Senate Advances Legislation to Protect Communities, Children, and Election Integrity Amid Busy Week
By State Senator Page Walley – March 6, 2026
The Tennessee Senate continued moving a strong agenda aimed at protecting communities, strengthening election integrity, defending parental rights, and holding bad actors accountable. Lawmakers also advanced measures to prohibit medical discrimination on the basis of vaccines, protect women’s spaces, and create safeguards for children featured in monetized social media content.
Legislation sets protections for minors featured in monetized social media content
As the rise of family vloggers and child influencers continues across social media platforms, the Senate Judiciary Committee passed legislation last week to establish legal protections for children who appear in monetized content online.
My bill, Senate Bill 1469 sets new standards governing when minors can participate in online content creation and ensures children financially benefit from content in which they appear.
The bill prohibits children under age 14 from engaging in qualifying compensated content creation. For minors ages 14 to 17, the bill requires a parent or adult who features the minor in monetized online content to set aside a portion of the child’s earnings in a protected trust account.
As social media continues to grow, more children are being featured in videos that generate significant income, often without clear legal protections in place. This legislation sets responsible standards for when a minor is considered a compensated content creator and ensures meaningful financial safeguards are triggered once those earnings reach a certain level.
The bill also ensures minors creating their own content receive 100% of their earnings. Additionally, it grants minors age 14 or older the right to request deletion of online content featuring their likeness, requires recordkeeping of earnings and allows legal action if required financial protections are violated.
The bill now heads to the Senate Floor for final consideration.
Women’s Safety and Protection Act advances to protect women-only spaces
To strengthen privacy and safety protections for female-only spaces across the state, the Judiciary Committee passed Senate Bill 468. Known as the “Women’s Safety and Protection Act,” the legislation mandates sex-based designations of restrooms, changing rooms and sleeping quarters in certain public facilities, including correctional institutions, domestic violence shelters, and public schools, ensuring that men use men’s restrooms and women use women’s restrooms. The measure also provides legal remedies for individuals whose rights are violated, including the ability to seek injunctive relief, damages, and attorney’s fees.
Women and girls deserve privacy, dignity, and safety in the spaces where they are most vulnerable. This is common sense legislation that protects biological reality and ensures our laws are clear, consistent, and rooted in protecting Tennessee families.
The bill heads to the Senate Floor for final consideration.
Counting the cost of psychotropic drugs to taxpayers
The Senate passed legislation Thursday requiring new annual reports on how much TennCare spends on psychotropic medications for both the general TennCare population and children in foster care through CoverKids. Senate Bill 2255 directs TennCare to work with the Departments of Health and the Department of Children’s Services to compile the reports.
Currently, the state is estimated to spend between $89 million and $96 million per quarter on psychotropic medications through TennCare and CoverKids. The reporting requirements will provide lawmakers with clearer data on prescribing patterns and overall costs, helping ensure better oversight and more informed policy decisions moving forward.
The first report will detail psychotropic medications paid for through TennCare, including the number of individuals prescribed the drugs, prescriptions per person, age demographics, county-by-county data compared to population levels, and the total cost. The second report will focus specifically on children in foster care who are prescribed psychotropic medications, including similar data points and identifying cases where prescriptions extend beyond 90 days.
Issues in Brief…
Keeping police officers’ personal information confidential – To enhance protections for law enforcement officers, our Senate State and Local Government Committee passed Senate Bill 1464. The bill requires state and local government entities to keep certain personal information of law enforcement officers confidential. Current law does not provide a uniform policy across state government.
The legislation was created in response to the rise in social media activity that has targeted law enforcement officers in the field and endangered them and their families by publishing personal and confidential information. The bill does not restrict lawful transparency but focuses on protecting sensitive information from misuse.
The legislation advances to the Senate floor for final consideration.
Early childhood mental health home visiting program – The Senate Health and Welfare Committee passed legislation this week to authorize the Department of Health to establish and administer an early childhood mental health home visiting program. My bill, Senate Bill 2153 follows the nurse home visiting model to provide evidence-based, in-home services that support mental health, early childhood development, and family stability for children from birth to five years old and their families.
The legislation now moves to the Senate Chamber for a vote before the full Senate.
Increasing funds for rural community ambulance services – To increase funding for our rural community ambulance services, the Senate Health and Welfare Committee passed legislation to increase the rate of reimbursement from 67.5% to 110% of allowable charges paid to ambulance service providers by TennCare. Ambulance service providers have consistently operated at a loss year after year. This change will help close that funding gap. Senate Bill 1805 advances to the Senate Finance, Ways, and Means Committee for further review.
As activity continues to intensify, please continue to reach out to me at sen.page.walley@capitol.tn.gov or 615-741-2368. Thank you for letting me serve.
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