Live from Music Row Tuesday 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 Davidson County Division 9 General Sessions Judge GOP nominee, Brian Horowitz in studio to explain his upbringing and educational background.
Leahy: We are joined in-studio by Brian Horowitz, an attorney who is a Republican candidate for General Sessions court judge, Division 9, in Davidson County.
He’s wearing his trademark kelly green jacket. Tell us a little bit about your background, Brian. Where are you from originally? Where did you go to high school?
Horowitz: I’m born and raised right here in Nashville, Tennessee. Just a couple of streets away, actually. And I graduated from Battleground Academy.
Leahy: Battleground Academy in Franklin.
Horowitz: I did.
Leahy: What did your folks do?
Horowitz: My folks – it’s a great story. And I do want to give a shout-out to BGA, though, for having four judicial candidates in Middle Tennessee. I think that’s pretty awesome for a small school.
But my father, who is incredibly influential to me, came to Nashville in the mid-’60s, in 1966, and was in one of the first integrated classes at Meharry [Medical College]. He came to Nashville in the ’60s.
Leahy: Is he a medical doctor?
Horowitz: He is. He’s a dermatologist. Once he concluded his residency in 1974, he came back, opened up shop in Midtown, became a faculty member at Meharry and just in every other hospital here in town, and has been practicing ever since.
Leahy: Still practicing?
Horowitz: He has cut back to five days a week, but other than that, he’s in there every day. My mother grew up in Donelson. She was a military brat in a trailer in Germany after the war.
And then when they came back, to a farm in Donelson, where she actually went to David Lipscomb Academy. So I may be the only David Lipscomb-Meharry combo here in town.
Leahy: And BGA.
Horowitz: And BGA, yes.
Leahy: Where did you go to college?
Horowitz: I went to the University of Tennessee for undergrad. Go Vols! Huge Vols supporter. And then for my MBA and negotiation mediation, I went to Belmont University. So I’m a local alum from Belmont, and for law school, I went to Nashville School of Law.
Leahy: Now, what was the order of those?
Horowitz: The order was, obviously the University of Tennessee first. I got my MBA. I thought that I was going to be a corporate warrior and realized that that wasn’t what I wanted to do.
It wasn’t what I was meant for. And so I worked during the day and went to law school at night for four years. It’s pretty difficult.
Leahy: That’s quite a lot to do, isn’t it?
Horowitz: It’s a tremendous amount to do.
Leahy: When did you graduate from Nashville School of Law?
Horowitz: I graduated from Nashville School Law in 2019, and I took the bar exam in 2019.
Leahy: And I assume you passed.
Horowitz: I did. I did. I was in the 85th percentile. I think that’s how you say it. I graduated number eight in my class at Nashville School of Law. We started with 135 people and ended up finishing up with around 65.
Leahy: It’s tough slugging that through for four years.
Horowitz: It’s tough to get through law school in general. But to get through law school when you have obligations and a mortgage and a full-time job during the day and you just have to fit in four hours at night.
Leahy: What was your full-time job during the day?
Horowitz: I was an asset manager and a property manager. And what I did was I helped companies right-size. I consulted and I also dealt with landlord-tenant issues for multiple landlords around.
Leahy: So you’ve only been practicing for three years?
Horowitz: I have, but I don’t focus on that, because I’ve had over 800 cases in General Sessions court. And after a couple hundred, you say, you know what? I think that this can be done better. And after a couple hundred more you really start coming up with ideas of, you know what? Yes, this can be done better.
Leahy: Should someone be a judge who’s only practiced law for three years?
Horowitz: Yes, I think so. I think especially for General Sessions, because it is the court of the people. It is the court where your average person comes in and I think that it gives me a tremendous connection with that average person, because I haven’t done it for as long as everybody else has, or as long as my opponent has, I think that makes me understand that people don’t understand the process when they get into it.
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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.
