Memphis lawmaker renews call for city to secede from Tennessee, form 51st state

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (WMC) – State Rep. Antonio Parkinson says Tennessee’s two blue cities, Memphis and Nashville, should break away and form their own state.

“I don’t think the state of Tennessee deserves a Memphis and Shelby County…or a Nashville, Davidson County,” Parkinson said on Action News 5’s A Better Memphis broadcast Friday.

Parkinson proposed creating a new state called West Tennessee, which would span from the eastern border of Nashville’s Davidson County to the Mississippi River.

“I’m not just talking about Memphis, I’m talking about the eastern border of Nashville, Davidson County and everything to the Mississippi River to create a new state called the new state of West Tennessee, the 51st state, West Tennessee,” Parkinson said.

Proposal follows new congressional map

Parkinson’s secession pitch follows the GOP supermajority approving a new congressional map Thursday that splits Shelby County into three districts, dismantling what was the state’s only majority-Black district.

“So this is about accountability. We’re paying all of this money, yet you remove our voice, so that is taxation without self-determination, taxation without actual representation,” Parkinson said.

Tennessee Speaker of the House Cameron Sexton denies race was a factor when Republicans redrew the map.

“Look, at the end of the day we were able to draw a map based on population and based on politics, we did not use any racial data,” Sexton told Action News 5.

Sexton said Democrats did the same thing in the 1990s when they split Shelby County into three different congressional districts.

Secession requires state, federal approval

For Memphis to secede, it requires approval from the State of Tennessee and the U.S. Congress.

Parkinson said he’s willing to fight that uphill battle.

“Why should we stay in an abusive relationship where they’ve shown us the pattern over and over and over…where they do not see our value, and do not care about us,” Parkinson said.

This is not the first time Parkinson has suggested Memphis secede from Tennessee. He made the same call in 2018 after the Republican-controlled state legislature punished Memphis, cutting the city’s funding by $250,000, in retaliation for removing two Confederate statutes.

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