September 9, 2024 • 23 mins
This episode I'm breaking down the current fight between the city council, election commission, and TN GOP about the gun reform referendums proposed for the November ballot.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Hey guys, and welcome to the Law according to Amber.
Every other Monday, we'll discuss controversial topics with the mixture
of opinion and legal facts. Thus the Law according to Amber.
Be sure to give me a follow on Facebook at
the Law Cording to Amber, as well as Instagram. Same name,
The Law according to Amber. What's up, y'all, It's Amber,
(00:32):
your favorite podcast or organizer. You know, all things are
the sorts. Here with another episode of the Law according
to Amber. So this episode, I really want to talk
about some local legislation that's happening and some updates around it,
and kind of going through the precedent that's really been
set by our say legislature, especially around gun reform. So
(00:57):
if you're not in Memphis or Tennessee and you have
missing all the news about the gun reform referendums on
the ballot in Memphis, here's the tea. So last year,
Jeff Warren, who's the city councilman in Memphis, and the
chair of the City Council JB. Smiley got together to
put together some referendums to go on the ballot around
(01:18):
gun reform. The goal was to allow folks to answer
questions about how they feel about gun reforms. So basically,
there were three questions that said, one, do you agree
with ending open carry within the Memphis city limits, meaning
you would only have to you will only be able
to conceal carrie in the city limits of Memphis. Two
(01:40):
do you agree with ending the sale of assault weapons
within the Memphis city limits? And three do you agree
with adding local red flag laws to the city limits
for Memphis, Meaning there would be things in place where
if someone was a danger to themselves or danger to others,
(02:01):
there'll be a red flag put on, like their background
check if they tried to.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Purchase the weapon.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Basically, so it goes through the city council process, they
get it all the way through and passed and ready
to go on the ballot. Now, this whole time, people
kept raising up the issue of like, well, what if
the state pushes back or what if the state tells
us no? And the city council will saying well, if
they do, you know, we'll cross that bridge when we
get there. But we're going to keep pursuing this because Memphians,
(02:29):
you know, deserve the right to you know, answer these referendums.
And there hadn't been that kind of referendum place on
the ballot here in Memphis. And so I thought the
questions made perfect since you know, to ask because ever
since open carry or Tennessee has become a two A state,
as folks will say, ever since open carry passed in Tennessee,
the gun violence has been through the roof. It already
(02:50):
was bad, but like, the gun violence has been crazy.
And I think that as we've seen in other places,
you know, when they pass laws like this, it does
tend to fake. Black communities and brown communities were the worst. Like,
we see a huge rise in gun violence, and the
majority of Tennessee is poor and rule. There's only a
few urban cities, Myphis being one of them, which is
(03:11):
majority black. And then Nashville, who has had some similar
issues as well with the gun violence rising, but especially
in Memphis, has been sky high through the roof. So
with those things in mind, you know, our city council
was like, well, let's put these referends on the ballot
with the goal of hearing from folks and seeing, you know,
what they agreed with, and then also letting the public know,
(03:34):
you know, letting our stay legislations. See like, hey, these people,
this percentage of people agree with this or this percentage
of people don't agree with this.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
You know, it just gives us the opportunity for that.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
So yesterday these really kind of blew up, I said,
I guess to say, legislature decided on Monday they was
finna just go ham. So yesterday our Leader of the House,
Camera Sexton, and the Lieutenant governor, Governor McNally started making
these comments to the news and the press saying that
(04:05):
if there was any gun control laws or referendums on
the ballot in November in Memphis, they were gonna withhold
the seventy eight million dollars in sales taxes that's supposed
to go to Memphis. Now one not legal at all,
you know, it's not two. It's obviously you' just a
scare tactic. But not only did they go that far,
but they also had the Secretary of State to send
(04:27):
a letter to our election commission here in Shelby County
telling them to take the referendums off the ballot, which
was like, whoa, y'all doing too much now. I mean
even the news said, you know in their articles about
the Seales Sex thing, that like there's no legal way
for them to do that. It's not legal for them
to withhold the taxes, and they even said themselves they
would have to pursue legislation next session to make that happen. So,
(04:50):
as we know, this is all scare tactics, it's all
it is. So after the Secretary of State sends the letter,
the Secretary of State is Trey harget by the way,
after he sends the let better to the election commission,
the Chow Kuinty Electric Commission calls an emergency meeting for
today at eleven am. So just happened a few hours ago.
They have the meeting. I gathered some folks to show up.
(05:12):
It was about four of us that made public comment,
which is a lot for Choby kind of election commission
meeting because usually no one makes public comment, or maybe
like one or two people do. So you make public
comments specifically just saying like, hey, your role as a
Choby Kuinty election commission is to make sure that we
have free and fair elections, and it is not fair
to remove this referendum from the ballot without allowing people's
(05:35):
voices to at least be heard. And by removing it,
you're not allowing that to happen, and that's just not
democratic and that's just not fair. They chose to remove
them from the ballot, So the next thing that's going
to happen is that our state is most likely gonna
get sued. And I think that that's what they should do.
