As Rep. Justin J. Pearson stood on stage at his election night watch party thanking his family and supporters, a check mark appeared next to the U.S. House of Representatives District 9 race on the Tennessee Secretary of State’s website. The “final unofficial results” were in.
State Sen. Brent Taylor, a Republican from Eads, had 49.63% of the vote to Pearson’s 48.50%, a roughly 2,500-vote lead in the sprawling district created by Republicans when they divided Memphis into thirds in May.
“What I will tell you, without a shadow of a single doubt, is that together we have changed history, and Tennessee politics will never be the same again,” Pearson told the crowd gathered at New Direction Christian Church. “Together we have made history in the district that they drew to gerrymander us into oblivion.”
Pearson issued a statement Wednesday accepting the results of the election, but saying he “will not concede to rigged maps, attacks on democracy in Tennessee, or to billionaire control of our political system.”
While Pearson didn’t win, Democrats saw dramatic gains across the state and the country. Democrats won both the U.S. House and Senate in what the Associated Press called “a decisive rebuke of Republican governance in Washington.”
In Tennessee, where Republicans redistricted with the express goal of making all nine Congressional districts Republican, Democrat Victoria Broderick defeated longtime Republican Congressman Scott DesJarlais by 280 votes in District 4, unofficial results show. The district includes 11 counties, including Davidson and Rutherford.
The Tennessee House Democratic Caucus also celebrated six victories in seats currently held by Republicans, raising the number of Democratic House representatives from 24 to 30. Among them is Jesse Huseth, who defeated incumbent State Rep. John Gillespie in District 97, which covers parts of East Memphis and unincorporated Shelby County.
Even as Democratic wins across the country energized Pearson supporters, they also mourned Republican wins locally, including U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn, who narrowly defeated Memphis City Councilwoman Jerri Green in the race for Tennessee governor. Voters shifted 27.21 points toward Democrats compared with the 2024 presidential election, according to NBC News.
Pearson spoke with MLK50: Justice Through Journalism Wednesday afternoon, shortly after conceding the election.
Q&A with State Rep. Justin J. Pearson
Q: What are the next steps for you?
A: “Our main thing right now is to thank people. We want to thank them for all their support, their encouragement in this campaign, from the door knockers and the phone bankers to the fundraising folks who donated and contributed and supported our campaign. I just want everyone to know how much I appreciate them for taking on the Herculean task of putting a huge crack in a gerrymander that was intended to destroy our political voice and power, and yet it awakened it.”
Q: What do you plan to take back to the statehouse?
A: “What I am taking back to the statehouse is a significant amount of encouragement that we’re on the right side of the issues. You know, had the district just been in Memphis and Shelby County, I would have never been to Lawrence and Murray. I would have never been to Giles, Rutherford to see what the problems are in those communities and their desperate need for people to actually represent their voices and their opinions. And quite frankly, I know now that the folks who are representing those areas are failing them woefully. And so I have a level of clarity when advocating for the expansion of Medicaid, when making sure that we fight to increase the minimum wage in our state, protect people from these data centers, that I’m actually lifting up the voices of their constituents who they’ve been ignoring for decades.”
Q: You got really close. What do you think that shows about the Tennesseans in District 9?
A: “I think District 9 and the people in Tennessee are ready for something different than the status quo politicians who are corporate-bought and who are capitulating to the powers that be that don’t care about working-class people. They don’t care about farmers. They don’t care about making life better for us. I mean, the fact we got this close in a district that was designed for us to have an impossible chance is really a testament to how strong our message was and to the needs of the people in Tennessee, and that gives me a lot of hope and courage that the best days for Tennessee are still ahead.”
Q: How do you think this election will reshape political dynamics in Nashville?
A: “I really do think that we, as Democrats in particular, should feel really encouraged. Republicans have failed in this state for over 16 years, and them continuing to hold onto power is only hurting us. It’s not helping us, and our race for Congress is indicative of that. The races that we saw winning, state house races flipping is indicative of that. Victoria’s victory is indicative of that: That something is happening in Tennessee, and our job is to continue to organize, mobilize and activate that power, and not just give up on ourselves or quit.”
Q: What are some things you learned during this campaign, particularly as you traveled across the sprawling new district?
A: “I think one of the main things that I learned, something that I always felt in my heart to be true, but I think it’s just real, is we have more in common than we do different, and it’s important to be proximate to different places to solidify that truth and that reality. … I’m planning a thank you tour, and so I’ll be going back to all of these counties, thanking everybody for their support and also talking about what’s next for us.”
Q: Part of this campaign that went beyond getting you to Congress was coalition-building. Why was that important to you and how do you plan to continue that coalition building beyond the campaign?
A: “I am a deep believer in what Heather McGhee calls the solidarity dividend and building it with the level of intention that rural folks, urban folks, Black folks, white folks, Latino folks — we all have to work together because it’s the billionaires versus the rest of us, and by working together, we can actually come up with common ground and common solutions to the problems that we face. So, moving ahead, we’re probably going to do monthly meetings and gatherings, either virtually or in person, that just keep our community connected … And then we’re also going to have a strong volunteer base that we’re going to activate coming into elections next year. We have Memphis mayor elections, Memphis city council elections, and then in our other counties we have county commissioner elections and things that are happening. And so this volunteer base is just going to stay engaged as we build this movement for justice rooted in love.”
Q: Is there anything else you’d like to add?
A: “I am overwhelmed with gratitude for the privilege to have run for Congress, and despite all that was against us from every side and every angle, our team and our volunteers and our community showed up at the ballot box to say that our civil rights and our voting rights matters, and you can rig a map, but you can’t rig a movement.”
Katherine Burgess is the government accountability reporter for MLK50: Justice Through Journalism. Contact her at katherine.burgess@mlk50.com
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