House GOP drops effort to revive anti-Nazi resolution

House Republicans won’t be pursuing their own resolution to denounce neo-Nazis after they previously helped kill a Democratic measure to do so.

Rep. John Ray Clemmons (D-Nashville) saw his resolution fail last month when it failed to receive a second in the Republican-controlled House State Government Committee last month. The Tennessean reported last week that House Republican Caucus Chairman Ryan Williams (R-Cookeville) planned to bring forward a nearly identical measure.

But Williams declined to promote the measure in a meeting of the House Delayed Bills Committee on Tuesday, meaning that it won’t proceed this session.

Critics of the GOP version noted that while it was largely the same as Clemmons’ resolution, it omitted language urging law enforcement to pursue white nationalist groups as “domestic terrorist organizations.”

Clemmons was critical of the original GOP move to take over his resolution.

“In yet another example of how out of touch this Republican supermajority has become, they are the only people in this state who would ever require a second chance to denounce neo-Nazis and their acts of violence,” Clemmons told The Tennessean.