I think that our local government really has to show
them that we're really sick of them pushing us around.
(05:58):
This is not the first time this has happened. The
state has come in and it pre emptied basically something
that would happen. And I think that this also is
showing how like how strict they're being right if they
won't even let us place a question on the ballot
about an issue, not a law, we're not changing anything.
They won't even let us post a question on the ballot,
(06:20):
Like they are just being very strict about, you know,
what we're allowed to do. And that's just not fair
because we as a city have the right to do
these things. We have a right to make up referendus,
we have a right to you know, put something on
the ballot and let it be heard, Like that's the
whole point, right, So when we're not even letting that
process play out, I feel like we've reached a whole
new level of white supremacy because now it's gone beyond
(06:43):
just passing these horrible laws in the state legislature. Now
they're trying to control what laws we passed locally, which
we also know is is illegal. So now we have
to wait to see, you know, what comes to that.
But there's a really strong history of our state, like
I said before, pre empty things. So even with these
ordinances we passed around Tyree Nichols right where the state
(07:04):
went in and tried to pre empty after the fact
because they didn't want us to pass the laws and
we already had passed them that there's no retroactivity within
the legislature, so that didn't work. And then when they
passed laws around marijuana, they passed a law that you know,
we weren't allowed to legalize it locally. They passed laws
(07:26):
around abortion that was like it was like a trigger
law so said that if abortion, you know, was ruled
unconstitutional or the rule any kind of ruling was changed,
then it would trigger this type of abortion. Man in Tennessee,
they've not allowed us to have a rental registry even
though we've tried to pass laws multiple times to provide
(07:46):
a rental registry. They pre empered that every time, even
going as far as allowing Nashville to have one but
not allowing Memphis to have one, which is crazy because
when you look at the issues going on with housing
right now Memphis, one of the biggest problems is that
we don't have a way to actually track these slum lords.
So we have people who come in who are slum lords,
(08:07):
who don't take care of their properties, their private owners
or from these big management companies, right, and they don't
do anything for the tenants, They don't respond to them.
But we as a city, as like the assessor's office
who assesses like property and has the information of who
owns what, they're not able to contact them or get
get in contact with them or hold them accountable basically
(08:28):
because there's no system tracking that, there's no registry, right
and so that's why we've pursued that so strongly and
still have been able to get it. Or even when
you consider money bail, they pass so many laws to
make money bail way worse, like to limit the way
that people can get bail, to limit the perimeters around
(08:51):
bail regardless of their constitutional or not, like they don't
care about the constitutionality. I think that's pretty clear that
they don't care in the way that they keep doing
things cosider unconstitutional or illegal and just.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Wait for the fallout later on.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
Because several times they've been sued about something and we
told them they're gonna get suited about it, they didn't listen.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
They passed the law.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
And then of course they get sued, which is exactly
what's happening right now with the bail law. There was
a law that they passed that removed the removed financial
consideration as something that gets this factor into the bail
amount from what pret our services use is basically, which
(09:32):
you know is illegal because we have equal protection rights
to say that. You know, we have to make sure
that everyone has equal portation under the law, including when
it comes to bail, and that means you have to
consider their you know, ability to pay, you have to
consider their finances, you have to consider all that stuff.
And you know, they was like, well, okay, they don't
(09:53):
care about it. They want to remove it because you know,
crime is just so bad in Memphis. We have to
be able to lock folks up. And it doesn't matter
how many times we tell them this argument doesn't make
any sense, right, Like you can't remove someone's ability to
receive vailed that that's just unconstitutional. They don't care, though,
they want to keep pushing these things, and now they're
getting sued. And this isn't the first time, Like I
(10:14):
said before, they've been sued plenty of times and continue
to be sued and they just, you know, I guess
they just wait for it to happen. But this specifically
is being really driven by a lot of the things
that Senator Brent Taylor and John Gillessie were doing in
the legislature, because they pushed a lot of these tough
(10:35):
on crime bills, and Senator Brent Taylor kept saying this,
you know, we gotta make Memphis matter rhetoric, as if
Memphis doesn't already matter to the people who live here,
who are Memphis, because he's not from Memphis, he.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Lives in Eads, he does not live in Memphis.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
And he continues to use this like it's basically like
a dog whistle trope of saying, you know, we just
make Memphis matter even though it already matters to us.
And if we did want to make me matter, wouldn't
a key way to do that be letting Memphian's voices
be heard on the ballot when it comes to referendums
about key issues they're concerned about. I think that would
(11:11):
be a key way to make me I fits matter.
It's by actually listening to people and what they say
their concerns are. But you know, not him, he doesn't
agree with that, I guess. And even though the pushback
from the same legislature around this is all a scare tactic,
the key thing here is that it's actually just rooted
in one particular thing. And the state themselves actually said
(11:32):
this camera section and the Lieutenant governor actually said this
is rooted in the fact that they know that hot
topic referendums will bring people out to vote and increased
voter turnout, and they're worried. They actually said this in
an article. They're worried that that increased turnout will make
John Gillespie lose his house race because most people are
(11:53):
going to come out to support the referendum are going
to be Democrats, which means they're going to vote for
the Democratic candidate, which is Jesse hughes Seth, who's against
John Gillespie. Now, while I think that that's an interesting plan.
