Editor's notebook: The Tennessee Republican ‘law and order' conundrum

Yahoo

31-01-2025

Donald Trump supporters clash with police and security forces as rioters try to storm the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by)
All eight Republicans in the U.S. House and both senators voted for the Laken Riley Act on Jan. 22. The act, which is named for the Georgia college student killed in February, mandates that Department of Homeland Security officials detain undocumented immigrants charged with any act of theft.
But on the violence of Jan. 6, 2021, when rioters backing an effort by President Donald Trump to overturn the results of the 2020 election stormed the U.S. Capitol, 'law and order' gets a little squishier for our representatives.
A review of social media posts from that 2021 day show several issued stern admonishments about the violence: mob members tear-gassed and beat 174 law enforcement officers. One died of his injuries a day later.
Tennessee's senior senator, Marsha Blackburn, wrote 'These actions at the US Capitol by protestors are truly despicable and unacceptable. While I am safe and sheltering in place, these protests are prohibiting us from doing our constitutional duty. I condemn them in the strongest possible terms. We are a nation of laws.'
Sen. Bill Hagerty — a freshman who had not yet been sworn into office — posted on X, 'I have always believed in peaceful protesting. What is happening at the U.S. Capitol right now is not peaceful, this is violence. I condemn it in the strongest terms. We are a nation of laws and this must stop.'
Rep. Tim Burchett, the Knoxville Republican representing Tennessee Congressional District 2, posted on his official website, 'The rioting at the U.S. Capitol is disgusting and criminal. The President needs to publicly tell his supporters to stop or else people are going to get hurt or possibly die. Thank God for the United States Capitol Police officers working to get the situation under control; they have families just like we do.'
Similarly, District 7 U.S. Rep. Mark Green, a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and retired U.S. Army officer, posted on X that day: 'We are a country of law and order—this violence is UNACCEPTABLE. Pray for our nation's Capitol Police and law enforcement officers.'
Given the hard lines taken by these lawmakers about the disgraceful Capitol riot, I figured they would also have thoughts about President Donald Trump's decision to pardon 1,500 rioters, including neo-fascist Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio and Steward Rhodes of Oath Keepers, the latter an anti-government militia.
Blackburn and other GOP senators didn't respond to repeated questions from D.C. reporters about the pardons, States Newsroom's D.C. Bureau reported.
Perhaps, I thought, Blackburn will respond to a Tennessee-based journalist.
I reached out to get comments from Blackburn, Hagerty, Burchett and Green, sharing with each of them their 2021 posts and asking for a response to Trump's pardons.
Only Hagerty's office replied.
'During the last few years, it became painfully apparent to Senator Hagerty that the Biden Department of Justice used the January 6 investigation to excessively punish individuals for their political views rather than their actions— most of those pardoned were targeted for non-violent offenses like trespassing,' wrote a spokesperson for Hagerty.
Throughout his presidential campaign last year, Trump was clear about his intention to pardon the Jan. 6 protesters, the response continued. 'The American people knew his intentions and voted for him.'
I give credit to Hagerty's office for responding.
But the hypocrisy of the other members is something to behold. How can the officials who were quick to label immigrants as terrorists remain silent over pardons for the domestic terrorists who had those same lawmakers cowering under their desks?
Many of us are more concerned about right-wing groups who seek to destabilize the government through actions like the Capitol riots — the 'patriots' in our midst who chose violence to achieve political aims and are now released into the population.
No one, we often hear, should be above the law. Yet, if the silence from Tennessee's Republican delegation is any indication, it's clear Tennesseans can't count on our federal representatives to take a moral high ground, as they choose not only to cave to the whims of the current administration, but to fail to even have the guts to publicly defend their choices.
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