Satanic clubs, whose members do not worship the devil, usually formed in response to presence of religious groups in schools
Community members in a Tennessee school district want to banish Satan from their children’s halls after the formation of a new club was announced.
The After School Satan Club (ASSC) wants to establish a branch in Chimneyrock elementary school in the Memphis-Shelby county schools (MSCS) district.
Continue reading...Three deaths reported in Montgomery county and a further three in the suburbs of Nashville, officials say
Severe storms and tornadoes in Tennessee killed at least six people on Saturday and caused what local emergency services described as extensive damage with tens of thousands of residents without power.
Nashville police said in a statement Sunday that a two-year-old boy and his mother were among three people killed there.
Continue reading...Desmond Mills Jr is one of five officers charged in the beating death of the Black man who called for his mother as he was attacked
A former Memphis police officer pleaded guilty on Thursday in the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols, becoming the first of five officers charged to reverse course, with prosecutors recommending up to 15 years in prison.
Desmond Mills Jr entered his plea during a hearing at the Memphis federal courthouse as part of a larger agreement to settle charges in state court as well. It was not immediately clear if any of the other officers would follow suit.
Continue reading...Olivia Hill, 57, a military veteran, joins the Nashville city council in historic election
A transgender woman won election to a seat on Nashville’s city council, becoming the first openly transgender person to be voted into political office in Tennessee.
Olivia Hill, 57, secured one of the four open at-large seats on the metro council of Nashville, a politically liberal city in an overwhelmingly conservative state.
Continue reading...The Center for Reproductive Rights has taken legal action on behalf of women denied care in Idaho, Oklahoma and Tennessee
Women who say they were denied abortions in medical emergencies have taken legal action in Idaho, Oklahoma and Tennessee, in the latest attempt to challenge abortion bans that, abortion patients and doctors say, prevent people from getting care even when their health is in danger.
The lawsuits in Idaho and Tennessee, along with a federal complaint against a hospital in Oklahoma, were filed on Tuesday by the Center for Reproductive Rights, which filed a similar lawsuit on behalf of women in Texas earlier this year. Tuesday’s filings were first reported by the Washington Post.
Continue reading...Tami Manis wins Guinness world record for her 5ft 8in mullet after going 33 years without a haircut
What does one get by going 33 years without a haircut? Tennessee’s Tami Manis knows – the world record for longest mullet on a female.
Manis, 58, spoke on Thursday about her path to clinching what is arguably one of the most unusual marks maintained by Guinness world records. In an interview published by the organization known for curating a database of more than 40,000 world records, she revealed how the music video for the 1985 song Voices Carry by the rock band ‘Til Tuesday inspired her to begin growing her hair particularly long in the back.
Continue reading...The union representing workers at the grocery chain had asked the company to allow more breaks and cooler working conditions
A Kroger distribution center employee has died on the job in Memphis amid hot working conditions, adding to a national debate in the US over the risk to workers during heatwaves.
The worker was identified as Tony Rufus, members from his union announced.
Continue reading...Law allows for termination if patient’s water breaks too early or in cases of ectopic pregnancy, but critics say it is not enough
A Texas law about to take effect on Friday carves out exceptions to the state’s abortion ban.
In June, the Republican governor, Greg Abbott, quietly signed HB 3058, allowing doctors to provide abortion care when a patient’s water breaks too early for the fetus to survive, or when a patient is suffering from an ectopic pregnancy.
Continue reading...Officers shot and wounded armed man who fired shots and was trying to gain entry to Margolin Hebrew Academy, police say
Police in Memphis said they had likely prevented a mass shooting after they shot a man who earlier was reported to have opened fire at a Jewish day school in the Tennessee city.
In a statement and news conference, local police said they had responded to a report of a white man with a handgun shooting outside the Margolin Hebrew Academy and trying to gain entry to the building.
Continue reading...Many of the 40,000 people in the suburb of Germantown under order to avoid using water for everything except flushing toilets
A diesel fuel spill that contaminated the water supply system of Germantown, Tennessee, has left residents unable to drink their tap water as the city’s public works crew rush to flush out the contaminated water.
The city first told residents on 20 July that a spill at a treatment plant tainted the water supply system. The order came after residents reported a fuel smell in their water. Officials said that a generator at the plant spilled diesel fuel into a reservoir after the facility lost power during recent storms.
Continue reading...State condemned as ‘the bottom of the barrel on rights restoration’ after change by state’s division of elections
Tennessee, already one of the strictest and most complicated states in the country for voting rights restoration, has enacted a new policy that makes it nearly impossible for people with felony convictions to regain their right to vote.
Tennessee has one of the highest rates of disenfranchisement in the United States. More than 9% of the voting age population, or around 471,600 Tennesseans, can’t vote because of a felony conviction, according to a 2022 estimate by the Sentencing Project, a criminal justice non-profit. More than 21% of Black adults are disenfranchised.
Continue reading...Josiah Garcia reportedly told undercover agent he was an excellent shot and willing to torture people and cut off fingers or ears
Fake website RentAHitman.com has snagged another would-be killer-for-hire after a US soldier applied to be an assassin and accepted his first (fake) mission apparently believing it to be real.
