Cherie Marceaux lives in Lawrence County, about three hours from Memphis. She and her husband run an animal rescue with horses, goats, pigs, dogs, ferrets, and more.
She’s not a Democrat or a Republican, Marceaux said, but knows who she wants to vote for in the newly redrawn U.S. Congressional District 9: Memphis Democrat and state Rep. Justin J. Pearson.
“He doesn’t just have guts, and he doesn’t just call out what’s happening, but he’s got hope in his eyes. I can see it in his smile. I can see it in his face,” Marceaux said. “I don’t believe in the party system. I believe in people, and he’s a people person. And he’s for the environment. How can I not love him?”
When Tennessee Republicans redrew congressional district lines in May, they intended to make District 9 a safe Republican seat. In response, Pearson has focused on nonpartisan issues that appeal to voters across the district and the political spectrum: opposition to data centers, gun safety, and affordability issues. And a recent poll has him within striking distance of his Republican opponent, state Sen. Brent Taylor.
It’s unclear whether common ground on these issues will translate to victory for Pearson in a district that is now heavily Republican and predominantly white. But regardless of the outcome, Pearson and his supporters say the coalitions they’re creating across District 9 are the first steps to rebuilding progressive power in Tennessee.
The new District 9 voted for Donald Trump by more than 20 points in 2024. The Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan election-rating organization, called the redistricting intended to strip Tennessee of its last Democratic congressperson “a really effective gerrymander.”
But Pearson supporters think there’s a chance. In September, Pearson trailed Taylor 44% to 48% in a Hart Research poll commissioned by TN Rise PAC and Three Star PAC (both groups that support Pearson).
“The most powerful thing that’s going to come out of this campaign — a win, lose or draw — (is) that people are realizing their own power,” Pearson told MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, in an interview.
“It’s been an overwhelming amount of support, overwhelming amount of just love and power building that I think can change the trajectory of Tennessee politics,” Pearson said. “I think that’s what we’re going to see not just after we win, but over the next several years as we continue to build power in these communities. We’re going to be on some county commissions, some school boards, some mayors. This momentum isn’t stopping.”
Data centers, environmental pollution at core of Pearson campaign
Marceaux’s home county of Lawrence is very different from Memphis. The county of about 46,000 people is 94 percent white and largely rural, while Memphis is a majority Black city of more than 609,000 residents.
But both places are grappling with the rapid growth of data centers and concerns that they’ll worsen water, air, and noise pollution. Opposition to data centers is a unifying position across the 15 counties that form District 9. Voters oppose them by a 36-point margin, according to the Hart Research poll.
The Pearson campaign has leveraged that opposition to expand his base of support, stressing that Pearson’s record shows he’s on the side of the people, not corporations.
Marceaux said Pearson’s longstanding opposition to data centers and other industrial polluters gives him credibility as he challenges Taylor, who was an early supporter of Colossus 1 and received $10,000 in campaign funding from a political action committee associated with SpaceXAI.
After a 2025 public hearing regarding the data center’s gas turbine permits, Taylor posted, “I believe our community will unite to embrace this transformative opportunity,” on X.
In 2025, Taylor passed a bill barring municipalities and utility companies from paying for new electrical infrastructure built to serve a data center. He argued that the bill would force data centers to pay for their own energy infrastructure, but critics say the law contains a loophole that allows the construction of unregulated gas-fired power plants.
Taylor’s campaign did not respond to multiple requests for an interview.
Just 45 days before the election, Pearson spoke in a small church in the town of Bolivar, just over an hour outside Memphis. The town has just 5,000 residents, about 64 percent of whom are Black.
“We know we need to stop these toxic data centers from being built in our communities,” he told the room, adding that 67 percent of future data centers are planned in rural America “in order to replace our jobs.”
Pearson told the room that this fight is personal: He lives three miles from Colossus 1, the first data center built by Elon Musk’s SpaceXAI in the Memphis area.
“People are either worried about the data center that’s currently in their backyard if you’re in Whitehaven, or they’re worried about what could be coming to them if you’re in Lawrenceburg,” Pearson said in an interview.
Bolivar resident Wanda Robinson said she’s hopeful that focusing on data centers will help Pearson overcome the challenges of running in a whiter, more Republican district.
“If we don’t speak out against [data centers], they’re liable to do anything,” Robinson said. “Next thing you know, it may be at our back door. So we have to stand, speak truth to power.”
