A pair of Tennessee Republicans want to rename a street memorializing the late Rep. John Lewis to instead honor Donald Trump.
State Sen. Frank Nicely (R-Strawberry Plains) and State Rep. Paul Sherrell (R-Sparta) introduced a bill that would rename a portion of Rep. John Lewis Way to President Donald Trump Boulevard. The street is near the Capitol Building in Nashville, reported WKRN-TV.
“The segment of road (Rep. John Lewis Way) in Davidson County, Tennessee, beginning with the intersection of such road with U.S. Highway 41/State Route 6 (James Roberston Parkway) and ending at the intersection of such road with Dr. Martin L. King Jr. Blvd is hereby officially renamed as ‘President Donald Trump Boulevard” to honor the former President of the United States,” reads Niceley’s bill.
As a student at Fisk University and the American Baptist Theological Seminary in the early 1960s, Lewis organized historic lunch counter sit-ins that led to Nashville becoming the first Southern city to desegregate public places.
Trump won each of the last two presidential elections in Tennessee by garnering slightly more than 60 percent of the vote over his Democratic opponents Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, although that wasn't enough in 2020 to win his re-election to a second term.
Lewis was an outspoken critic of the former president, who groused that the congressman had not attended his 2017 inauguration.
"I find a lot of people impressive. I find many people not impressive," Trump said after Lewis died in 2020. "He didn't come to my inauguration. He didn't come to my State of the Union speeches, and that's okay, that's his right, and again, nobody has done more for Black Americans than I have. He should've come. I think he made a big mistake."
"He was a person that devoted a lot of energy and lot of heart to civil rights," Trump added. "But there were many others also."