Josiah Garcia, a Tennessee air national guardsman, was arrested after federal agents said he responded to an online ad through the parody website.
Continue reading...Reinstatement by unanimous vote of local commission follows similar move for fellow Black Democrat Justin Jones
The second of two Black Democrats who were kicked out of the Republican-led house of representatives in the Tennessee legislature followed his colleague back to work at the capitol on Thursday, a week after their expulsion for participating in a gun control protest propelled them into the national spotlight.
State representative Justin Pearson, a lawmaker from Memphis, was sworn in on Thursday outside the statehouse in Nashville. The day before, Shelby county commissioners had unanimously voted to reinstate him after an expulsion he, his fellow expelled lawmaker Justin Jones and others have denounced as motivated by racism.
Continue reading...Memphis officials voted to reinstate Justin Pearson, the second of two lawmakers expelled from legislature by Republicans
Hundreds of supporters marched Justin Pearson through Memphis to the Shelby county board of commissioners meeting on Wednesday, chanting and cheering before entering the commission chambers, where officials quickly voted 7-0 to restore him to his position.
“The message for all the people in Nashville who decided to expel us: You can’t expel hope. You can’t expel justice,” Pearson said at the meeting, his voice rising as he spoke. “You can’t expel our voice. And you sure can’t expel our fight.”
Continue reading...Lawsuit claims former fixer breached attorney-client privilege and unjustly enriched himself, among other allegations
Tennessee’s neighbor Kentucky is having its own reckoning with gun violence after a mass shooting in Louisville on Monday left five people dead.
But as the Washington Post reports, the partisan divide over what to do about these repeated acts of violence is as wide as ever in the solidly Republican state. The Post tuned into public events held by two freshman House representatives from the state, one the sole Democrat in its delegation, the other a Republican.
Continue reading...Judiciary committee will review supreme court justice’s undeclared luxury travel with Republican mega-donor Harlan Crow
Donald Trump is trying to prevent his former vice-president, Mike Pence, from testifying to the grand jury investigating the January 6 insurrection, NBC News reports:
Earlier this month, Pence decided to drop his legal challenge to the subpoena from special counsel Jack Smith, who is investigating the insurrection at the Capitol in addition to Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election and the classified documents discovered at Mar-a-Lago.
Continue reading...GOP-controlled state house voted to expel Black lawmakers Justin Jones and Justin Pearson while sparing Gloria Johnson
Kamala Harris made an urgent trip to Nashville on Friday to meet with two Black Democratic lawmakers expelled from the state legislature for their role in in a peaceful protest calling for gun control in the aftermath of a school massacre, an unprecedented act of retaliation that sparked accusations of overt racism.
The Republican-controlled legislature voted on Thursday to expel representatives Justin Jones and Justin Pearson, but to spare a white Democratic lawmaker, Gloria Johnson, who participated in the same protest but narrowly avoided being kicked out.
Continue reading...Vice-president visiting lawmakers at Fisk University as Republican-controlled house’s move condemned as racist
It’s lunchtime on Friday, and we’re waiting to hear from Democrats in Tennessee how they intend to respond to the vote by Republicans to expel two young Black Democrats from the state’s House after they led a protest calling for gun reforms.
A wave of outrage followed Thursday’s move. Joe Biden blasted the move “undemocratic” while the ACLU of Tennessee, and Martin Luther King III, son of the civil rights pioneer, suggested racism was behind the action.
Supreme court justice Clarence Thomas has been defending himself after reports he accepted decades or undeclared hospitality from a Republican mega-donor. Thomas, a staunch conservative, says he didn’t believe he was required to disclose it.
The Biden administration released a proposal that would forbid schools and colleges across the US from enacting outright bans on transgender athletes competing in sports.
US officials say they suspect Russia is behind the leaking and posting on social media of top secret documents, including an assessment of the country’s progress in its war in Ukraine.
Republicans in Kansas voted to ban gender-affirming medical care for transgender youth, but the bill is likely to be vetoed by Democratic governor Laura Kelly.
Continue reading...Joe Biden and Barack Obama condemn expulsion of Justin Jones and Justin Pearson from Republican-controlled state house
Two Democratic lawmakers have been expelled from Tennessee’s GOP-dominated House, an extraordinary act of political retaliation for their role in a gun control demonstration after the killings at a Nashville elementary school last week.
Thousands of protesters have flocked to the Tennessee state capitol to support three Democratic members who were facing removal. Only two of the three were ultimately forced out.
Continue reading...Republican legislators introduce resolution to remove trio after they supported protest in wake of Nashville school shooting
Republican legislators in Tennessee have begun the process of expelling three Democratic colleagues from the conservative-controlled house over their support for a gun control protest at the state capitol days after a deadly school shooting in Nashville.
On Thursday, hundreds gathered at the capitol to protest against the absence of gun control measures after three nine-year-old students and three staff members were killed at the Covenant school last week, according to a report in the Tennessean.
Continue reading...