I honestly think that we're going to come out to
vote against him. Anyways, after he lied to Tyree Nicholls's
parents to their faces and said that he will hold
off on this bill that would undo our ordinances, even
(12:15):
though it didn't undo them. But that's a side note.
You know, he said that he would hold off on it,
and then they said okay, and they went home. They
came back and he told them that they didn't need
to come back the next day. You know, the bill
wasn't going to be hurt. And he just lied to
them because he wanted them to not be there while
he passed the bill, because he couldn't face them, because
he's a coward. So while I do agree that a
(12:38):
hot button topic referendum could bring more voters out, I
also think that most of them will just come out
just because of the fact that he's a piece of
shit they representative, and it's probably going to burn in
hell right along with Brett Taylor. I think that's a
good enough reason by attempt, just from the way they acted.
But I did think it was interesting that the leader
(13:00):
themselves quoted that, like they mentioned that in the article
around these referendums, and it shows you how afraid they
are to lose this seat. Because if you're willing to
threaten to take somebody sells taxes away, which you know
you can't do anyways, but you're willing to threaten that,
are you scared? You've got to be scared. You gotta
be afraid, which honestly, if I wasn't, I will be.
(13:22):
Because Jesse Houston has outraised John Gillespie multiple times in
the last few periods. He's outraised him both times. He's
more popular, the district that they're in is more black
and more Democrat, and John Gillespie won by a very
slim margin last time. It was like two hundred some votes.
It wasn't a lot. And there aren't a lot of
(13:43):
people voting in these House races too. There's something else
you have to consider. There aren't a lot of folks
voting in the House races, so you know it could
go left for him, and I hope it does. I
hope John Gillespie lose his seat, and I'm definitely gonna
be out canvassing for Jesse to try to make that happen. Anyway,
But back to the referendum talk, I do want to
(14:04):
go over some legal precedents here around the referendums, because
what I think is pretty clear just from the news
articles that I read and them interviewing camera Sexton and
Lieutenant Lieutenant Governor McNally, is that they one have not
read the referendums, or two they're just stupid, because if
you actually read the referendums, it does not change a law,
(14:25):
which we know we don't have the ability to do
because there are state laws making Tennessee a to a state,
so we aren't able to change those laws. But what
it does do is gather information, and they're cited multiple
times saying that we're attempting to change state law, we're
attempting to supersede or override state law, which isn't true,
Which lets me know they probably did not read the referendums,
(14:46):
which wouldn't be surprising because they don't even read the
bills when they're in the state House. So, like I
said before, there's already precedent for this type of thing.
So just in two thousand and four, the City of
Memphis actually sued the Shelby County Election Commission because they
refused to put a referendum, which is Ordinance number five
zero or seven to two on the November two, two
(15:06):
thousand and four ballot. They sue them, and then that
court found that the Chevy County Election Commission had exceeded
its authority in refusing to place the measure on the ballot,
and therefore they were ordered to put it on the ballot.
I think it's really interesting because one, this is a Supreme
Court case, so this is not just like a lower court.
This went up multiple courts and then went to the
(15:28):
Supreme Court of Tennessee, which is in Jackson, Tennessee, by
the way, and they found, you know, that the electric
Commission can't do that. So now we have a situation
where our election commission here has refused to put some
referendums on the ballot because of instructions they received from
the Secretary of State's office, who is the coordinator of elections,
(15:48):
telling them not to do so. And here we have
also clear precedent saying that they are not allowed to
do that. So this loss is going to be really
interesting because I mean to me to reading the case law,
it's very obvious that if the City of mephicsuit the
City of Mific City Council.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
My badly be specific. If the City of Memphis.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
City Council suit, we will win, and that's just gonna
only make them look even worse for trying to prevent
us from doing this in the first place. Councilmen JB.
Smile eg R is also cited as saying, you know,
I think clearly we I think we clearly show that
this issue has already been addressed with local municipalities when
it comes to these issues. I just don't know where
the Secretary of State receives this information, and I'm not
(16:29):
really concerned about it. What I'm not going to do
is go back and forth with anyone. I respect the
General Assembly and their right to implement legislation. What I
hope for the Council is if the Council is respected
as a body duly elected by the people to gouge
their citizens or how they feel about a particular issue.
One he funny, but two I agree. You know, I'm
(16:49):
not going to go back and forth with nobody either.
You know, the state want to go back and forth.
Look at this lawsuit, go back and forth with this lawsuit,
and we can handle it that way because we ain't
got to for them games. They know that the November
election is coming up close. You know, we just six
to nine days away. We ain't got time for this.
And like he said in his comments, this is a
(17:11):
duly elected body. Our city Council is elected, and we
as people elected them to make decisions for us, like
passing these ordinances that will put this rehurrendum on the ballot,
and we deserve to have that hurd So I'm gonna
keep y out updated on what happens. But I think
that some of what the state legislature said about them
(17:31):
being worried about more folks turning out because of John
Gillespie's race and showing up for theseherendums and then in
turn they're being more voters against John Gillespie in that
House race, very true. I think that definitely could happen.
