Philip Blumel: America loves Term Limits. Hi, I’m Philip Blumel. Welcome to No Uncertain Terms, the official podcast of the term limits movement for the week of February 14th, 2022.
Stacey Selleck: Your sanctuary from partisan politics.
Philip Blumel: In the last episode, we got a progress report on the efforts to push a term limits amendment through the US Congress. This week, we return to the States where legislators are not waiting on the US Congress to reform our political system. An important committee vote is expected in Tennessee this week, where activists are calling on the State Senate to approve the term limits convention resolution. The Tennessee House has already passed the measure. In Florida, school board term limits have reemerged yet again with the State House passing a measure that would limit school board members around the state to eight consecutive years in office. For more detail on these developments, let’s turn to US Term Limits Executive Director, Nick Tomboulides. Hey, Nick.
Philip Blumel: I’m excited about what I’m hearing is going on in Tennessee. We have four states now that have officially applied for the term limits convention, that is to say an amendment writing convention under Article five of the US Constitution. And we’re on our edge of our seats wondering which state is gonna be the fifth. And I know in Tennessee, it’s already passed in the House, right? And we’re trying to get it through the Senate. And there’s an important committee meeting and vote coming up this next week.
Nick Tomboulides: Yes, that’s right. We have passed in four states. And I think what’s lost in that discussion sometimes is that we’ve also passed one chamber in six states. Georgia, Louisiana, Tennessee, Utah, Arizona, North Carolina. Some of those are not moving right now, but some are. And I would say the one that is moving the fastest right now is Tennessee, where we are seeing progress every single day. Just a couple of weeks ago, Glenn Jacobs, our state chairman came to the capitol, did some meet-and-greets with legislators, brought in some activists to talk about term limits convention to explain why it’s such a good idea. I know he met with the lieutenant governor, I saw that all over social media. And yes, now finally, term limits convention, HJR 8 has been scheduled for a hearing with the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Philip Blumel: That is great. So, what’s… Well, what’s the prospects? [chuckle]
Nick Tomboulides: The prospects are good because the sponsor of the Term Limits Convention, Senator Mike Bell, who I would say is the strongest Article five and term limits advocate in the entire Tennessee legislature, he’s also the committee chair, that always helps because obviously he can count the votes. But if anything goes wrong, somebody gets a flat tire on the way to the capitol, if he’s in charge, he can also make adjustments, possibly move it to the next meeting if that’s necessary. So we feel like we’re in very good hands with Senator Bell, and we’re expecting a good hearing.
Philip Blumel: Okay. Well then how close are we to the floor? We can’t be counting our chickens before they’re hatched here, but we have a committee hearing and vote next week. If it advances, it’ll go to another committee, or does it go to the floor?
Nick Tomboulides: No, it’s going to the floor. If it gets through Senate Judiciary this week, on Tuesday the 15th, it is going directly to the floor of the Tennessee Senate where in due time, it will receive a full floor debate and vote.
Philip Blumel: This is huge. Well, this is great. This is… Tennessee definitely it could be the next state to pass the term limits convention resolution. Has it passed the Tennessee Senate before?
Nick Tomboulides: It has never passed the Tennessee Senate before. It has passed this committee once before, a few years ago, but it was a different set of members on the committee. So you can’t take anything for granted. We feel very good about the count. We believe the votes are there. I would encourage anybody from Tennessee to go to termlimits.com/takeaction. You’ll be able to send a message to the committee. Absolutely do that, ’cause we don’t wanna count our chickens before they hatch, but it’s looking very good.
Philip Blumel: Good. I know there’s been a lot of groundwork laid in Tennessee. We’ve had USTL staffers there. We have activists on the ground. We’ve got the in-defact-able. In-indefatigable. In…
Nick Tomboulides: I’ve never known how to pronounce that word. So, I don’t even try.
Nick Tomboulides: I don’t even try that word.
Philip Blumel: Okay.
Nick Tomboulides: I’ve only written that word down.
Philip Blumel: Indefatigable. Indefatigable. Anyways, Glenn Jacobs, term limits hero and other people like him… I know that there’s other politicians, even Congress members in Tennessee that have come out and in support. So, yeah, there’s a lot of movement there. Please, anybody in Tennessee, termlimits.com/takeaction. Let your legislators hear from you this week.
Nick Tomboulides: Glenn Jacobs is incredible. If you haven’t heard that name, then you might know him as a former WWE wrestler Kane, Hall of Fame, legendary pro-wrestler, former WWE Champion. Now, the mayor of Knox County. He has been a shining star for the term limits movement. He has been our secret weapon in Tennessee, because he is just so articulate. He is so respected and most importantly, he really believes in term limits, that’s the important part. I’ve met with elected officials before and worked with elected officials before who know that it’s a popular issue. And so, they wanna hitch their wagon to it. And they wanna ride the wave, so to speak, to get elected to something, but they don’t really have that fire in the belly. They really lack the passion, really, that you need for the issue. The passion that 82% of Americans have, but Glenn Jacobs, Mayor Jacobs has that passion. He is really, truly committed to the issue of term limits for Congress and committed to seeing it through in Tennessee with the convention.
