NASHVILLE — A Tennessee lawmaker plans to ask Gov. Bill Haslam this week to work to “suspend all efforts” to settle Syrian refugees in the state following last Friday’s terror attacks in Paris.
Rep. Sheila Butt, R-Columbia, is asking colleagues in an email to sign a letter in an effort to persuade fellow Republican Haslam to agree in the wake of the attacks which according to news accounts killed at least 129 people.
The self-proclaimed Islamic State has claimed credit for the coordinated assaults.
In her email, Butt said “Tennesseans are mourning this week with the people of Paris.” She said “we understand completely the sense of helplessness, despair and dread after the terrorist attack on our own state in Chattanooga in July of this year.
Sheila Butt“Four Marines and a Sailor were brutally and defenselessly shot and killed and other servicemen and a police officer were wounded,” Butt’s letter notes. “Many lives changed drastically that day. We still feel the violation and the loss.”