Tennessee
Tennessee Senate passes bill allowing teachers to carry guns amid vocal protests
Covenant moms among USA Today’s Women of the Year for 2024
Melissa Alexander, Mary Joyce, Sarah Shoop Neumann, Becky Bailey Hansen, Covenant Moms with Covenant Parents for a Brighter Tomorrows talk about their experience working in activism
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Tennessee Senate Republicans passed legislation Tuesday that would allow public K-12 teachers and school staff to carry concealed handguns on school grounds — despite vocal protests from Covenant School families and others seeking stricter gun-control measures.
Senate Bill 1325 allows Tennessee school faculty or staff to carry a concealed handgun on the grounds of their school. Tennessee law already allows school resource officers, assigned through an agreement between local school districts and law enforcement, to carry firearms on campus.
The measure passed in a 26-5 vote that fell along party lines. Discussion over the bill halted as a group of around 200 gun-reform advocates voiced their opposition in the Senate gallery, holding signs and snapping their fingers in support or hissing in dissent as Senators debated the bill.
The school district’s director of schools, the school principal and the chief of the “appropriate” law enforcement agency must sign off on a staff member’s authority to carry a concealed handgun.
Tennessee state Sen. Paul Bailey sponsored the legislation and said Tuesday that a school principal could make a blanket decision not to participate and notify a director of schools they don’t want to allow any teachers to carry. But the legislation itself does not directly outline this opt-out mechanism that Bailey referred to and rather directs school administrators to consider each certification individually.
What are lawmakers saying about the bill
The measure isn’t yet law.
The House companion bill, HB 1202, technically only needs a final vote in the lower chamber after passing through committees last year. The bill is currently being “held on the desk,” a procedural term that means the bill is in a holding pattern unless someone moves to remove it from the table.
Republicans have overwhelmingly supported the bill, which was initially filed in January 2023 but has been cited as a potential school security measure in the wake of The Covenant School shooting last March. Democrats oppose the measure, which has also attracted hundreds of gun-reform protestors who oppose a GOP supermajority-led trend of expanding access to firearms in Tennessee.
Republicans argue it’s a needed security option for schools that have been unable to hire a school resource officer or more rural schools where law enforcement response might be delayed during a security crisis.
Shortly after the Covenant School shooting last year, state officials approved new funding to place a school resource officer at every public school in the state. But personnel shortages have slowed the placement, and hundreds of Tennessee schools still lack an SRO.
“We are not trying to shoot a student but protect a student from an active shooter whose sole purpose is to get in that school and kill people,” sponsor Tennessee state Sen. Ken Yager said Tuesday. “In counties like I serve, rural counties, where they may only have two deputies on a shift, it might take 20 or 30 minutes to get to that school. What havoc can be wreaked in that 30-minute period? This bill tries to fix that problem and protect children.”
Tennessee Democrats sharply criticized the bill, arguing it was “irresponsible” and could put students at risk to have guns in the classroom, open to be stolen or misused in a panicked crisis situation.
“The level of irresponsibility here is befuddling,” Tennessee state Sen. Jeff Yarbro said. “We’re sending people to a 40-hour — one week, less time than kids spend in summer camp — to learn how to handle a combat situation that veteran law enforcement officers have trouble dealing with. It is complicated, to say the least, for someone to handle a firearm accurately, responsibly, effectively with an active shooter and literally hundreds of innocent children in the area. And we’re letting people do that with a week’s training.”
Covenant mom calls Senate’s actions ‘appalling’
After repeated warnings about disruptions, Tennessee Lt. Gov. Randy McNally called for state troopers to clear the gallery. He permitted a group of mothers of Covenant School students to stay, saying they had not caused a disruption.
Beth Gebhard, whose son and daughter attend the Covenant School in Nashville, said her children were there last spring as a shooter killed three 9-year-olds and three adult staff members. She watched the Senate proceedings Tuesday with tears in her eyes, alongside several other mothers of students at the school.
She staunchly opposes the bill. She said her children, 9-year-old Ava and 12-year-old Hudson, survived the shooting because of well-trained teachers and police officers doing their job. She can’t imagine a teacher having to also deal with confronting a shooter, especially one armed with an assault-style rifle.
“A handgun will do nothing against that,” she said. “If what had happened on March 27 had gone down the way that it did with a teacher armed with a handgun attempting to put the perpetrator out, my children would likely be dead.”
She called the lawmakers “cowardly” for clearing the gallery.
“If they are supposed to be representative of our voice and they are dismissing these people … they are not for us and it is appalling,” she said, holding back tears. “It’s so upsetting. It makes me want to move.”
Melissa Alexander and Mary Joyce, both mothers of students who attend Covenant, huddled with Gebhard after the vote. A Capitol building staff member who spotted the trio brought by a box of tissues, earning grateful smiles.
“As mothers of survivors, all we can do is continue to show up and keep sharing our stories and hope that eventually they will listen to them and take our advice,” Alexander said. “We have real experiences in these tragedies. We are the ones who have been there, experienced this and lived through the aftermath of it.”
College softball’s fastest flamethrower just got faster.
Tennessee softball ace Karlyn Pickens had already thrown the fastest pitch ever recorded at 78.2 mph. But in the first inning of the super regional against Nebraska on May 24, she beat her own record.
Pickens threw 79.4 mph during Nebraska pitcher Jordy Bahl’s first at-bat of Game 2.
