Justin Pearson sworn back in to Tennessee House

After being reappointed, Tennessee state Representative Justin Pearson was sworn in on Thursday. He and a Democratic colleague were ousted for leading a gun protest on the House floor.

Pearson was sworn in on the Capitol steps by around 50 supporters and reporters to cheers and applause.

“We’ve just been expelled, but we’re back,” Pearson informed the throng. Hope is unavoidable. We’re not silenced. We’ll fight.

“I am so glad to be fighting with you, because victory is ours,” he declared, pumping his fist in the air, and then he and the audience screamed, “Power to the people.”

Pearson sat down in the statehouse after the reinstatement ceremony’s cameras and well-wishers.

Pearson was appointed to his vacant Memphis district seat by the county legislature on Wednesday. His swearing-in ended a two-week political maelstrom in Tennessee.

Tennessee Republicans expelled Pearson and Justin Jones, another young Black Democrat, on April 6 for spearheading a House chamber protest a week earlier. The March 27 Nashville school shooting murdered three children, three adults, and the shooter, prompting the protest.

“Gun Violence is impacting and hurting every part of our community,” Pearson said on the legislative steps after reading a list of recent gun victims. “They tried to expel this movement of justice, but it cannot be stopped.”

On Monday, the Nashville-area county legislature returned Jones to his vacant seat and swore him in on the capitol steps.

On Wednesday, the Memphis-area county board reappointed Pearson and swore him in at 8 a.m. Central Daylight Time (1300 GMT).

Pearson’s third swearing-in this year. He won a March special election after being assigned to the seat in January.

We’ll keep battling gun violence. “We’ll fight environmental racism and injustice,” Pearson said reporters after his reappointment.

He declared, “If we never quit, we will see universal background checks” for guns at the ceremony.

The supermajority Tennessee House Republicans have announced they will accept expelled state lawmakers returned by county governments if they obey the legislature’s procedures.

The state constitution allows local legislative bodies to appoint interim state representatives pending special elections. Jones and Pearson will run in unscheduled extraordinary elections.

Along with Knoxville Democratic Representative Gloria Johnson, they led the March 30 gun control protest that disrupted a legislature session. Outraged citizens supported them.

Johnson nearly avoided House decorum expulsion. She later informed reporters she survived because she is white.