”

Madison County Commissioner, District 9 – Republican Jay Bush:


Democratic State Senator Jeff Yarbro:


Democratic State Rep. Gloria Johnson (who says she still hasn’t received a $3 key to her office!):


Longtime political operative Holly Mccall (who contributes to the Holler):

Williamson County Tweeter @StormResist:


Former State House Candidate Allan Creasy:


From John Harris, who manages Tennessee Firearms Association, Inc.: