From One Small Step to Statehouse: Elaine Davis on Turning Advocacy into Action

You know, they're safe. They were, they were enemies of the crown. And I just think that, like, what you're doing is kind of that lineage.

You know, it's, it's, it might not seem as dramatic, but I mean, for your life and the life of your son, it was really dramatic. And I just think that's fabulous.

“No, and I agree with you, it's obviously my name is not, it is may or may not be something that people remember.”

But I do want to, I want people to know that I cared and then my concern was to make Tennessee better and to make our community and our schools safer.

And so that's something that is a legacy that is important to me. And whether anybody remembers my name or not is irrelevant, I just want the next person behind me to carry on and continue to ensure that we do keep our children safe. Americans are capable of achieving extraordinary things when they have the freedom and opportunity to do so. This is American Potential. Welcome to American Potential podcast. I'm your host David from. So we're coming live from Nashville, Tennessee as we're out celebrating America's 250th birthday from Tennessee going all around the country.

“And we're so thrilled to be here in Nashville, home of country music, the beginning of the American frontier and stories about folks, you know, ordinary folks who really made a real difference.”

And we're talking to just somebody who, you know, decided to get involved because her son had some needs. She helped pass legislation that helped her son in school, but she didn't stop there. She went on to become a Knox County commissioner. Vice chair of the Republican Party in Knox County and now is serving in as a state representative in the Tennessee legislature. So a great story of getting involved. So I want to welcome Elaine Davis to the. Thank you. I appreciate to come in. This is a great event. I'm super excited that you're home to. I'm really looking forward to it. AFP always puts on great events. I'm so grateful for their service and what they do for our community in our country.

Well, I'll take any excuse to come to Nashville. So I love it. I appreciate your host and us. So maybe tell me a little bit about, you know, your story of how you got involved. I mean, one of the things that we talk about these events is our one small step campaign, which is, you know, that in every moment in history, anything that changed somebody had to make a decision to get involved to try to change their community or their. The other state or there or the nation eventually and those stories at the early remarkable and hopefully we hope to encourage many people who believe in liberty to do that. And you've got a great story that that kind of embodies some of that. Can you share it with us?

“I would love to and that's one of the things I'm grateful for is the opportunity to speak to things that I know that a lot of people. They have issues of their own in all it takes is just that one small step to move forward.”

I had a son, he's 25 now, but at the time when he was one, he was diagnosed with type one diabetes and he almost died. And when he got to be about school age, I didn't realize it, but there's not a nurse in every school. And so I wasn't sure how he was going to be cared for at school because the way that the law was written, the only person that could deliver medical procedures, which was at that time, testing his blood sugar and giving himself insulin, was a school nurse. So if there's not one in every school, my concern was how was he going to be cared for and was he going to be taking care of properly, especially in an emergent situation.

So that led me to come to the legislature. I reached out to, you know, at first I went to my school board and they said, hey, we don't have the money to hire the nurses, go to County Commission.

I went to County Commission. I said, hey, they need money. They said, go to the state. They we need money from the state in order to do it. And so with each step, I realized how important it is to make sure that you have people that are listening and are concerned about your issue and help be your advocate at that level. And so I was incredibly grateful that now Lieutenant Governor Randy McNally at the time he was Senator McNally carried some legislation for me to help try to get nurses in our school system. And if they weren't there to allow for volunteers to perform some of those medical procedures to to keep our kids safe at school.

And so I'm fortunate this year that I'm helping to carry some legislation to try to get more nurses in our school. We're trying to develop a grant program very similar to what we have done with our school resource officers. We have provided state dollars to allow for one school resource officer in every school to keep them safe in that regard. And my I'm just piggybacking on that legislation to say that they're medical issues. And we have so many students now that are in our school system that have this chronically.

Well that's a great story I mean there's a lot of your colleagues who have different inspiring stories as to why they ran but I mean that's that's a hard felt one that that's really goes to you know that that you wanted to help your son.

So as you've been serving now in the legislature what is it what have you learned about like the process and what have you liked and maybe what were you not as prepared for coming in.

