Live from Music Row Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Tennessee Congressman Chuck Fleishmann (R-TN-03) to the newsmaker line to discuss working in Washington, D.C., his background, and maintaining conservative values.
Leahy: We are joined on our newsmaker line by our good friend, Congressman Chuck Fleishmann from the Third Congressional District of Tennessee, representing the Hamilton County area. Welcome, Congressman Fleischmann.
Fleishmann: Well, good morning, Michael. I hope things are going well in Nashville. It’s a little bit cold here in Washington, figuratively and in reality. But we’re up here for another week. Always a pleasure to be with you. And I appreciate your getting the conservative word out to folks.
Leahy: Yeah boy, there’s not a lot of us getting out the conservative word these days, is there?
Fleishmann: You are so right. We have got to do a better job messaging. When you think of this horrible voting rights bill that the Senate is trying to push. And sadly, the House passed the things that are in it.
If the average American actually took a look at it and said, my gosh, no more voter ID laws. Elections are things that you would just say, oh, my gosh, I don’t want that in America. That’s in this bill.
And there should be a public outcry. So thank you for fighting the good fight, whether it’s on this BBB or any of the horrible radical left-wing agenda that’s out there.
But we’ve got to start talking about conservative ideology and getting policy right. But you’re in a good fight. And I thank you.
Leahy: You are a graduate of the University of Tennessee College of Law.
Fleishmann: That’s right.
Leahy: Were you there at the time when Glenn Reynolds was teaching constitutional law then, or did he come after you?
Fleishmann: I think he came a little bit after me. I graduated in 1986. I was there from ’83 to ’86. I remember Professor Kirby, who was actually a Tennesseean that was there. And were a few others who taught it. Joe Cook. But no, I don’t remember Professor Reynolds.
Leahy: Of course, he’s Instapundit on the web, Glenn Reynolds. But I raised that because this inaccurately called, “Voting Rights Act” is designed to nationalize our elections. It’s clearly unconstitutional. The Constitution makes it quite clear that presidential elections are to be administered at the state level with rules determined by the state legislatures.
That fundamental unconstitutional element of this to me is extraordinarily concerning. And it’s also being jammed through by the leftist Nancy Pelosi, not through regular order, but just being jammed through. As a member of Congress who loves the Constitution, when you see this, how do you react?
Fleishmann: It saddens me. I’m 59 years old, and for the past three or four decades, we as conservatives have lost so many fights to preserve our constitutional republic. And we are a great republic, not a democracy. We are not a mob rule. We are a constitutional republic with three great branches. A nation of rule of law.
But the radical left wing agenda, and I want your listeners if you come away with something to realize this, the left will go from issue to issue. They will fight hard they will use any tool necessary.
They will overlook the Constitution, they will use the mainstream media, and they will work to try to gain the upper hand with their agenda. And we’ve got to fight back in this country because if we do not do this, Michael, I am very, very concerned.
When I see Supreme Court justices, particularly the progressives, but sometimes we lose some that were Republican appointees that come out with decisions that are clearly antithetical to the Constitution. It’s how they feel? No, it’s not how they feel.
It’s how our Founding Fathers intended our great republic to run. We’ve got to stop this. There’s an all-out attack on our institutions.
And conservatives need to stand up and fight for the free enterprise system, for God and country, and for all the things that made our country great. And yes, our great United States Constitution.
Leahy: You and I have something in common. We were both born in New York State. I was born in upstate Oswego, where the snow comes off Lake Ontario. You were born in Manhattan and grew up in Chicago.
Tell us a little bit about your background. Oh, by the way, I noticed that according to your bio, one article I saw, you’re a distant relative of Harry Houdini. Is that true?
Fleishmann: That is true. It’s my grandfather’s first cousin. Never got to meet him. He passed in about 1925, 26. I was born in ’62. But we were fortunate enough that we actually have some of the memorabilia that has been passed down.
Leahy: I’m a genealogy buff.
Fleishmann: Ahhh.
Leahy: Harry Houdini was your first cousin twice removed.
