Government is supposed to do the things none of us can do individually on our own, such as pave our roads, keep our neighborhoods safe and clean, and provide a quality education for our kids. For the past 15 years under one-party rule in Tennessee, government spends more time doing what corporations want than doing what we want.

Earlier this year, during the special session that redrew congressional maps to strip representation from Black voters in Memphis, I stood on my desk on the Senate floor, held up a banner that said "NO JIM CROW 2.0" and sang "Lift Every Voice and Sing" to protest the redistricting plan drawn to protect the controlling party's grip on power, not to represent Tennesseans. I paid a price for it: my committee seat was stripped, my travel pay eliminated, and my legislative pay cut.

So ask the obvious question: who's funding the controlling party's power? Follow the money, and it keeps leading back to corporate and dark money. That's not a coincidence, and it's exactly what the Restore Power to the People Act is built to stop.

The problem

The amount of money in our elections has gotten out of hand. Corporations get almost everything they ask for, and Tennessee taxpayers get stuck with the bill. Too many politicians end up representing whoever funded their campaign, not the neighbors who voted for them. Call it what it is: the system is rigged, and it's rigged for the wealthy.

This isn't a Democrat problem or a Republican problem. Nobody, on any side, thinks there's too little money in politics. And while the controlling party spends their energy on the culture-war fight of the week, corporations quietly get their wish list signed into law.

Tennessee can't undo the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision by itself. But there's a lever the state already controls: corporations only exist, and only hold the powers they hold, because state law says so.

The Tennessee fix

This isn't a new rule about what corporations are allowed to say. It's a change to what Tennessee's corporate charters include in the first place. Specifically, the bill:

• Rewrites the powers Tennessee grants to every corporation, LLC, union, nonprofit, cooperative, and other entity it charters or that does business here, so political spending power is no longer part of that grant.
• Applies the same way to every kind of entity — there's no carve-out for any single industry, party-aligned group, or organization.
• Keeps a transparent channel open: people can still pool money through a registered, reporting political action committee. What changes is corporations writing the check directly or funding a super PAC as "corporate" spending.
• Leaves every individual's rights untouched. Owners, employees, shareholders, and members keep every right they had the day before — to vote, to give personally, to speak, to organize.
• Has real teeth: a corporation that spends anyway loses its state-granted privileges, like limited liability, until it pays the money back and certifies it will follow the law going forward.

What doesn't change

• News coverage, editorials, and endorsements from media outlets are untouched.
• A company's board can still take a public position and tell its own employees or shareholders about it.
• Nothing about what an individual person says, gives, or does is regulated by this bill.

Why this can happen now

Hawaii became the first state to enact this approach in 2026, and other states are moving on similar bills. Tennessee families shouldn't have to wait on Washington. The state already has the authority it needs to act.