Nashville’s Congressional Primary Results
Incumbent U.S. Rep. Scott DesJarlais, seeking his ninth term in Congress, breezed through Thursday’s primary election to earn the Republican nomination. DesJarlais has survived several personal scandals and three rounds of redistricting since voters first sent him to D.C. during 2010’s populist Tea Party backlash against President Barack Obama and corporate-friendly GOP politics. The newest congressional boundaries, passed by Tennessee’s Republican supermajority during May’s special session, stretch southeast from Antioch to the Chattanooga outskirts, capturing Murfreesboro, Manchester, Sewanee and McMinnville.
Early in his political career, transcripts surfaced confirming that DesJarlais — a physician and anti-abortion conservative — had several sexual partners at his workplace, including two patients, while chief of staff at Grandview Medical Center, and pressured at least two former sexual partners to get abortions. DesJarlais has since faded into the House’s rank-and-file right win…