Fleishmann: Grandfather’s first cousin. Well done.
Leahy: The way they do that is they go at an equal level and then each generation removed is called removed. (Fleishmann laughs) So his first cousin twice removed. But here’s what’s interesting.
Harry Houdini is a distant relative to be much more proud of than my distant relative. You’ll recognize the name. Wait for it… my half third cousin is the very liberal left wing Democrat senator from Vermont, Patrick Leahy. How about that?
Fleishmann: Well, how about that? Unfortunately, Senator Leahy is going to resign. And I’ll date myself a little bit. I remember a time, Michael, when Vermont actually had one of the most conservative senators in the United States Senate. And this is going back to the early 80s, but their state, sadly, took a left turn.
But that is interesting. We can’t get away from our genealogy, but a little bit about me. I was born in New York City, but I never lived there. I had three elementary schools, three middle schools, and two high schools. New York, Philadelphia, and Chicago. Fortunately, God saw fit to put me in at age 20, a law school class at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville.
I graduated in 1986, married a wonderful lady from Hixson, Tennessee which is a suburb of Chattanooga, and set up a little law practice there and got involved in Republican politics and helped to fight the good fight against the state income tax in Tennessee.
Which now is prohibited by statute thank God. If you remember, we had a Republican trying to push for state income tax, which infuriated me a few years back. But our great state never has to worry about that again.
Thank goodness. Nine states don’t have state income taxes. I wish all 50 states didn’t have state income taxes. And I wish we could deal with something at the federal level because the tax code is another abomination of what the progressives call progressive.
But what I call ridiculous and bloated. Bottom line, self-made, very thankful and just appreciate the opportunity to be a Tennesseean since 1983 and serve wonderful people in the third district of Tennessee. Which the district, as you saw come out this week, is going to remain largely the same.
Leahy: So you were elected first in 2010. Here’s my big question to you. And you may know, a good friend of mine who served in Congress for a couple of years, Dave Brat from 2014 to 2018.
Fleishmann: I remember Dave.
Leahy: You remember Dave? Yeah. He’s now the Dean of Business at Liberty University College of Business in Lynchburg, Virginia. But we talk often about how the House has changed since 2010. From 2016 to 2018, the Republicans controlled the House.
Now Democrats have since 2018. And there is a process the Founders set up called regular order, where bills would first be considered in subcommittees and then committees and then go to rules and then go to the House floor for a general vote after they were approved.
That’s all gone now. And I think it’s terrible. How do you do your job when the majority left is always jamming through these 3,000-page bills that nobody gets to read or understand before they vote on it?
Fleishmann: It’s frustrating. And, Michael, I’m glad you asked that. What I think we need to do, whether we’re a legislator on the right, as I am or wherever on the spectrum, is to demand that the process be fair and open. And in the House right now, you’re right.
It is a cram-down. Nancy Pelosi is very very disciplined, unfortunately. And when moderates stand up to her, do they get punished and what do they do? They fall in line and they vote for bills like this Voting Rights Act, which is an abomination. Or BBB or any other radical agenda.
Leahy: You mean Bill Back Broker?
Fleishmann: Yes. (Chuckles) Loaded up with every part of the radical left-wing agenda that they have been unable to pass. These are watershed bills. Our listeners need to understand this. These are radical left-wing watershed bills that need to be stopped and stopped now.
Having said that, take a look at the United States Senate. And I believe in our great constitutional history. Originally, our Founding Fathers set up the Constitution where senators were not elected by popular vote.
They were appointed. We amended the Constitution last century to change that. And I’m all for that. If we’re going to change something, do it the right way through a constitutional process. We did that. But this is why the filibuster is so important.
Leahy: And the filibuster is not part of the Constitution. Congressman Fleishmann. It is a rule that’s been around since about 1805. We are out of time. Congressman Fleishmann, will you come back in the studio and talk with us longer?
Fleishmann: We’d love to do that at some point in time. And thank you for everything you do. Keep fighting the good fight and remember this.
It’s never too late to save our great republic to stand up, be conservative, love this country, and fight the good fight.
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
