Benjamins in Chains
💵 TN lawmakers propose guardrails for programmable money · Bill to protect ICE agents passes Senate · The battle for Nashville's soul: this month's speaker announced · Much more!
Good afternoon, everyone. TN lawmakers propose guardrails for programmable money... Bill to protect ICE agents from getting doxxed passes TN Senate... Local vegan deli workers on strike... Squirrel responsible for Nashville power outage on Monday... And much more!
The Battle for Nashville's Soul Join us Thursday, March 26th for a discussion with developer and advocate Chris Remke as we dig into the city's actions around zoning and property taxes. (Buy Ticket)
Correction: In yesterday’s newsletter, we printed that Nashville tourism dropped 13 percent. To clarify, international tourism in Nashville has decreased by 13 percent. Overall tourism actually increased 2.7 percent. We apologize for the error.
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The Cost of Fully Programmable Money
From Megan Podsiedlik
Digital currency promises efficiency, automation, and innovation, but it also introduces some serious questions around financial freedom, privacy, and security.
This year, Tennessee lawmakers are considering a bill that would put guardrails on programmable money. Senator Bo Watson (R-Hixon) and Representative Bud Hulsey (R-Kingsport) are sponsoring the legislation that would prohibit a person from requiring another to use programmable money for transactions and bar issuers of programmable money from denying transactions based upon certain factors.
The bill moving through the Tennessee General Assembly was drafted by Solari, a company based out of Tennessee that develops and promotes model legislation aimed at protecting financial freedom. We sat down with its founder, Catherine Austin Fitts, who is slated to give expert testimony on the subject of programmable money during committee hearings this week.
“Our priority at Solari is helping make sure that the financial system is both analog and digital,” said Fitts, who started her career on Wall Street as the managing director of Dillon, Read & Co. and later served as the Assistant Secretary of Housing in the first Bush administration. “Control comes when you have an all-digital system.”
Fitts explained that establishing limits on programmable money isn’t about fear-mongering; it's about making sure that your money cannot be used to control you.
“I'm always shocked that there is any opposition to this,” said Fitts. “The people who say this legislation is not necessary say, ‘Oh, well, that's a theoretical possibility. We would never do that.’ My attitude is, 'Okay, if you're saying the horse will never jump off the cliff, you don't mind if I put her in a bridle and saddle so it can't jump off the cliff if it tries.'”
Similar legislation has been filed in Idaho and recently passed in Utah. According to Fitts, those who decry such guardrails as boogeyman politics need look no further than what happened during Covid shutdowns: “During the pandemic, lots of business and income and market share on Main Street got shifted to the big-box stores and the online companies because the government was dictating who could operate and who could not."
Why now? Fitts explained that “a series of bills have either passed or are being considered at the federal level that are expected to dramatically increase private stablecoins and private digital assets that are set up in a regulatory framework where government controls the rules and regulations of how they can be used.”
Why Tennessee? “Culture is incredibly important, because the only way to enforce a successful financial system is with culture,” said Fitts. “You need people who build an enterprise: they're hardworking, they're productive, and they're honest. It's one of the things I love about Tennessee…. There's such a great culture to support enterprise here.”
Catherine Austin Fitts will be presenting her expert testimony in the Senate Commerce & Labor Committee today and in the House Banking & Consumer Affairs Subcommittee tomorrow.
✹ DOES NASHVILLE WANT YOU TO STAY?
The Zoning Phantom Leadeth the Taxman Zoning, land use, and property tax disputes have animated political discussions in Nashville since Mayor Freddie O'Connell first took office in September 2023.
Through his Substack, Built to Think, and organization, Save Our Nashville Neighborhoods, Chris Remke has emerged as the city’s most potent critic of the Metro agenda. He's effectively drawn attention to everything from Nashville’s inflated growth projections to the smoke-and-mirrors assurances given to homeowners about how upzoning would affect them, and most recently, the betrayal of local businesses now saddled with unwieldy tax bills.
Join us Thursday evening, March 26th, for a wide-ranging discussion on what Metro is trying to achieve and where they've gone wrong.
This event is for the benefit of The Pamphleteer, Nashville, and priced with that in mind. Bard-level subscribers receive free admittance.