But I think people, like I said before, we're already
gonna show up no matter what. So thank you for
joining me for this special episode of the Law.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
Cordon and Amber.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
I just want to drop in, give y'all some tea,
explain a few things, let you know what the legal
precedent was here, you know what cases they're gonna be
at and then when I get some next steps or
when I hear about, you know, whatever is happening next,
of course i'll update y'all. I'll probably do like an
informational or like a explainer video on TikTok and Instagram,
(18:13):
and I'll make sure to put it on Facebook too.
I might not do a whole nother podcast episode, but
if y'all have any specific questions about this the referendums,
or this issue itself, about the you know them suing
or whatever, feel free to hit me up on socials.
My Instagram, Facebook are both at the Law according to Amber,
(18:34):
and you can message me on there and I'll be
sure to respond to y'all. So, yeah, this has been
another episode of the Law according to Amber the psych
The episode's not over after all, because I have an
update and I want to make sure I add this
in here to give y'all the details because it's a
really big update. Actually, So the city Council is suing.
(18:56):
They're ssuing the Shelby kind of election commission, because election
commission to the referendums out of the ballot, which I
hope would happened, and I'm so glad that it did
because our Election Commission was in the wrong, and the
City Council is standing up for people and their right to,
you know, want to have their voices heard on a ballot. Now,
something I did think was interesting, especially from the talking
(19:18):
points during the press conference that the city Council had.
City Council Chairman JB. Smiley kind of alluded to a
responded to the state legislature camera sexing and McNally saying
they're gonna withhold tax dollars, but took a very.
Speaker 3 (19:34):
Different turn with it.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
And I think that also this shows that people understand
how to use talking points and how to push the
right pressure points. So in response, he just said, like,
for those people you know who are threatening to take
away our tax dollars, the majority of our budget goes
to law enforcement. So what you're telling us is you
(19:56):
want us dead and in poverty. And I thought that
was an interesting take because we all know niggas love
the police. Not me, but you know rich people, the
white folks in Memphis, maybe they love the police. So
flipping the narrative into saying, yeah, you're threatened to take
our tax dollars away, and those tax dollars are gonna
(20:19):
pay the salary of police officers, the exact thing that
you say you love, you know, back of blue and
you know.
Speaker 3 (20:25):
All that shit.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
So I thought it was an interesting I thought it
was an interesting way to flip things, to flip the script.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
I will say Shairman JB.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
Smiley, who is my friend, by the way, just like disclaimer,
but somebody I've known for years definitely knows how to
respond to things in a way where.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
They're gonna get the attention they need.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
And so the white people in the state legislature ain't
saying nothing else since. But I think that the comeback
was definitely better than the little shots tried to throw.
And even Jerry Green, Counseloman Jerry Green, who is a
really good councilwoman, even she made some comments very similar
(21:10):
you know, we don't back down from a fight.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
She did it like a z BO quote.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
But I don't petition to basketball like that, So I
can't even remember what the quote was, but it was
a catchy quote. And she just you know, talked about
her history. She's been fighting against gun violence for like
as long as I've known her. Actually, like she is
in Mom's a man, and she really pushes back against
you know all the crazy stuff we're seeing in the
say legislature, and has been like voicing her opinion around
(21:36):
open carry for a long time, so I already knew
where she stood on the issue, but it was good
to hear like publicly in a press conference her talk
about how this is a bad idea and why. And
there were a few other council members that spoke. Councilwoman
Jenna Wash swearing Jim She got a long gas name,
Councilwoman Jenna swearing Jim Washington. And then Pearl Walker, who's
(21:58):
also a councilwoman who's mostly over like the white Haven
area East mean fis like he can heal where I'm from.
And Councilman prol Walker had a great question. She said,
you know, I want to know why do you want
us unsafe? Because that's exactly what's happening here. Open carrey
has not been a solutionary in Memphis. It has not
been a good look for us, Like it has not
(22:20):
helped anyway. And we know that just from the basic
stats like gun crimes and violence is up when it
comes to guns because people just have so much easy
access to them. And I mean, I think, like I
said before, that was what the same legislature wanted, right.
They want us to just kill each other, and they
do that by making things it's available as possible. You know,
(22:41):
you don't need a training class you can go buy
and a solid weapon you can walk around with it,
just do whatever you want. And that's just not a
good look and it's it's not a recipe for success
at all. So I'm glad to see that they're suing.
They're supposed to be having their first court date coming
up this week, so we'll see what happens. Is going
to be in it since civil court and chance not
(23:03):
civil court. It's in chance to re court and it's
gonna be heard soon, so we'll see what happens. A
lot of folks have been asking, you know, what happens
if it doesn't make it on the ballot, and Charman J. B.
Smilett was like, oh, we'll be in court next week,
like it's it's gonna make it to the ballot, And
I agree with him. I think that it will make
it on the ballot. I don't think that we're gonna
(23:23):
get past November and it's not gonna be on there.
