Almost as soon as an alliance of white nationalist groups announced it was planning to hold a rally this month in Shelbyville, opposing activists across Tennessee sprang into action.
On the heels of a similar demonstration that turned violent and deadly two months ago in Charlottesville, Va., they're at work mobilizing counterprotesters to stand in opposition to members of Nationalist Front, which will hold a "White Lives Matter" rally Oct. 28 in Shelbyville, and has applied for a permit to do so later that day in Murfreesboro.
"I think we can affect the national discourse for this, but I also think in Shelbyville, for the minorities, for the people of color and the Jews, this is going to be a chance to say, 'It's not the 1950s anymore,'" said Chris Irwin, a Knoxville-based attorney aligned with the Tennessee Anti-Racist Network.
Read more at our news partner's website, tennessean.com.