“Well I think that one of the most important things even when I served on county commission it's about developing those relationships with your fellow legislators.”

They need to know when you're bringing legislation forward what the intent is where you're coming from and what you're trying to do with the legislation and garnering support with that it is a very collaborative effort. So sometimes it's not political party versus political party it's urban versus suburban versus rural and so you have to listen to those different legislators and what the needs are their district to try to be accommodating and try to work together to bring consensus to move something forward that's beneficial to everybody.

I'm just trying to be where your district is in Tennessee. So I'm in I'm part of Knox County. I live in that's right. South Knox County and kind of south of the river. Knights, we we were pleased to have your mayor when Jacob's not earlier today. He's awesome. That's great fabulous. It's really. Yes, he is. You guys are fortunate to have a lot of great represented presentation. Hey, he's Tennessee. We've got some great ones. Yeah. So, you know, now that.

You know, you're talking to somebody else who is going to get involved or has it started getting involved.

“Certain taking interest in their community and community service. What would you tell them about getting involved in about even sign a run for the legislature?”

Well, for me, I had no involvement in government whatsoever. This was something that I stepped out in faith on that I knew how important it was to protect my son. And so for so many people that same issue, whatever it may be, is incredibly important to you. And so you become a subject matter expert on that, but you also learn how to work with others to try to move something forward. And so the best piece of advice I can give to somebody is don't think that you can't accomplish anything because you can.

Whether you pass some legislation or you don't pass some legislation at a very minimum, you make people aware of the issue. And once someone becomes aware of an issue and there's a focus drawn to that issue, then you can garter support for to try to bring remedy. So, how many terms have you served?

So, I've was first selected in 20 to reelected in 24 and I'll be up on the ballot in 26. We have two year terms, so we're mostly campaigning.

So you're a veteran now.

“So what are some of the issues that you've been most interested in and bills that you've worked on?”

I appreciate that question. There's a lot of pieces of legislation that I'm really proud of, and especially with regard to some of the issues around school nurses and try to increase their pay and increase their number. Some of the other things that I've worked on that I'm really trying to get funded is I like to get period products in our hospitals. A lot of young women don't have the ability to have those products at school. And in a lot of cases, you have chronic absenteeism because they're not going to school because they don't want to be embarrassed.

They don't want to have an accident at school and not be able to care for themselves. So, um, if somebody was thinking about, I think I should have had someone to run for office, but what would you say to somebody who's debating whether or not to get involved in, you know, they're, they're, they look at their TV and they yell at it or they get upset about the complaint to their spouse.

But they haven't gotten involved. What would you say to them about getting involved and how to take that first step?

Well, just like I did, I took a step out in faith. I first prayed about it and I really just asked God to quit me to be able to speak and speak with clarity and discernment and to be respectful to everyone. And so that's, that's an important step for a lot of people is just to ensure that you are equipped and that you are knowledgeable and that you have a voice and it is powerful and not to diminish yourself in any way. Well, I just think that it's such a central part about our system. Like we look back to the founding fathers, you know, the courage that they had to take that step and, you know, put their lives on the line, you know, they're safe, they were, they were in the me's of the crown.

And I just think that's fabulous. No, and I agree with you, it's obviously my name is not, it is may or may not be something that people remember, but I do want to, I want people to know that I cared and then my concern was to make Tennessee better and to make our community and our, and our schools safer. And so that's something that is a legacy that is important to me and whether anybody remembers my name or not is irrelevant. I just want the next person behind me to carry on and continue to ensure that we do keep our children safe and that they are the priority.

That's great. That's great. Well, Representative, I'm so glad you joined us here. I'm glad you can be here for our celebration. Hopefully people, I'm sure people can hear it. And we're so excited to celebrate America's birthday in Nashville. It's always fun for us. We'll have to get to Knoxville next.

Absolutely, come on down. Thanks. Folks, if you liked this episode, please feel free to like us on social media and to subscribe to our channels.

“Always remember, freedom and liberty are easily taken for granted. Don't take for granted. Go out there and defend freedom and liberty.”

Thanks for joining us and we'll see you on the next episode.