Speaker 3 (23:25):
So yeah, it should be interesting.
Hey guys, and welcome to the Law according to Amber.
Every other Monday, we'll discuss controversial topics with the mixture
of opinion and legal facts. Thus the Law according to Amber.
Be sure to give me a follow on Facebook at
the Law Cording to Amber, as well as Instagram. Same name,
The Law according to Amber. What's up, y'all, It's Amber,
(00:32):
your favorite podcast or organizer. You know, all things are
the sorts. Here with another episode of the Law according
to Amber. So this episode, I really want to talk
about some local legislation that's happening and some updates around it,
and kind of going through the precedent that's really been
set by our say legislature, especially around gun reform. So
(00:57):
if you're not in Memphis or Tennessee and you have
missing all the news about the gun reform referendums on
the ballot in Memphis, here's the tea. So last year,
Jeff Warren, who's the city councilman in Memphis, and the
chair of the City Council JB. Smiley got together to
put together some referendums to go on the ballot around
(01:18):
gun reform. The goal was to allow folks to answer
questions about how they feel about gun reforms. So basically,
there were three questions that said, one, do you agree
with ending open carry within the Memphis city limits, meaning
you would only have to you will only be able
to conceal carrie in the city limits of Memphis. Two
(01:40):
do you agree with ending the sale of assault weapons
within the Memphis city limits? And three do you agree
with adding local red flag laws to the city limits
for Memphis, Meaning there would be things in place where
if someone was a danger to themselves or danger to others,
(02:01):
there'll be a red flag put on, like their background
check if they tried to.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Purchase the weapon.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Basically, so it goes through the city council process, they
get it all the way through and passed and ready
to go on the ballot. Now, this whole time, people
kept raising up the issue of like, well, what if
the state pushes back or what if the state tells
us no? And the city council will saying well, if
they do, you know, we'll cross that bridge when we
get there. But we're going to keep pursuing this because Memphians,
(02:29):
you know, deserve the right to you know, answer these referendums.
And there hadn't been that kind of referendum place on
the ballot here in Memphis. And so I thought the
questions made perfect since you know, to ask because ever
since open carry or Tennessee has become a two A state,
as folks will say, ever since open carry passed in Tennessee,
the gun violence has been through the roof. It already
(02:50):
was bad, but like, the gun violence has been crazy.
And I think that as we've seen in other places,
you know, when they pass laws like this, it does
tend to fake. Black communities and brown communities were the worst. Like,
we see a huge rise in gun violence, and the
majority of Tennessee is poor and rule. There's only a
few urban cities, Myphis being one of them, which is
(03:11):
majority black. And then Nashville, who has had some similar
issues as well with the gun violence rising, but especially
in Memphis, has been sky high through the roof. So
with those things in mind, you know, our city council
was like, well, let's put these referends on the ballot
with the goal of hearing from folks and seeing, you know,
what they agreed with, and then also letting the public know,
(03:34):
you know, letting our stay legislations. See like, hey, these people,
this percentage of people agree with this or this percentage
of people don't agree with this.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
You know, it just gives us the opportunity for that.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
So yesterday these really kind of blew up, I said,
I guess to say, legislature decided on Monday they was
finna just go ham. So yesterday our Leader of the House,
Camera Sexton, and the Lieutenant governor, Governor McNally started making
these comments to the news and the press saying that
(04:05):
if there was any gun control laws or referendums on
the ballot in November in Memphis, they were gonna withhold
the seventy eight million dollars in sales taxes that's supposed
to go to Memphis. Now one not legal at all,
you know, it's not two. It's obviously you' just a
scare tactic. But not only did they go that far,
but they also had the Secretary of State to send
(04:27):
a letter to our election commission here in Shelby County
telling them to take the referendums off the ballot, which
was like, whoa, y'all doing too much now. I mean
even the news said, you know in their articles about
the Seales Sex thing, that like there's no legal way
for them to do that. It's not legal for them
to withhold the taxes, and they even said themselves they
would have to pursue legislation next session to make that happen. So,
(04:50):
as we know, this is all scare tactics, it's all
it is. So after the Secretary of State sends the letter,
the Secretary of State is Trey harget by the way,
after he sends the let better to the election commission,
the Chow Kuinty Electric Commission calls an emergency meeting for
today at eleven am. So just happened a few hours ago.
They have the meeting. I gathered some folks to show up.
(05:12):
It was about four of us that made public comment,
which is a lot for Choby kind of election commission
meeting because usually no one makes public comment, or maybe
like one or two people do. So you make public
comments specifically just saying like, hey, your role as a
Choby Kuinty election commission is to make sure that we
have free and fair elections, and it is not fair
to remove this referendum from the ballot without allowing people's
(05:35):
voices to at least be heard. And by removing it,
you're not allowing that to happen, and that's just not
democratic and that's just not fair. They chose to remove
them from the ballot, So the next thing that's going
to happen is that our state is most likely gonna
get sued. And I think that that's what they should do.
I think that our local government really has to show
them that we're really sick of them pushing us around.
