By Tennessee Holler
Instead of passing an infrastructure bill to fix our crumbling bridges, or passing an election security bill to pull our nation back from the brink of losing our democracy, or passing health care expansion to help hundreds of thousands in our state see a doctor when they get sick… Tennessee Republicans have spent the past week sounding the alarm about a few hundred unaccompanied migrant children passing through Tennessee on their way to unite with family members.
They never miss an opportunity to fear monger about immigrants, especially children. Blackburn, Hagerty, Fleischmann, Green… the parade of hate was ceaseless, culminating with right-wing radio mouthpiece Phil Valentine saying the pastors who helped the children should be arrested. Non-ke Jesus would. As the Holler’s Justin Kanew & Chris Hale said when they took on GOP operative Rick Williams for saying Catholic charities should be defunded for helping them: “The GOP worldview is antithetical to the Gospel of Jesus”
The Bible they love to wave around says we are called to help children, the poor, the least of these – not arrest pastors for doing so. As Sohn says in the Free Press: “The same Republicans who saw no problem with kids ripped from parents, put in cages & lost under Trump are now up in arms because migrant children are traveling through Chattanooga and a few being cared for.
It’s sad that this was so predictable. The day Biden took office they started bleating about the border, and this was just another chapter in that ugly book. Tennessee is better than this.