Sabi Kumar

Rep. Sabi Kumar: (R) Chair, Insurance Committee, Member, Calendar and Rules Committee, Health Committee, Health Subcommittee, and the Insurance Subcommittee. Rep. Kumar supported twenty-five of the TLRC positions on chosen bills with three very critical dissents. He earned a 92% vote score.

He co-sponsored six of our favored bills:

SR0023 – Rudd – Resolution creating a bi-cameral panel to research the recall of Judge Ellen Hobbs Lyle (failed in House Civil Justice subcommittee).

A media story on the subject

SB0230/HB0016 – Hensley/Cepicky – Teacher’s discipline freedom, creating a path for the removal of unruly student (passed).

SB0623/HB0580 – Bell/Ragan – The teaching of Critical Race Theory is prohibited in TN public schools (passed).

SB1335/HB0928 – Hensley/S. Campbell – 2nd Amendment Sanctuary Act: voids for Tennessee any Federal laws or policies that violate the 2nd Amendment (passed with amendment that weakens).

SB0828/HB1181 – – Rudd / Bowling – Fetal remains must be disposed of by burial or cremation, making it prohibitive to harvest or sell fetal body parts (passed).

SJR2 – Kelsey – Puts Right-to-Work into our Tennessee constitution, making it much more difficult to rescind (passed).

Kumar earned an eight out of ten on constitutional fidelity. He is strong on most points but does not seem to realize the visceral resistance, out of fear, some have for the unapproved inoculation. He insists everyone should get it in spite of the mounting evidence of its unreliability and the serious health risks involved.

He lost leadership points by sponsoring the following bill which TLRC opposed:

SB0425/HB1379 – Kumar/Massey – Would require insurers to cover infertility treatments which would result in higher premiums for all. Dictating to private business is antithetical to the U.S. and Tennessee constitutions but some of our legislators only remember that when it serves them (sent to Summer Study).

Chairman Kumar lost additional points by supporting the following bills which TLRC opposed:

HJR0010 – Parkinson – A Resolution to declare racism as a public health issue (sent to Summer Study). The passing of this resolution would have labeled Tennessee as a self-identified systemically racist state; we are not! “Systemic racism” has been conscripted and construed into a bludgeon to divide Americans. We must resist the comfortable path of acceptance, which implies assent.

SB0736/HB0141 – Johnson/Lamberth (a Governor’s bill with which we take issue) – Special tax exemption for the film and video industry which was supported by a large majority of the General Assembly (passed). TLRC does not support special carve-outs for cherry-picked industries. The government should not be picking winners and losers.

Chairman Kumar sponsored eleven bills, six of which passed into law:

HB0828 Health, Dept. – requires the department, in collaboration with other public and private healthcare agencies, to incorporate information about Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias into its existing public health programs and services.

HB0830 requires a manufacturer, under certain circumstances, to replace farm machinery with comparable farm machinery or accept return of the farm machinery and refund the full purchase price and related repair costs, less a reasonable allowance for use and a reasonable offset for physical damage; creates a civil cause of action for consumers.

HB0831 requires each member of a board of directors of an industrial development corporation to complete a conflict-of-interest statement; requires the Tennessee Ethics Commission to post on its website a sample conflict of interest statement.

HB1027 specifies that standard medical practice does not involve prescribing hormone treatment for gender dysphoric or gender incongruent prepubertal minors; prohibits a healthcare prescriber from prescribing a course of treatment that involves hormone treatment for gender dysphoric or gender incongruent prepubertal minors, except that a healthcare prescriber may prescribe a course of treatment that involves hormone treatments for prepubertal minors for diagnoses of growth deficiencies or other diagnoses unrelated to gender dysphoria or gender incongruency.

HB1028 authorizes a municipality, a county, or a county having a metropolitan form of government to prohibit the use of tobacco products or vapor products, or both, on the grounds of a public park, public playground, or public greenway as long as the public park, public playground, or public greenway is owned or controlled by the respective municipality or county.

HB1045 requires licensing authority, upon learning a healthcare prescriber was indicted for or convicted of certain criminal offenses, to restrict or revoke, respectively, the prescriber’s ability to prescribe controlled substances; requires licensing authority to suspend the license of certain healthcare professionals upon finding the healthcare professional failed to comply with physician collaboration requirements; requires facility administrators to report certain information.

We do not need more laws; we need better laws, and enforcement of the better laws. The grassroots are looking for courage in our legislators: courage to stand up for constitutional principles over pressure from leadership and paid lobbyists. We are at a crisis point and now is the time to stand for the people instead of special interests, the wealthy, and well-connected, and against those who assume power through corruption and coercion. If we do not, we could very well lose our republic and our liberties.