NASHVILLE – Tennessee legislators return to the state Capitol Monday for a special session in which Republican majority lawmakers hope to resurrect previously failed efforts to pass a measure to shield businesses from coronavirus-related lawsuits except in cases of “gross negligence or willful misconduct.”
The measure is joined by several equally controversial pre-filed House bills as Republicans seek to crack down and enact harsher criminal penalties on demonstrators at the state Capitol, state-owned property and beyond the Capitol complex amid weeks of protests over racism, police brutality and Confederate figures still honored in the Capitol.
Republican Gov. Bill Lee called the special session to address those issues as well as a telehealth bill left behind when lawmakers acrimoniously adjourned their June session amid House and Senate GOP lawmakers’ infighting over the COVID-19 liability bill.
During the June session, top House Republicans including Majority Leader William Lamberth, a Republican attorney from Portland, refused to vote for the COVID-19 liability protection measure due to retroactive provisions that sought to protect businesses, hospitals, nursing homes, universities, schools, churches and other entities going back to March 5, the first reported case of the coronavirus in Tennessee.
House Bill 1, the new bill, backdates that only to Aug. 3, when Lee issued the special session call.