(18 Jul 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
++QUALITY AS INCOMING++
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Nashville, Tennessee – 17 July 2025
1. Wide of State Rep. Justin Jones, (D)-Nashville, talking to airport officials, UPSOUND (English) State Rep. Justin Jones: "Everything for legal purposes to know, because I’ve never had been racially profiled before."
Official: "You haven’t been racially profiled."
Jones: "So I just want to – I want understand why we’re being racially profiled because we were allowed to come in and this gentleman says you’re not welcome here today."
2. SOUNDBITE (English) State Rep. Justin Jones, (D) Tennessee state House:
"The Tennessee Highway Patrol and Department of Homeland Security of our state, he said ask the federal government. This is the only opportunity we have to question the federal government. And she’s in our district, in our home, this district overwhelmingly it’s diverse and multi-racial, so I just wanted to see what happened to the people and also if she’ll hear the stories of the people I’ve met who are still looking for their loved ones. That’s why we’re here today."
3. Wide of Jones talking to airport officials, UPSOUND (English) Officer: "I’d do the same thing with anybody else we’re asking to leave the secure site. We’re going to have any follow-up conversations with airline and so on, once you’re outside of the secure side."
4. SOUNDBITE (English) State Rep. Justin Jones, (D) Nashville:
"Every other event we’ve had here in the airport, we’ve been allowed as representatives. This is the first time I’ve been told as a house representative that I’m not allowed to attend an event from the administration. We were here with Secretary Buttigieg. We were for every event they’ve had at the airport. This is first time that we’re told we’re not welcome here. In fact, you saw they let us in, but somebody from Secretary (Kristi) Noem’s staff came over and said we don’t want him here specifically. You saw that the Secret Service let us in and we went through the credentials. The airport police let us in, and even the airport authority was explaining the agenda to let us know. But Secretary Noem’s staffs said that were not welcome here. I’m here simply to support veterans and also because I want to get answers from my constituents who’ve been harassed and who’ve been brutalized by ICE here in Nashville. I just want to know from the secretary where are the people in my district? I represent the 52nd House District, which this airport sits in. It’s the most diverse district in the state of Tennessee. Many of my constituents were impacted by the ICE raids. I simply wanted to just hear the Secretary’s support of veterans, and also I’ll get questions as to what happened to my constituents who were taken by ICE in the beginning of May. 196 ICE arrests, the majority of whom never committed a crime in the city of Nashville, never been charged with a crime, yet were taken. And many of them, we don’t know what happened with them."
5. Wide of Jones talking to airport officials, UPSOUND (English) Officer: "My boss is the Department of Public Safety as part of the International Airport Authority."
State Rep. Justin Jones: "May I speak to who you just spoke to?"
6. SOUNDBITE (English) State Rep. Justin Jones, (D) Nashville:
7. Wide of Jones leaving airport, UPSOUND (English) State Rep. Justin Jones: "I understand that it wasn’t you. Thank you."
STORYLINE:
Tennessee state Representative Justin Jones was removed from the press conference of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem Thursday before the secretary arrived.
AP video by George Walker
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