Live from Music Row Thursday 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 all-star panelist Clint Brewer in-studio to comment upon The Wall Street Journal’s hit piece on Tennessee legislature and the residency bill that passed Monday night.
Leahy: We are delighted to have in-studio, our very good friend, all-star panelist, recovering journalist, public affairs specialist, Mr. Clint Brewer. Good morning, Clint.
Brewer: Morning, Mike. I’d like to listeners to know that (clears throat) I am still waking up like most of them. Mike is pinging around the studio with a lot of energy. (Leahy laughs)
Leahy: I’m trying to lift you up, brother. I’m trying to lift you up!
Brewer: I’m trying to keep up here. I wish I was over my coffee like you guys were. One Red Bull didn’t do it this morning.
Leahy:Â Are you a Red Bull guy?
Brewer: I am when I’m coming here.
Leahy: You trek in from Wilson County.
Brewer: I do.
Leahy: And so you kind of get up a little bit earlier.
Brewer: I do.
Leahy: The natural sleep cycle is a little bit later than we get up.
Brewer: Yeah, yeah, it is.
Leahy: Somebody who missed their sleep cycle, apparently, the editorial board of The Wall Street Journal. I’m going to read this to you. It just was published last night, and they so don’t know what they’re talking about.
And usually, if you look at The Wall Street Journal, it’s owned by the Murdoch group, and the same people that own Fox News, but usually The Wall Street Journal, the editorial board is relatively conservative.
Brewer: Well, yeah, it makes sense, right?
Leahy: Usually.
Brewer: A lot of times. Many times.
Leahy: But the reporting leans Left, doesn’t it, at Wall Street Journal,
Brewer: For the most part, I think it can. I think a lot of newsrooms lean Left.
Leahy: The Tennessee Star doesn’t lean Left.
Brewer: Yeah, we’re all aware of that. (Leahy laughs) Many legacy media companies lean Left.
Leahy: So they really don’t know what they’re talking about. And they took a shot, a very unfair shot, at all of Tennessee. And I’m going to read it and I’ll get your reaction to it. You haven’t seen it, so you’ll just hear this.
I’ll read the first four paragraphs of this with the headline, and then I’ll pause and get your reaction. The headline is “Tennessee’s Political Protection Racket: State Legislators Pass a Law to Block a Trumpian Outsider from the Ballot.” (Reads from article)
“The filing deadline to run for a U.S. House seat in Tennessee is next week, yet on Monday, the state legislature moved to change the rules by creating a three-year residency requirement. The bill is a flagrant attempt to sideline an outsider candidate backed by President Trump, and it may be unconstitutional. Morgan Ortagus worked as a spokeswoman for Mr. Trump’s State Department before she moved to Nashville in 2021.
“After lawmakers drew a new political map this year, Jim Cooper decided to retire. The race to replace him includes a herd of Republicans, including Ms. Ortagus. Ms. Ortagus isn’t from Tennessee originally, but then neither are many of her neighbors. The population of the Nashville Metropolitan area grew 21 percent between 2010 and 2020 as newcomers flocked to the state without an income tax.
“Voters can decide if Ms. Ortagus is a carpetbagger, and if they care. Yet, lawmakers want to narrow the people’s options preemptively by disqualifying anyone who hasn’t lived in Tennessee for three years. One of the bill sponsors, State Senator Frank Niceley, supports a different candidate, former State House Speaker Beth Harwell. This is rotten.
“No matter what you think of Mr. Trump, state lawmakers want to help an insider candidate by blocking an outsider from the ballot. Worse, they’re doing it in the middle of a campaign days before the filing deadline. Governor Bill Lee’s office says he’s, ‘Still reviewing the legislation.’ Tennessee has a weak veto so the legislature could override him with a simple majority.”
Now, The Wall Street Journal, in my view, has totally shaded that story. What are your thoughts on it?
Brewer: Well, a couple of things. One, we have laws in this country that create these kinds of barriers for entry into races all the time. There’s an age limit on being able to run for president of the United States. Correct?
Leahy: Mercifully so.
Brewer: But should we just take that off? I mean, these things have been in place traditionally for a reason. Now set aside. I think Morgan Ortagus is actually a very qualified candidate. But let’s set that aside.
Do the politically elite have a different set of rules than everybody else? I mean, why would the people of Tennessee not speak through the legislature? I think they possibly have.
Leahy: That’s the key point.
Brewer: Why not?
Leahy: Because they’re trying to say that it’s Niceley trying to push Beth Harwell out, the vote was 31 to one in the Senate, 70 to 18 in the house. I don’t think all of them support Beth Harwell.
Brewer: They have a representative form of democracy in this country.
Leahy: That’s right. Take that, Wall Street Journal.
Brewer: We should come back to this.
Leahy: We will come back to it.
Listen to the full interview here:
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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.
It would be nice if the Wall Street Journal would stick to Wall Street. It has devolved into a left-leaning rag under the Murdock empire.