Tennessee State Rep. Justin Pearson — the same Democrat who got himself expelled in 2023 for turning the House floor into a megaphone protest — went absolutely nuclear on state troopers during the redistricting special session this week, screaming profanities in their faces on camera. CBS and NBC covered the redistricting story. They just conveniently forgot to mention the part where a sitting legislator had a full psychotic break on video.
Because why would America need to see that?
Here's what actually happened, as reported by NewsBusters' Jorge Bonilla. During the third day of Tennessee's special session on congressional redistricting, Pearson's brother was being removed from the chamber by Tennessee Highway Patrol troopers. Pearson physically made contact with a trooper — appearing to push him — and then screamed, "Move the f back, boy! What the f is wrong with you?" He called the officer a "stupid motherf*" while someone nearby called the trooper "a pig."
See Pearson's unhinged behavior for yourself...
https://twitter.com/turkeyloin/status/2052460247625728477
The video went viral. It was everywhere. Twitter lit up. Conservative media covered it wall to wall.
But when CBS Evening News anchor Tony Dokoupil tossed to correspondent Ed O'Keefe for the Tennessee redistricting segment, viewers got this sanitized gem instead: "Tennessee Democrats could do little more than protest the move, and they did that standing in a line, shouting at Republicans as they voted overwhelmingly to drop the state's one Democratic congressional seat." Standing in a line. Shouting at Republicans. That's one way to describe a man physically confronting law enforcement while screaming obscenities.
NBC Nightly News anchor Tom Llamas was even lazier about it, offering only that "Democratic lawmakers protesting after Republicans in the state legislature passed a new congressional map." Protesting. Like it was a bake sale with strongly worded signs.
Let's not pretend this is complicated. The networks had footage of a Democrat state representative pushing a state trooper and dropping F-bombs on camera. They had Sen. Charlane Oliver in a tug-of-war with the Senate Sergeant at Arms over a banner reading "No Jim Crow 2 Stop the Steal." They had protesters pulling fire alarms and throwing parachutes from the House gallery. This wasn't a peaceful demonstration — it was a circus.
And they buried every bit of it.
Now imagine — just imagine — if a Republican state legislator had screamed "Move the f* back, boy!" at a Black state trooper. We'd have three CNN panels, an MSNBC special, and a New York Times editorial calling it proof of systemic racism within 45 minutes. The footage would be on loop for a week.
But Pearson's a Democrat, so CBS showed people standing in a line and NBC called it a protest. The redistricting itself was significant — the Republican-controlled legislature passed a new congressional map that splits Memphis's majority-Black district into three, potentially making Tennessee 9-0 Republican in congressional representation. That's a real story worth covering honestly. But "honestly" isn't really in the network playbook when the embarrassing footage features the wrong team.
This is what media bias actually looks like. Not what they report — what they choose to leave out. Every newsroom in America had that Pearson video. CBS and NBC looked at a Democrat lawmaker physically confronting police officers and calling them profane names, and they made a conscious editorial decision: nah, let's not show that.
We see you. We always see you.
