Gov. Bill Lee’s insistence on taking action highlights how gun control has become a major tension point for the GOP in overwhelmingly conservative Tennessee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee\u2019s decision last week to call a special legislative session to tackle gun reform has prompted a number of unfamiliar allies to line up behind the Republican leader.
Democrats and gun control groups have lauded Lee\u2019s move \u2014 which came weeks after a shooting at The Covenant School in Nashville killed six people, including three 9-year-old children.
On the other hand, Republicans in the gun-friendly state have signaled they\u2019re unwilling to go along with Lee, who, following the shooting, pleaded with his conservative Legislature to take action.
The unfolding dynamic has put on display how gun control \u2014 which remains for most Republicans an untouchable policy item, even in the face of repeated mass shootings \u2014 has emerged as a tension point in the party even in overwhelmingly conservative states.
\u201cIt really is starting to feel like we\u2019re on the same team,\u201d Raumesh Akbari, the Democratic minority leader of the Tennessee state Senate, said in an interview.
\u201cIt has been fascinating to see him break from his caucus, from his party, given that they have not been willing to embrace the possibility of gun safety legislation, especially after what happened at Covenant,\u201d she said.
Akbari was referring to Lee\u2019s recent announcement to call the Legislature, which has a GOP supermajority, back to Nashville for a special session in August to tackle gun-safety measures.
While the dispatch wasn\u2019t unexpected, it nevertheless appeared to send shockwaves through the Tennessee political arena and quickly upended entrenched political loyalties in the state.
Gun rights groups bashed the governor as “lousy Lee” and threatened to do whatever they could to imperil his political future, even though Lee is term limited.
Not too long ago, Lee had earned plaudits from such groups, which had praised his efforts in recent legislative sessions to enact constitutional carry laws and other gun protections.
Meanwhile, in interviews with NBC News, gun control and safety advocacy groups heaped praise upon the conservative Republican.
\u201cWhat Gov. Lee is doing here is rather commendable. It\u2019s an act of political courage, even if the solution he put on the table isn\u2019t a perfect one,\u201d said Sean Holihan, the state legislative director at Giffords, a national nonprofit organization that promotes gun safety. He said it was \u201cabsolutely\u201d to Lee\u2019s credit that he was trying to lead on guns.
John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety, said Lee\u2019s efforts marked a \u201csignificant step forward\u201d for Republicans, adding that there was \u201cno question\u201d that Lee was trying to take action \u201cto prevent mass shootings.\u201d
In his announcement, Lee said he\u2019d use the eight weeks leading up to the special session to \u201cmeet with legislators, stakeholders and Tennesseans throughout the summer to discuss practical solutions ahead of the special session.\u201d
Weeks earlier, in the days after the mass shooting inside The Covenant School, Lee, who along with his wife had been friends with some of the victims in the shooting, had signed an executive order to strengthen background checks. He also called on Republican lawmakers to pass a version of a red flag law, saying that legislation was needed to address shortcomings in the state\u2019s existing gun laws.
\u201cWe can\u2019t stop evil, but we can do something,\u201d Lee said during that announcement. That initial push prompted Republicans in the Legislature to abruptly schedule an adjournment of their session.
In an email to NBC News, a Lee spokesperson reiterated that the governor was continuing to give priority to an \u201cimproved Order of Protection law\u201d as “a possible solution.”
Red flag laws, which are similar in scope to order of protection laws, allow authorities to temporarily seize firearms from people who are found to pose a danger to themselves or others.
Lee\u2019s latest call, however, has so far been met with either silence or rejection by Tennessee Republicans and gun rights groups.
The Tennessee House Republican Caucus, for example, has repeatedly said that \u201cany red flag law is a nonstarter.\u201d Jennifer Easton, a spokesperson for the caucus, said that members were continuing to demand the release of the Covenant shooter\u2019s \u201cmanifesto\u201d before working with Lee on any proposals.
A spokesperson for Tennessee House Speaker Cameron Sexton declined to answer questions about what subjects state Republicans would be willing to work with Lee on. Spokespersons for Tennessee House Majority Leader William Lamberth and the Tennessee Senate Republican Caucus didn\u2019t respond to questions from NBC News.
Gun rights groups, however, laid into Lee.
\u201cI don\u2019t even know if it\u2019s so much he\u2019s changing his mind or it\u2019s more that he\u2019s showing his true colors\u201d on guns, said Gun Owners of America spokesperson Jordan Stein.
\u201cThe way he\u2019s talking, it sure does sound like\u201d the governor appeared to be closer on gun policy to Democrats than to his own caucus, Stein said.
Lee hasn\u2019t given any indication he\u2019d work primarily with Democrats in the Legislature to enact gun laws.
And even if he did, the GOP supermajorities in both chambers are so large \u2014 years of partisan redistricting in the state have resulted in a 75-24 and a 27-6 Republican advantage in the state House and Senate, respectively \u2014 he would not be able to get anything passed without substantial Republican support.
Working in his favor, though, is public polling in the state showing overwhelming support for stronger gun control laws. A Vanderbilt University survey this month found that 82% of registered voters in the state said they supported Lee\u2019s executive order. Notably, the poll found that 72% of \u201cself-described MAGA Republicans\u201d said they backed the executive order. Separately, 75% of all respondents said they supported a red flag gun law.
The public outcry in Tennessee following The Covenant School shooting has been loud and chaotic \u2014 and has put Republican dysfunction in the state on international display. Days after the massacre, protests demanding gun control erupted across the state, including on the state House chamber floor, where three Democratic lawmakers took part.
Republican legislators took the exceptionally rare step of voting to expel two of those three lawmakers \u2014 throwing out the two Black Democrats but sparing a third one, who is a white woman \u2014 leading to accusations of racism.
Both expelled lawmakers, Justin Jones and Justin J. Pearson, were quickly reinstated to their seats, leaving Republicans with nothing to show aside from the bad publicity surrounding their views on guns and their heavy-handed approach toward their Black colleagues.
That sequence put into greater focus the national GOP\u2019s struggles over how to balance policies and issues that are popular among the conservative base \u2014 such as opposition to new gun restrictions \u2014 but deeply unappealing to swing voters who will play a vital role in next year\u2019s elections.
But unlike on the national level, some Democrats in Tennessee are trying to throw their Republican counterparts a bone, urging them to advance policy as a way to help them move on from the debacle.
\u201cI\u2019ve shared with my colleagues that the way to fix this and for them to right their ship is to pass something,\u201d Akbari, the Democratic minority state senate leader, said.
It\u2019s not totally unheard of for a conservative Republican governor in a red state to act on gun control. In Florida in 2018, for example, then-Gov. Rick Scott, weeks after the horrific mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland signed a package of gun laws, including measures raising the legal age for firearm purchases to 21, expanding a waiting period for gun purchases and a red flag law.
Gun rights groups, sensing opportunity, said they\u2019d settle for far less in the upcoming Tennessee special session. That would include accepting incremental measures, such as a voluntary do-not-sell list and a beefed up safe storage law.
Akbari said it was likely that, if anything gets done at all, \u201cit\u2019s probably not going to be what my caucus would prefer.” But she remains hopeful.
\u201cThe governor\u2019s really rising to meet the moment of what people are asking for,\u201d she said.
Feinblatt, of Everytown for Gun Safety, warned, however, that the growing hope and goodwill between groups like his and Lee would evaporate if he gets nothing through.
\u201cYou don\u2019t get off the hook by just calling for it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n