Philip Blumel: Alright, we had some action on another front in Florida last week as well, didn’t we? The issue of school board term limits has been around a long time in Florida, it’s been on the ballot and off the ballot, it’s been past one house, not the other. Every year, there’s progress made and it doesn’t quite get to the finish line. And yet it’s a big issue in Florida, the voters are behind, and it’s particularly necessary in Florida, which is a state where school board members in the major counties are paid basically career salaries and there’s all kinds of big special interest money pouring into this elections.
Philip Blumel: So, it seems like a sleepy thing, but in Florida it’s not. And people recognize that and we just haven’t been able to get it done. But what happened last week that gives us hope that this might be the year.
Nick Tomboulides: By the way, Florida is a huge outlier in that regard, in having a professionalized paid school board that makes higher than the median personal income for the state. And by the way, most school board members also have other full-time jobs. So, they’re totally double-dipping for the two meetings they have to attend a month.
Philip Blumel: Yeah, you are right. Most states, it’s an unpaid position, not just low paid, but unpaid. I mean, even in big states, New York and New Jersey and Pennsylvania and these places, they don’t get paid to be on the school board.
Nick Tomboulides: No, no, they get free pencils and erasers, but that’s it.
Philip Blumel: [laughter] Yeah.
Nick Tomboulides: So, in a normal year, what I find myself doing is schlepping my way back and forth from Melbourne where I live to Tallahassee to attend committee hearings for school board term limits ’cause normally it has to go through three committees before it can get to the floor of either the State house or the State Senate. This year has been completely different because there basically was no school board term limits bill that was moving. There was a bill that would have changed school board salaries. Should have eliminated School Board salaries completely, but it wasn’t getting a lot of traction, it was getting immense pressure from the unions and from the school board. And what the Florida House did in the 11th hour was they made a floor substitute, they completely eliminated that language to stop paying the school board members, and they replaced it with school board term limits.
Philip Blumel: Well, I’m okay with that.
Nick Tomboulides: Yeah, I mean, I’m okay with that too. So, this time around, it completely circumvented the committee process, and went directly to the floor. Quite honestly, we’ve had like 15 different committees over the last few years, we’ve heard every possible argument that could possibly be made against this, and we’ve still gotten to the floor every time, so we didn’t really need those committees. But it went directly to the floor and it passed, it was nearly a straight party line vote. I think there was one Democrat who supported it this time around, but it passed and it didn’t need a three-fifths majority because unlike previous years, this was a state statute, it was not an amendment to the Florida constitution. So, you can pass a statute with a pure majority, and that’s what this was. So, the state house has now passed it and it’s incumbent upon the state senate to finish the job.
Philip Blumel: Success last week in Florida, and hopefully success this week in Tennessee. Tune-in next week and we’ll let you know how it went in Tennessee.
S?: This is a public service announcement.
Philip Blumel: One of the biggest stars of the term limits movement right now is Glenn Jacobs, the Mayor of Knoxville County, Tennessee. Last week, Jacobs was featured on the national desk with Jan Jeffcoat, a new daily national TV news program that premiered on Sinclair Radio Network in January. It is telling that the Washington DC based news program turned to Jacobs in Tennessee to find its spokesmen for term limits.
Jan Jeffcoat: No doubt America is deeply divided with career politicians on Capitol Hill, and my next guest is taking on the DC swamp by pushing term limits, he says, would break up the power structure. Joining us right now is the Tennessee chair for US term limits and Knox County Mayor, Glenn Jacobs. Mayor Jacobs, welcome to the national desk.
Glenn Jacobs: Morning, thank you for having me.
Jan Jeffcoat: You’ve been there since 2018, as mayor. So, three years now, why are you so passionate about term limits on Capitol Hill?
Glenn Jacobs: Well, I’m not the only one, term limits are, as you mentioned, in the open, one of the issues that unites people across the country, whether you’re a Democrat or a Republican, over 80% of folks agree with the idea of term limits. And I think that what it does is it really helps eliminate the career politicians from Washington, DC, that’s specifically what we’re talking about here, is congressional term limits on Congress and on the Senate. We have term limits on the presidency, and I see no reason why we shouldn’t have those on Congress as well.
Jan Jeffcoat: You said yourself, the Congress does not want to impose term limits on themselves. So, in what way do you believe, and others also that agree with you, that term limits can be achieved on Capitol Hill, how much of an uphill battle is this?
Glenn Jacobs: Well, the idea of US term limits is actually to circumnavigate around Congress and use the Article Five Convention of the States. There are two ways to amend the Constitution, one is Congress can do it directly with the two-thirds vote of each house, and then it goes to the States for avocation. But also if two-thirds of the states get together, two-thirds of the State legislatures call for a convention of the States, an amendment can be proposed that way. So, yes, since Congress is probably not gonna do it themselves, we can actually do it through the States.
