Justin Pearson celebrates return to Tennessee legislature after expulsion

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.

Republicans banished Pearson and Jones last week for their role in the protest on the house floor over the shooting, which left three children and three adults dead.

In his address outside the capitol, Pearson read the names of those killed and referenced another mass shooting on Monday at a bank in Louisville, Kentucky, in which five people were killed and eight others were injured.

The Nashville metropolitan council took only a few minutes on Monday to restore Jones to office. He was quickly reinstated to his house seat that day.

The appointments are interim, though Jones and Pearson plan to run in special elections for the seats later this year.

The expulsions last Thursday made Tennessee a new front in the battle for the future of American democracy. In the span of a few days, the two raised thousands of campaign dollars and the Tennessee Democratic party received a jolt of support from across the US.

In Tennessee, Republican lawmakers have been supportive of the idea to strengthen school safety, but they have largely rejected calls for stricter gun controls with only weeks to go in the legislative session.