LOCAL COLOR
🐝 Be Hive Strike Employees laid off from a local vegan deli are taking to the streets. BE Hive founder Ben Stix laid off seven of his fifty-four workers due to lagging demand. The remaining production workers have since gone on strike, calling for a boycott of the “deli” until the laid off workers are reinstated and pay for remaining workers is increased. They’re out picketing today, tomorrow and Friday if you want to observe the local flora and fauna.
💊 Drink Spiker Tracker Columbia resident Erika Gorman set up a site to track drink-spiking incidents down on Broadway after a family friend was drugged and robbed of $70,000. The site, Spiked in Nash, shows a record of incidents and provides a form so you can add your own.
✹ METRO COUNCIL WATCH
Who bankrolls your councilmember? We analyzed every donation to every council member to show you whether they're funded by their constituents or someone else. Higher grades go to those who raise more money locally. (Take a Look)
NON-LOCAL COLOR
📹 Richmond Removes LPRs Richmond, Virginia turned off its license plate readers after the police chief hallucinated a “national lookup” feature and car thefts jumped 33 percent.
HEADLINES
- 🧊 TN Senate passes bill to protect the confidentiality of sensitive immigration enforcement operations and the officers involved. Over the summer, Metro government released the names of ICE agents after an immigration enforcement operation in Nashville. The debacle spurred an investigation into Mayor Freddie O’Connell’s administration and it inspired this legislation.
- 💍 Federal filing claims Colombian-born journalist arrested in Nashville married U.S. citizen 13 days after receiving letter from ICE. DHS additionally states that Estefany Rodriguez Flores twice applied for authorization to work in the United States. The first occurred in February 2022, when she applied for and was granted an I-765 Work Authorization from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), which was valid until February 2024. (TN Star)
- 🦌 Lawmakers look for long-term fix to Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency’s budget woes. Two bills are moving through the state legislature that would steer money from the general fund into TWRA coffers. According to Agency Director Jason Maxedon, the TWRA needs about $18.5M in recurring revenue to provide security over the next decade. (Lookout)
- 🏛 Congressman Andy Ogles joins new Sharia-Free America Caucus. Ogles is one of 46 House members from 22 different states who joined the caucus created by U.S. Representatives Keith Self (R-TX-03) and Chip Roy (R-TX-21). Self thanked his colleagues “for joining this noble cause to save Western Civilization and fight back against the threat of Sharia.” (TN Star)
- 🐿 Thousands of Nashvillians were without power on Monday morning… because of a squirrel. This is not the first time a squirrel has caused an outage. In 2022, nearly a third of Dickson Electric System customers suffered a power outage due to “a cute little squirrel that created a whole lot of chaos.” (WSMV)
✹ QUOTE OF THE DAY
“It’s not sustainable — business on Broadway is the lowest I’ve seen in all the time we’ve been here. … This will absolutely lead to people going out of business. You’re going to have vacant storefronts, and the politicians can say I’m being dramatic, but the politicians don’t balance my books every month.”
Bill Miller, Founder and CEO of Icon Entertainment & Hospitality, on Broadway businesses' tax bills.
DEVELOPMENT
- Developer plans high-rise hotel on downtown's Barbershop Harmony Society site (NBJ)
- Earls Kitchen + Bar will open in Nashville Yards on April 16 (NBJ)
- Lower Broadway building housing Bootleggers listed for sale (Post)
- London-based robotics, AI company opens Nashville headquarters (Post)
THINGS TO DO
View our calendar for the week here.
📅 Visit our On The Radar list to find upcoming events around Nashville.
🎧 On Spotify: Pamphleteer's Picks, a playlist of our favorite bands in town this week.
👨🏻🌾 Check out our Nashville farmer's market guide.
TONIGHT
🎸 Twang Tuesday @ Acme Feed and Seed, 7p, Free, Info
🪕 Emily West & Friends @ 3rd and Lindsley, 7p, $19.90, Info
🎸 Honky Tonk Tuesday @ Eastside Bowl, 8p, $10, Info
+ two-step lessons @ 7p, The Cowpokes @ 8p
📰 Check out the full newsletter archive here.
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Today's newsletter is brought to you by Davis Hunt, Megan Podsiedlik, and Camelia Brennan.