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'Total Fraud': Twitter Users React to the Transformation of Expelled Tennessee Democrat

The transformation of expelled Tennessee lawmaker Justin Pearson from his time at Bowdoin College to now has social media users calling the Democrat out as a complete "fraud." 

Clips shared from a 2016 college campaign ad, when Pearson was running for president of the school's student government, show him calling for unity among his peers. 

"I'm Justin J. Pearson, and I'm running for president of BSG," he says in the ad. "There are a few reasons why we're running this campaign this year. One has to do with representation … How can we represent all voices in a conversation?"

He continued, "I wanna bring together different voices — dissenting voices, voices that may be more liberal or more conservative — in order that we can reach a point of, sort of, the radical middle." 

But it's not just the way he addressed political differences that shocked people—his look and mannerisms have completely changed as well, with some arguing he's "like the Hilaria Baldwin of Al Sharpton clones." 


Pearson and two other Democratic state representatives led hundreds of protesters onto the House floor last month following the mass shooting at the Covenant School in Nashville, calling for stricter gun control laws. The House voted to remove him along with one other Democrat, Justin Jones, though Jones has been reinstated on an interim basis. The Shelby County Commission will vote Wednesday to determine whether Pearson will be appointed to fill his seat. A special election will be held in both cases in the coming months.