Jan Jeffcoat: Now, you do have some senators, even on the Republican side, like Chuck Grassley, who has openly supported the idea of term limits. He did announce he too would seek re-election though. If re-elected, Senator Grassley would have served 70 consecutive years in public office. Now, he said, quote, I’m gonna read this to you, “You would be diluting the influence of your state if you decide to quit after two terms when other people don’t have that, you also have to realize the ballot box is term limits if people don’t want you in there. That’s just kind of the way I look at it.” So, what do you say to Senator Grassley when he says, “You know what, the ballot box is kind of the terms limits right here.”
Glenn Jacobs: Sure, in a perfect world, of course. Unfortunately, in the world that we live in, incumbents received the vast amount of campaign funding, they have more influence, they just have a ginormous, a huge advantage over people coming in that would try to unseat them. And we know that because in my own case, the County Mayor previous to me is now US Congressman doing a great job, Tim Burchett. He was term limited, and if he hadn’t been term limited, there is no way that I would have run because I know that I couldn’t take that seat. So when we’re talking about the ballot box being the term limiter, yeah, of course. But the advantage is, the really home court advantage that it gives incumbents because of all the money now in politics, it’s huge.
Jan Jeffcoat: Mayor Jacobs, I’m just curious, when you go out and you talk to voters, what are their biggest issues right now and what do they think about the mid-terms?
Glenn Jacobs: The biggest issue is inflation, and at the state of the economy and rising prices here in Tennessee also, immigration is still a big issue on the minds of voters. I think in the mid-terms, I think it’s really gonna be a Red Wave. Unfortunately, President Biden has had a disastrous first year and the policies that they’re pushing are not working, and I think the people really wanna get back to good conservative policies for this country, that they actually work.
Jan Jeffcoat: Do you think we might see you on Capitol Hill some time, are you thinking about maybe a run for Congress one day?
Glenn Jacobs: [laughter] No, no, no, not really. Like I said, my Congressman here does a great job, Tim Burchett, I’m also happy with our US Senators, so I will sit that out probably forever.
Jan Jeffcoat: [laughter] All right. Mayor Glenn Jacobs, thank you so much for joining us this morning. We appreciate it, have a good one.
Glenn Jacobs: Thank you.
Nick Tomboulides: Hey Phil, you know there’s a very important holiday coming soon?
Philip Blumel: Oh, president’s Day?
Nick Tomboulides: Hell no. Term Limits Day, man. Term Limits Day…
Philip Blumel: Of course.
Nick Tomboulides: Forth annual Term Limits Day is coming up on February 27th. It’s a celebration of the most successful grassroots movement in modern American history.
Philip Blumel: Right, and remind everybody why it’s February 27th?
Nick Tomboulides: It is February 27th because that was the date in 1951 when the 22nd amendment to term limit the president was ratified and it officially became part of the constitution, and we said, “Sorry, FDR. No one’s ever gonna do that again.”
Philip Blumel: That’s right. So you’re telling me that there is precedence for a constitutional amendment putting term limits in the US Constitution? Okay, ’cause that’s what we’re trying to do again, and so it clearly can be done, and this is an annual holiday, reminding us that it can be done and that it should be. Term Limits Day is a holiday that we ask people to make some kind of public support for this idea, just remind people that it’s a current issue and remind the politicians in your neighbourhood that you support it. So this could mean wearing a button, putting a sign in your yard, sending out Happy Term Limits Day, emails, posting something on Facebook, Happy Term Limits Day, February 27th, etcetera. We have a website up where it has a list of ideas that would be termlimits.com/termlimitsday, and to check that out, and you might have some other things that you wanna contribute and let us know about through that site, ideas that we can share with other Americans that wanna celebrate with us.
Nick Tomboulides: The way I judge whether Term Limits Day is successful is, was it bigger than it was the year before? And you know, we had a little bit of COVID stuff getting in the way last time, so it shouldn’t be too hard to surpass that, but we wanna see more activists, we wanna see more events, more tweets, more emails, more letters to the editor. Let’s get the word out there, let’s get term limits trending on Term Limits Day.
Philip Blumel: Yeah, let’s do that.
Philip Blumel: Thanks for joining us for another episode of No Uncertain Terms. The term limits convention bills are moving through the state legislatures, this could be a break through year for the term limits movement. To check on the status of the term limits convention resolution in your state go to termlimits.com/takeaction. There you will see if it has been introduced and where it stands in the committee process on its way to the floor vote. If there’s action to take, you’ll see a take action button by your state, click it. This will give you the opportunity to send a message to the most relevant legislators urging them to support the legislation, they have to know you’re watching, that’s termlimits.com/takeaction. If your state has already passed the term limits convention resolution or the bill has not been introduced in your state, you can still help. Please consider making a contribution to US term limits, it is our aim to hit the reset button on the US Congress and you can help. Go to termlimits.com/donate, termlimits.com/donate. Thanks, we’ll be back next week.
Stacey Selleck: Contact your state law makers before they vote on term limits for congress, go to termlimits.com/takeaction.
S?: USTL.