After understanding the political nature of the charges and subsequent unjust arrest by the FBI, one of the first questions asked is, “What did your sheriff say about this?”
The sad truth is my sheriff didn’t know about the event until a week later when I stopped in and told him. I made a point of asking the FBI agents on the hour plus ride into Nashville if the talked to my sheriff. Their response was revealing, “No, we didn’t bother telling him.”
The reality is, other than federal agents, no one in the entire state of TN knew where I was for over 6 hours. My wife did not know why I was arrested. Her attempts to get confirmation over the phone that it was actually the FBI that made off with her husband were frustrated. My sheriff was bypassed in the entire process violating the Tennessee constitution and the 10th amendment to our US Constitution. None of my elected officials, who are charged with the physical protection and my general well being, knew anything about the matter until I brought it to their attention and identified with the media reports about the event.
I visited my governor’s office the following day after my release and tried to find someone at the capitol building that would take an interest in a Tennessee citizen being abused by federal powers. A year later and I still have had no response from the Governors office. We pray for him often. We are active in our community and state politics. I have testified in the Tennessee Senate regarding business matters with the business we own. But so far the governor has not responded and the four agents who broke the law are still free to harass and intimidate other citizens of Tennessee.
This is a disappointing aspect of our case. It is obvious we have a lot of broken links in our government. But at the same time, I think it gives us a starting place to make changes. With repeated examples of FBI over reach happening across the nation, how should a state respond to protect it’s citizens? What can be done?
I recently joined Gary Humble and Kevin Kookogey from Tennessee Stands and we were able to talk through some options to begin to correct the situation. As Tennesseans we talked specifically about changes in Tennessee, but the principles would apply to every state. I hope you enjoy the discussion. I’d be interested to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
Freedom Matters Podcast from tennesseestands.org:
I’ll leave you with this short clip of our homeschool choir singing the Aaronic Blessing over our Governor, Bill Lee. It is not a great recording, but the sentiment shows through. I’m training my children to be law abiding and freedom loving citizens of Tennessee. We respect and honor all legal authority and pray for them as Christians are commanded to do.
Great question? I would even ask “where are all the other Republican Governors?” If this can happen in TN it can surely happen in othe states across our nation. Of course if our governor was engaged in the federal government coming into our state I would hope he would ask other republican governors to get involved and also while together would want to pursue repealing through putting pressure on our senators and representatives.