(05:58):
This is not the first time this has happened. The
state has come in and it pre emptied basically something
that would happen. And I think that this also is
showing how like how strict they're being right if they
won't even let us place a question on the ballot
about an issue, not a law, we're not changing anything.
They won't even let us post a question on the ballot,
(06:20):
Like they are just being very strict about, you know,
what we're allowed to do. And that's just not fair
because we as a city have the right to do
these things. We have a right to make up referendus,
we have a right to you know, put something on
the ballot and let it be heard, Like that's the
whole point, right, So when we're not even letting that
process play out, I feel like we've reached a whole
new level of white supremacy because now it's gone beyond
(06:43):
just passing these horrible laws in the state legislature. Now
they're trying to control what laws we passed locally, which
we also know is is illegal. So now we have
to wait to see, you know, what comes to that.
But there's a really strong history of our state, like
I said before, pre empty things. So even with these
ordinances we passed around Tyree Nichols right where the state
(07:04):
went in and tried to pre empty after the fact
because they didn't want us to pass the laws and
we already had passed them that there's no retroactivity within
the legislature, so that didn't work. And then when they
passed laws around marijuana, they passed a law that you know,
we weren't allowed to legalize it locally. They passed laws
(07:26):
around abortion that was like it was like a trigger
law so said that if abortion, you know, was ruled
unconstitutional or the rule any kind of ruling was changed,
then it would trigger this type of abortion. Man in Tennessee,
they've not allowed us to have a rental registry even
though we've tried to pass laws multiple times to provide
(07:46):
a rental registry. They pre empered that every time, even
going as far as allowing Nashville to have one but
not allowing Memphis to have one, which is crazy because
when you look at the issues going on with housing
right now Memphis, one of the biggest problems is that
we don't have a way to actually track these slum lords.
So we have people who come in who are slum lords,
(08:07):
who don't take care of their properties, their private owners
or from these big management companies, right, and they don't
do anything for the tenants, They don't respond to them.
But we as a city, as like the assessor's office
who assesses like property and has the information of who
owns what, they're not able to contact them or get
get in contact with them or hold them accountable basically
(08:28):
because there's no system tracking that, there's no registry, right
and so that's why we've pursued that so strongly and
still have been able to get it. Or even when
you consider money bail, they pass so many laws to
make money bail way worse, like to limit the way
that people can get bail, to limit the perimeters around
(08:51):
bail regardless of their constitutional or not, like they don't
care about the constitutionality. I think that's pretty clear that
they don't care in the way that they keep doing
things cosider unconstitutional or illegal and just.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Wait for the fallout later on.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
Because several times they've been sued about something and we
told them they're gonna get suited about it, they didn't listen.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
They passed the law.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
And then of course they get sued, which is exactly
what's happening right now with the bail law. There was
a law that they passed that removed the removed financial
consideration as something that gets this factor into the bail
amount from what pret our services use is basically, which
(09:32):
you know is illegal because we have equal protection rights
to say that. You know, we have to make sure
that everyone has equal portation under the law, including when
it comes to bail, and that means you have to
consider their you know, ability to pay, you have to
consider their finances, you have to consider all that stuff.
And you know, they was like, well, okay, they don't
(09:53):
care about it. They want to remove it because you know,
crime is just so bad in Memphis. We have to
be able to lock folks up. And it doesn't matter
how many times we tell them this argument doesn't make
any sense, right, Like you can't remove someone's ability to
receive vailed that that's just unconstitutional. They don't care, though,
they want to keep pushing these things, and now they're
getting sued. And this isn't the first time, Like I
(10:14):
said before, they've been sued plenty of times and continue
to be sued and they just, you know, I guess
they just wait for it to happen. But this specifically
is being really driven by a lot of the things
that Senator Brent Taylor and John Gillessie were doing in
the legislature, because they pushed a lot of these tough
(10:35):
on crime bills, and Senator Brent Taylor kept saying this,
you know, we gotta make Memphis matter rhetoric, as if
Memphis doesn't already matter to the people who live here,
who are Memphis, because he's not from Memphis, he.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Lives in Eads, he does not live in Memphis.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
And he continues to use this like it's basically like
a dog whistle trope of saying, you know, we just
make Memphis matter even though it already matters to us.
And if we did want to make me matter, wouldn't
a key way to do that be letting Memphian's voices
be heard on the ballot when it comes to referendums
about key issues they're concerned about. I think that would
(11:11):
be a key way to make me I fits matter.
It's by actually listening to people and what they say
their concerns are. But you know, not him, he doesn't
agree with that, I guess. And even though the pushback
from the same legislature around this is all a scare tactic,
the key thing here is that it's actually just rooted
in one particular thing. And the state themselves actually said
(11:32):
this camera section and the Lieutenant governor actually said this
is rooted in the fact that they know that hot
topic referendums will bring people out to vote and increased
voter turnout, and they're worried. They actually said this in
an article. They're worried that that increased turnout will make
John Gillespie lose his house race because most people are
(11:53):
going to come out to support the referendum are going
to be Democrats, which means they're going to vote for
the Democratic candidate, which is Jesse hughes Seth, who's against
John Gillespie. Now, while I think that that's an interesting plan.
