The Generational Divide

Back in the late 90s, I was active in progressive Tennessee politics for a couple of years, when I lived in Knoxville. It was the most active I’ve been in my life in terms of real organizing and such. Something about living in a place like Knoxville brings it out of you since it’s so hard to survive in such a right-wing place. Today, the city is more purple, but the surrounding area is frightening. We had a state legislator at the time named Tim Burchett, who was an idiot known for introducing a bill to make it legal to eat roadkill. Today, he’s still an idiot, but in Congress.

Well, at the time there was a rising guy named Steve Cohen in Memphis who we all respected. It was controversial when he ran against Harold Ford for Congress in 1996. The Ford machine was real in Memphis. Harold Sr, retired in 1996 and Cohen ran and lost to Harold Jr. Young Harold had huge ambitions, even presidential, and he decided the way to do this was to be the most right-wing Democrat possible. He didn’t make a lot of friends back home in Memphis, the machine wobbled, and he’s basically the kind of Democrat forgotten by everyone who appears on Fox today. This happened after he tried to take on Bob Corker in the 2006 Senate election and couldn’t pull it off in a state where whites were fleeing to the Republicans.

Well, Cohen stayed in the state legislature that whole time and built himself a real power base, even as a white Jewish guy in a Black district. So when he ran for Congress again in 2006, he won, much to the outrage of the rest of the Ford machine, who tried to racebait him. The 2008 primary was very ugly, with black leaders really going all in on the race thing. But Barack Obama intervened here to support Cohen, he won going away, and has represented Memphis in Congress ever since. He’s fine. He’s really become a pork guy, which is fine, nothing wrong with bringing as much to your district as possible.

But now, Justin Pearson, one of the legislators briefly evicted from the Tennessee legislature by the fascists who control it, is challenging him for the job. Cohen is very, very old. Pearson is young and energetic and wants to do a lot more fighting against fascism that Cohen is about these days. He’s framing his primary fight against Cohen as a generational divide:

The phone call last October was ostensibly a courteous gesture from a onetime intern to his former boss ahead of a campaign announcement. It quickly turned sour.

You’re going to run behind me just like everyone else, Representative Steve Cohen, 76, the former boss and a veteran of 10 successful congressional runs in Memphis, told State Representative Justin J. Pearson, 31, who made the call.

Mr. Pearson ended the call with his own rebuttal: I’m going to beat you.

The two Democrats, who separately described the conversation, have not directly spoken since, and that flash of acrimony — months ahead of the August primary contest — is a sign of how personal the generational battle to remake the Democratic Party this year could become.

In a party that until recently was largely run by octogenarians, the push for generational change spans the country. Party stalwarts — from former Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the former majority leader, Steny Hoyer, to Senator Richard J. Durbin and reliable rank-and-file liberals like Jan Schakowsky — will retire at the end of the year.

….

Mr. Cohen has repeatedly held off challengers with ease in a Tennessee district that overwhelmingly backs Democrats. But Mr. Pearson’s activism has energized some voters, and his brief expulsion from the state House three years ago over a gun control protest has given him national prominence and a considerable war chest.

“The elected official that I seek to be is the one that I wanted to grow up having,” Mr. Pearson said, sipping a coffee before speaking at a “No Kings” rally on Saturday. With Mr. Trump in office, he said, “we need active leadership, not passive leadership.”

….

At the 2024 Democratic convention, it was Mr. Pearson, standing next to Mr. Cohen, who delivered the speech announcing Tennessee’s delegates for Vice President Kamala Harris.

Since then, he has been at the front lines resisting both a federal law enforcement task force sent to Memphis by the president and an artificial intelligence complex built by Elon Musk near a Black neighborhood.

Last week, just before Mr. Pearson took the stage at a rally protesting a visit by Mr. Trump to Memphis, Barbara Beaver, 66, acknowledged the “good work” that Mr. Cohen has done.

“But,” she added, “I also have to acknowledge that there’s another voice out there that is doing equally good work.”

All this has wrecked the previously cordial relationship between Mr. Cohen and Mr. Pearson. When Mr. Pearson didn’t invite him to his recent wedding, it was an unmistakable sign that the younger lawmaker was distancing himself, Mr. Cohen mused.

Mr. Pearson described Mr. Cohen’s response to his challenge as unnecessarily abrasive. (In one interview, Mr. Cohen compared it to the attack on Pearl Harbor.)

“We weren’t friends — he’s not a mentor,” Mr. Pearson said.

Mr. Pearson’s real challenge will be convincing voters that he is more than a fixture on protest lines. Most of the bills he has sponsored in the legislature this year have stalled in committee.

To be sure, there are few opportunities for Democrats under the legislature’s Republican supermajority, but some Tennessee conservatives have been opposed to Mr. Pearson’s approach since his first day in office, when he was sworn in wearing a dashiki. Some Democrats have also been rankled by Mr. Pearson’s more confrontational tactics and notoriety.

Some political watchers said that the primary challenge could be viewed as an affront to more senior Black Democrats, who have waited for Mr. Cohen’s retirement. Mr. Cohen pointed to the State Senate minority leader, Raumesh Akbari, and Ms. Lamar, as well as other officials from surrounding Shelby County as possible successors.

I think it’s fair to say that a guy in his mid 70s who has been around forever should probably consider stepping aside. But Cohen has been good and is hardly the worst of the olds or the oldest of the olds.

But I’d also say this–being a politician is not a lifetime appointment. Waiting for someone to retire is a stupid strategy for a politician. It never works because these people never retire. Someone has to take the shot. That’s how Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez entered Congress, for example. The idea that just become someone is a reliable vote that we should just reelect them doesn’t hold much water and it is also a pretty recent phenomena. Most of congressional history has seen massive churn every Congress, much more than the last few decades. Everyone has a right to the job. I very much do believe it is time for new blood among Democrats and there’s a lot of reason to feel that Pearson would be good. But again, Cohen is also good. Generational transition is especially good. So let them hash it out and let the Memphis voters pick who they want, it’s all fine.