NASHVILLE – Tennessee House Speaker Beth Harwell this week got an up-close and painful introduction to an occupational hazard perhaps better known by U.S. Postal Service workers than politicians.
The state’s most powerful female politician was bitten several times by a dog as she went canvassing door to door for votes in her Nashville district.
“I was knocking on the door – I was at the front door – and the dog came around from the back of the house and I was stuck on the front steps,” Harwell, a Republican first elected to the state House in 1988, told state Capitol reporters on Thursday.
“So I did what I normally do with a dog, which is throw out my hands and say, ‘Sit!’ Real firm,” Harwell added. “And this big dog just reached up and grabbed a finger.”
She displayed a heavily bandaged middle finger on her right hand. Another bandage was on the side of her hand. The dog, which Harwell described as standing about waist high, also bit her on her hip as she sought to maneuver away.