Pickens tied the previous record of 77 mph by Tennessee legend Monica Abbott earlier in the season twice before she broke it against Arkansas on March 24. Abbott originally set the record during a National Pro Fastpitch game in 2012.
The Weaverville, North Carolina, native is known for her velocity as one of the few pitchers to consistently throw in the mid 70s and higher.
Tennessee was tied 2-2 with Nebraska after the first inning. The No. 7 seed Lady Vols (43-15) lost Game 1 to the Huskers 5-2, and they would need to win Game 2 to extend their season and force a rubber match on May 25.
Pickens had already thrown five strikeouts in the first two innings of Game 2.
Pickens won her second straight SEC Pitcher of the Year award this season after leading the conference in ERA and strikeouts. She currently has a 0.99 ERA and 259 strikeouts on the season.
Cora Hall covers University of Tennessee women’s athletics. Email her at cora.hall@knoxnews.com and follow her on X @corahalll. If you enjoy Cora’s coverage, consider a digital subscription that allows you to access all of it.
Tennessee
Karen Weekly on errors, lost challenge in Tennessee softball’s Game 1 loss to Nebraska in super regional
The NCAA super regional in Knoxville started and ended with Jordy Bahl.
The Nebraska pitcher hit a single off Tennessee softball ace Karlyn Pickens on her first pitch of the game. Seven innings and a couple of costly Tennessee errors later, Bahl ended Nebraska’s 5-2 win on May 23 with a strikeout.
The No. 7 seed Lady Vols (43-15) are down one game in the best-of-three series at Sherri Parker Lee Stadium. Going in, Tennessee was 8-0 in Game 1 of the super regionals at home. It has never advanced to the Women’s College World Series after dropping the first game of super regionals.
“Well, this is super regionals, and these are tough games,” Tennessee coach Karen Weekly said. “We did some uncharacteristic things . . . But that’s postseason, some weird things are going to happen. It’s a marathon, that’s what I told these guys in our postgame. We’ve lost games on Friday night in SEC play, and we’ve come back and won the series. We just need to rely on that experience and come out here tomorrow, flush tonight.”
The Lady Vols will face Nebraska (43-13) in Game 2 of the super regional on Saturday (5 p.m. ET, ESPN).
What Karen Weekly said about lost challenge in fourth inning
Tennessee could have gotten out of the fourth inning multiple times before Nebraska built a four-run lead.
The Lady Vols had two outs in the fourth when Pickens threw a wild pitch. Bella Bacon attempted to steal second base, but catcher Sophia Nugent had a perfect throw to Laura Mealer. The throw comfortably beat Bacon and led Mealer right into the tag, but the umpire called Bacon safe.
Weekly challenged the call, and replays appeared to show Bacon sliding into Mealer’s glove. But the call on the field was upheld, and the inning continued.
“I mean, I’m thinking it’s a good challenge, because the throw beat her,” Weekly said. “So you’re thinking, OK, how do we not have an out there? And I’ll have to see the replay. I mean, they went to review. We don’t have all the camera angles that we have during the regular season. That’s unfortunate. But if we miss the tag, we miss the tag.”
Tennessee doomed by errors in second postseason game
The Lady Vols started the postseason with a loss in the SEC tournament due to two costly errors, and they had two critical errors in the Game 1 loss to Nebraska.
Those happened during the at-bat immediately after the challenge. Bahl hit a fly ball to shallow left field, and Mealer camped out under it, waving everyone off. But outfielder Saviya Morgan came running in and didn’t hear anyone call her off. Mealer backed off at the last second and Morgan missed the catch.
“(It’s) just one of those things where, they both made a mistake,” Weekly said. “Saviya came in and was calling a ball that wasn’t hers, and Laura, at that point in time, just needed to hold her ground and make the catch and not defer to Saviya.”
The ball bounced off Morgan’s foot to Pickens, who threw it home to try to keep another run from scoring. But her throw was off, and Nebraska scored twice and took a 5-1 lead. Weekly pulled Pickens, who had seven strikeouts.
“If we get out of that inning before that pop-up, we had a chance to put a tag on a runner at second base, the inning’s over right there,” Weekly said. “I think if we can kind of keep that at 3-1, we close it to 3-2 — Karlyn’s going to get in there and battle for you. I have a ton of faith in Karlyn. A ton of faith in Karlyn.”
Cora Hall covers University of Tennessee women’s athletics. Email her at cora.hall@knoxnews.com and follow her on X @corahalll. If you enjoy Cora’s coverage, consider a digital subscription that allows you to access all of it.
Gavin Adcock, the 26-year-old country singer, was arrested Wednesday in Tennessee for reckless driving and violation of open container laws.
The Tennessean, citing the Wilson County Sheriff’s Office, reports the Georgia native posted a $1,000 bond and was released around 4:34 a.m. on May 22.
Adcock, known for songs like “Deep End” and “Ain’t No Cure,” was coming off performing back-to-back nights at Nashville’s The Pinnacle and is still planning to continue his “Need To” tour in Grant, Oklahoma, on Saturday.
No further details were available about the circumstances that led Adcock to be arrested, or when he’ll be back in court to address the charges.
It isn’t Adocock’s first run in with the law. He posted on X in 2023 that he’d previously been arrested for driving with a suspended license.
“I sat in there for ten hours and made friends with my cellmates,” he posted.
Mark Heim is a reporter for The Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @Mark_Heim. He can be heard on “The Opening Kickoff” on WNSP-FM 105.5 FM in Mobile or on the free Sound of Mobile App from 6 to 9 a.m. daily.
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