Now that she is no longer a freshman in the Tennessee House, state Rep. Michele Reneau, R-Hixson, said she plans to introduce child adoption and biometric data protection legislation in the upcoming General Assembly session.
Now, Reneau said, she better understands the nuances of the legislature and how to position bills to successfully become state law.
“There’s just a lot of moving parts in whether something moves forward. There are certainly some interests that have louder voices than others, right,” Reneau told the Chattanooga Times Free Press at a grant announcement last week. “I certainly understood that there was some aspect of that. You just don’t realize how big it is.”
Reneau’s 2024 win was an upset, unseating five-term Rep. Patsy Hazlewood, R-Signal Mountain, by fewer than 150 votes. Reneau’s campaign raised significantly less money than Hazlewood’s at $22,410, about one-sixteenth the $366,790 raised by Hazlewood.