Thread: Well, here we are, special session. Quite honestly it doesn't feel very special, especially not for TN families. To me, a special session in a pandemic would be addressing Medicaid expansion so that every Tennessean has access to affordable healthcare...

It would be delivering the funds necessary to make our schools safe for staff & kids with distance learning until we have contained the virus as many other places have. It would mean fixing our broken unemployment system so families don't have to go 8-10 weeks without a paycheck.

And how do you even pretend you are having a special session "for COVID-19" when you have no plan to contain the virus and you aren't even discussing it? We will never get our economy back on track without containing the virus.

Opening schools to in-person classes at this time stands to make this impossible with the amount of community spread it is likely to bring. We must contain the virus first.

What are we discussing? Making it possible for bad actors to be released from liability when they cause harm. Don't buy the line the liability bill helps small business, non-profits, or schools and universities. Those entities are protected by laws already on the books in TN.

After removing the Safe Harbor portion of this bill, all it does is protect that tiny group, likely less than 1% of businesses, who are bad actors and ignoring all the pandemic guidelines. These are the folks hurting the economy by preventing consumer confidence from growing.

Why would we put the bad actors on the same playing field as the VAST majority of businesses who are doing everything right. Again, those folks doing right are already protected by TN laws. And why on earth would we take access to the legal system away from regular Tennesseans?

The Telehealth bill can be continued through January by Exec Order, why spend $47,k a day to for special session for this bill? At least this bill is Const. sound, the others will likely face Constitutional challenge. Our Gov loves unconstitutional lege for some peculiar reason.

The protester bills are a mess & will certainly face a const. challenge. Again, we have laws against vandalism in TN, why are we spending time in a pandemic talking about this? We have had peaceful protesters at the Capitol for 59 days, they have harmed nothing or no one.

The protesters want the bust of a murdering KKK Grand Wizard removed from a place of honor in the State Capitol to a museum and they want to discuss racial justice policies. Most other southern states have taken these steps, not Tennessee, the protesters deserve to be heard.

Again, we are penalizing regular Tennesseans ability to be heard while we allow special interests to demand this special session do their bidding before they cut their campaign donation checks for the GOP.

Mom just called: "Gloria, is everybody wearing masks?" No mom, my colleagues across the aisle are not wearing masks. Mom asks, "Why not?" I have to tell her it's because they don't care about my health or hers.

Remember, I couldn't help her with cooking, her meds, or just visit. I had to get tested and quarantine after coming to Nashville for Gov Ops and one of my colleagues who wasn't masked was positive for COVID.

Yeah, nothing special in this session for hard working Tennesseans.