Pearson has launched two advertisements in the greater Nashville area. Both mention data centers: “Now I’m running for Congress to stop data centers from invading our state,” he says in one about how his parents taught him “The Golden Rule.”
In the second, Pearson says, “career politicians and the billionaires who control them want to convince us that the problem is each other: white folk or Black folk, city folk or country folk. Because as long as we’re questioning our neighbors, we’re not asking the questions that matter.
“… Why can’t working families afford healthcare or groceries?” he asks. “And why … are data centers being built in our backyards?”
Taylor’s first campaign advertisement focuses on how he’s “tired of violent criminals running around Tennessee like squirrels in a bait shop.”
Back in Lawrence County, Marceaux worries about a data center planned for a property near her home. She is concerned about the creek that runs near the data center’s planned location, the well water everyone in the area drinks, and the swimming hole her grandchildren use. She also worries about the potential impact on the bald eagles and a protected species of heron found in the county. Previously, industries stripped a nearby property of pine trees, she says, leading to a loss of woodpeckers.
“My hope [is] that [Pearson] can get up there and, on a higher level, he can get us some protection, since our local governments don’t want to protect us,” she said.
Gun control, affordability cut across partisan divisions
On a sunny Saturday in the town of Savannah, a group of six gathered underneath the town gazebo before heading out to knock on doors across Hardin County.
Kristina Richardson, volunteer lead for the county, said she first became aware of Pearson when he was temporarily expelled from the state legislature during the Covenant School protest. A disabled veteran, she said she and her husband “are very pro-Second Amendment” but want “commonsense gun laws.” Pearson’s protest impressed her, she said.
Most Tennesseans — including Democrats, Republicans, and a majority of self-described “MAGA Republicans” — support tougher background checks for firearm owners, according to a 2023 Vanderbilt poll. Pearson supporters across District 9 say his focus on gun control and affordability has helped him broaden his appeal to more conservative voters.
Jenna Gammill, who grew up in Savannah and now lives in the adjacent Wayne County, said the area is “bleeding red.”
“Slowly but surely, there’s people getting fed up, but they don’t want to crush their own ego and admit that they messed up,” she said. “I’m hoping that they’ll maybe start to vote for things that will help them and not harm them.”
Major issues include the lack of access to healthcare and the high cost of diesel fuel for farmers, she said. She thinks more people will vote Democrat in this election — even if they won’t say so publicly.
Allie Stokes, who joined Richardson and Gammill to canvass, said when Pearson visited Savannah in June, she heard him answer questions about environmental concerns related to the Tennessee River, which flows through the town of fewer than 8,000 people.
“We can’t even eat the fish out of the river here safely anymore on a regular basis, because there are signs at the river that say it gives you cancer,” Stokes said.
When someone brought that concern up to Pearson, he promised to look into it, she said. He also seemed in touch with people struggling with the cost of living, she said.
“I feel like he’s going to be a representative that doesn’t forget the people that put him there when he gets in office,” she said.
As the group knocked on doors around Hardin County, Stokes voiced surprise at how many Democrat-voting households she saw.
“I’m really passionate about Justin’s campaign,” Stokes said. “I’ve seen him speak, and it really seems like he cares about each part of the district that he wants to represent, not just one demographic or one side of it.”
Pearson supporters say coalition building will outlast the election
Now, Richardson is not only volunteering for Pearson’s campaign, but also joining a coalition of people from across the new District 9 who plan to support their neighbors in times of need and advocate for progressive causes even after the election.
Richardson sees some irony in it: Republicans meant to divide up Democrats in creating the new District 9, but instead people are organizing across the 15 counties. “And we’re willing to drive,” she said.
Regardless of the outcome of this election, “I think [Pearson has] shown us that we do have the power, even though they tried to take it by gerrymandering the district,” she said. “It’s backfired on them, and it’s brought us closer together. It’s got me talking to people two, three hours away from me and working with them on this campaign, for instance, but also on other things like the data center in Lawrenceburg.”
Pearson said in an interview that as he’s traveled the district, he’s found more commonality than differences, including among people who vote Independent or Republican.
“It was a concern of mine that folks may not be as receptive to us: that the racism that the state house was banking on, quite frankly, by rigging the district this way would disadvantage us to the point where it’d be impossible. But that’s not what we’re seeing,” Pearson said. “I think our message is reaching Republicans and conservative people because it is people-first policies, and for anybody with a good conscience or goodwill, I think that resonates.”
Katherine Burgess is the government accountability reporter for MLK50: Justice Through Journalism. Contact her at katherine.burgess@mlk50.com