I honestly think that we're going to come out to
vote against him. Anyways, after he lied to Tyree Nicholls's
parents to their faces and said that he will hold
off on this bill that would undo our ordinances, even
(12:15):
though it didn't undo them. But that's a side note.
You know, he said that he would hold off on it,
and then they said okay, and they went home. They
came back and he told them that they didn't need
to come back the next day. You know, the bill
wasn't going to be hurt. And he just lied to
them because he wanted them to not be there while
he passed the bill, because he couldn't face them, because
he's a coward. So while I do agree that a
(12:38):
hot button topic referendum could bring more voters out, I
also think that most of them will just come out
just because of the fact that he's a piece of
shit they representative, and it's probably going to burn in
hell right along with Brett Taylor. I think that's a
good enough reason by attempt, just from the way they acted.
But I did think it was interesting that the leader
(13:00):
themselves quoted that, like they mentioned that in the article
around these referendums, and it shows you how afraid they
are to lose this seat. Because if you're willing to
threaten to take somebody sells taxes away, which you know
you can't do anyways, but you're willing to threaten that,
are you scared? You've got to be scared. You gotta
be afraid, which honestly, if I wasn't, I will be.
(13:22):
Because Jesse Houston has outraised John Gillespie multiple times in
the last few periods. He's outraised him both times. He's
more popular, the district that they're in is more black
and more Democrat, and John Gillespie won by a very
slim margin last time. It was like two hundred some votes.
It wasn't a lot. And there aren't a lot of
(13:43):
people voting in these House races too. There's something else
you have to consider. There aren't a lot of folks
voting in the House races, so you know it could
go left for him, and I hope it does. I
hope John Gillespie lose his seat, and I'm definitely gonna
be out canvassing for Jesse to try to make that happen. Anyway,
But back to the referendum talk, I do want to
(14:04):
go over some legal precedents here around the referendums, because
what I think is pretty clear just from the news
articles that I read and them interviewing camera Sexton and
Lieutenant Lieutenant Governor McNally, is that they one have not
read the referendums, or two they're just stupid, because if
you actually read the referendums, it does not change a law,
(14:25):
which we know we don't have the ability to do
because there are state laws making Tennessee a to a state,
so we aren't able to change those laws. But what
it does do is gather information, and they're cited multiple
times saying that we're attempting to change state law, we're
attempting to supersede or override state law, which isn't true,
Which lets me know they probably did not read the referendums,
(14:46):
which wouldn't be surprising because they don't even read the
bills when they're in the state House. So, like I
said before, there's already precedent for this type of thing.
So just in two thousand and four, the City of
Memphis actually sued the Shelby County Election Commission because they
refused to put a referendum, which is Ordinance number five
zero or seven to two on the November two, two
(15:06):
thousand and four ballot. They sue them, and then that
court found that the Chevy County Election Commission had exceeded
its authority in refusing to place the measure on the ballot,
and therefore they were ordered to put it on the ballot.
I think it's really interesting because one, this is a Supreme
Court case, so this is not just like a lower court.
This went up multiple courts and then went to the
(15:28):
Supreme Court of Tennessee, which is in Jackson, Tennessee, by
the way, and they found, you know, that the electric
Commission can't do that. So now we have a situation
where our election commission here has refused to put some
referendums on the ballot because of instructions they received from
the Secretary of State's office, who is the coordinator of elections,
(15:48):
telling them not to do so. And here we have
also clear precedent saying that they are not allowed to
do that. So this loss is going to be really
interesting because I mean to me to reading the case law,
it's very obvious that if the City of mephicsuit the
City of Mific City Council.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
My badly be specific. If the City of Memphis.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
City Council suit, we will win, and that's just gonna
only make them look even worse for trying to prevent
us from doing this in the first place. Councilmen JB.
Smile eg R is also cited as saying, you know,
I think clearly we I think we clearly show that
this issue has already been addressed with local municipalities when
it comes to these issues. I just don't know where
the Secretary of State receives this information, and I'm not
(16:29):
really concerned about it. What I'm not going to do
is go back and forth with anyone. I respect the
General Assembly and their right to implement legislation. What I
hope for the Council is if the Council is respected
as a body duly elected by the people to gouge
their citizens or how they feel about a particular issue.
One he funny, but two I agree. You know, I'm
(16:49):
not going to go back and forth with nobody either.
You know, the state want to go back and forth.
Look at this lawsuit, go back and forth with this lawsuit,
and we can handle it that way because we ain't
got to for them games. They know that the November
election is coming up close. You know, we just six
to nine days away. We ain't got time for this.
And like he said in his comments, this is a
(17:11):
duly elected body. Our city Council is elected, and we
as people elected them to make decisions for us, like
passing these ordinances that will put this rehurrendum on the ballot,
and we deserve to have that hurd So I'm gonna
keep y out updated on what happens. But I think
that some of what the state legislature said about them
(17:31):
being worried about more folks turning out because of John
Gillespie's race and showing up for theseherendums and then in
turn they're being more voters against John Gillespie in that
House race, very true. I think that definitely could happen.
