Graded F: Tennessee Democrat Stephen Cohen (D-09)
He once physically threw an Armenian American reporter out of his house. Now he's leaving Congress.
Asbed asks about Tennessee Democrat Stephen Ira Cohen, and Hamparian calls it a good-news story. He describes Cohen as one of the most hostile members of Congress toward Armenian Americans, recalling that Cohen famously and physically threw an Armenian American reporter out of his house early in his career, an incident Hamparian says viewers can still find on YouTube. Cohen then doubled down, becoming strongly pro-Turkish and pro-Azeri.
The interesting twist this cycle is procedural. Cohen became a casualty of the national trend toward redistricting. His Memphis-area seat has historically been a majority African American district, and he faced a strong primary challenger, Justin J. Pearson, in a hotly contested Democratic primary. As that race developed and Pearson looked positioned to win, the Tennessee state legislature redistricted the entire state in a way that made it very hard for the Memphis seat to remain in African American hands.
Reading the tea leaves, Cohen announced he would not seek re-election. His final days in the House fall in the first few days of January. Hamparian notes that if the redistricting plays out as its authors intend, the seat will likely go to a Republican, but the takeaway he offers is that Cohen is leaving. The clip blends a vivid personal anecdote with a look at how state-level redistricting can reshape who represents a district and, for ANCA, who holds an F grade in Congress.
Transcript
Asbed Bedrossian: How about Tennessee Democrat Stephen Cohen?
Aram Suren Hamparian: Okay, that's a good news story. Steve Cohen is one of the most hostile members of Congress to Armenian-Americans. He famously threw an Armenian-American reporter out of his house, physically threw him out of his house early on in his career. If you want, you can look it up on YouTube. It's pretty entertaining and pretty angry on his part. But he doubled down early on on being very pro-Turkish, very pro-Azeri. And what happened this cycle is interesting. He became the victim of this national trend toward redistricting. And the Tennessee state legislature, historically African-American, held seat in the Memphis area. And he was facing, he's not African-American, but he was facing an African-American, Justin J. Pearson, a very strong candidate, in a hotly contested Democratic primary. And it looked like Justin Pearson might defeat him in the primary. But while that process was playing out, the Tennessee state legislature redistricted the entire state to make it very hard for the Memphis-based seat to be held by an African-American. the tea leaves. Steve Cohen just retired from Congress. He said he would not run for re-election. So he is thankfully departing. His last days in the House will be next, the first few days of January. It looks like if the Tennessee redistricting plays out the way its authors want, that seat will be held by a Republican. But the good news is that Steve Cohen will be leaving.
Hovik Manucharyan: Yeah.