The Tennessee General Assembly and its GOP supermajority have been on quite the streak in recent years.
In 2021, the legislative body struck down permit requirements for open and concealed carrying of handguns.
Despite efforts from Republican Gov. Bill Lee to the contrary, the state legislature in April passed a bill barring any municipality in Tennessee to enact red flag laws — a measure found in 21 other states that allow guns to be temporarily taken away from someone deemed to be dangerous.
As for abortion, the medical procedure, following the U.S. Supreme Court reversal of Roe v. Wade in 2022, is illegal in Tennessee with no exceptions for rape or incest. In the Volunteer State, women can’t even take medication used in two thirds of abortion cases to terminate a pregnancy in the early weeks of the first trimester without the supervision of a physician. And even that is in limited cases, in the instance of a medical emergency.
So despite a 2023 state report finding the leading cause of childhood death in Tennessee to be homicides, in which 86% were committed with a firearm, the state legislature has made it easier to buy a gun than for a woman to be prescribed a pill that ends her pregnancy.