But I think people, like I said before, we're already
gonna show up no matter what. So thank you for
joining me for this special episode of the Law.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
Cordon and Amber.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
I just want to drop in, give y'all some tea,
explain a few things, let you know what the legal
precedent was here, you know what cases they're gonna be
at and then when I get some next steps or
when I hear about, you know, whatever is happening next,
of course i'll update y'all. I'll probably do like an
informational or like a explainer video on TikTok and Instagram,
(18:13):
and I'll make sure to put it on Facebook too.
I might not do a whole nother podcast episode, but
if y'all have any specific questions about this the referendums,
or this issue itself, about the you know them suing
or whatever, feel free to hit me up on socials.
My Instagram, Facebook are both at the Law according to Amber,
(18:34):
and you can message me on there and I'll be
sure to respond to y'all. So, yeah, this has been
another episode of the Law according to Amber the psych
The episode's not over after all, because I have an
update and I want to make sure I add this
in here to give y'all the details because it's a
really big update. Actually, So the city Council is suing.
(18:56):
They're ssuing the Shelby kind of election commission, because election
commission to the referendums out of the ballot, which I
hope would happened, and I'm so glad that it did
because our Election Commission was in the wrong, and the
City Council is standing up for people and their right to,
you know, want to have their voices heard on a ballot. Now,
something I did think was interesting, especially from the talking
(19:18):
points during the press conference that the city Council had.
City Council Chairman JB. Smiley kind of alluded to a
responded to the state legislature camera sexing and McNally saying
they're gonna withhold tax dollars, but took a very.
Speaker 3 (19:34):
Different turn with it.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
And I think that also this shows that people understand
how to use talking points and how to push the
right pressure points. So in response, he just said, like,
for those people you know who are threatening to take
away our tax dollars, the majority of our budget goes
to law enforcement. So what you're telling us is you
(19:56):
want us dead and in poverty. And I thought that
was an interesting take because we all know niggas love
the police. Not me, but you know rich people, the
white folks in Memphis, maybe they love the police. So
flipping the narrative into saying, yeah, you're threatened to take
our tax dollars away, and those tax dollars are gonna
(20:19):
pay the salary of police officers, the exact thing that
you say you love, you know, back of blue and
you know.
Speaker 3 (20:25):
All that shit.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
So I thought it was an interesting I thought it
was an interesting way to flip things, to flip the script.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
I will say Shairman JB.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
Smiley, who is my friend, by the way, just like disclaimer,
but somebody I've known for years definitely knows how to
respond to things in a way where.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
They're gonna get the attention they need.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
And so the white people in the state legislature ain't
saying nothing else since. But I think that the comeback
was definitely better than the little shots tried to throw.
And even Jerry Green, Counseloman Jerry Green, who is a
really good councilwoman, even she made some comments very similar
(21:10):
you know, we don't back down from a fight.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
She did it like a z BO quote.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
But I don't petition to basketball like that, So I
can't even remember what the quote was, but it was
a catchy quote. And she just you know, talked about
her history. She's been fighting against gun violence for like
as long as I've known her. Actually, like she is
in Mom's a man, and she really pushes back against
you know all the crazy stuff we're seeing in the
say legislature, and has been like voicing her opinion around
(21:36):
open carry for a long time, so I already knew
where she stood on the issue, but it was good
to hear like publicly in a press conference her talk
about how this is a bad idea and why. And
there were a few other council members that spoke. Councilwoman
Jenna Wash swearing Jim She got a long gas name,
Councilwoman Jenna swearing Jim Washington. And then Pearl Walker, who's
(21:58):
also a councilwoman who's mostly over like the white Haven
area East mean fis like he can heal where I'm from.
And Councilman prol Walker had a great question. She said,
you know, I want to know why do you want
us unsafe? Because that's exactly what's happening here. Open carrey
has not been a solutionary in Memphis. It has not
been a good look for us, Like it has not
(22:20):
helped anyway. And we know that just from the basic
stats like gun crimes and violence is up when it
comes to guns because people just have so much easy
access to them. And I mean, I think, like I
said before, that was what the same legislature wanted, right.
They want us to just kill each other, and they
do that by making things it's available as possible. You know,
(22:41):
you don't need a training class you can go buy
and a solid weapon you can walk around with it,
just do whatever you want. And that's just not a
good look and it's it's not a recipe for success
at all. So I'm glad to see that they're suing.
They're supposed to be having their first court date coming
up this week, so we'll see what happens. Is going
to be in it since civil court and chance not
(23:03):
civil court. It's in chance to re court and it's
gonna be heard soon, so we'll see what happens. A
lot of folks have been asking, you know, what happens
if it doesn't make it on the ballot, and Charman J. B.
Smilett was like, oh, we'll be in court next week,
like it's it's gonna make it to the ballot, And
I agree with him. I think that it will make
it on the ballot. I don't think that we're gonna
(23:23):
get past November and it's not gonna be on there.
Speaker 3 (23:25):
So yeah, it should be interesting.
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