Mississippi Today

Bills to watch in the 2023 Mississippi legislative session

Published

2 years ago

January 25, 2023

Staff Editor

Bills to watch in the 2023 Mississippi legislative session

by Bobby Harrison and Geoff Pender, Mississippi Today
January 25, 2023

Editor’s note: This list will be updated throughout the legislative session.

About 3,000 bills have been filed in the Mississippi Legislature to be considered during the 2023 session. Last week was the deadline for legislators to file general bills.

The deadline, though, does not apply to revenue and appropriations bills that face a February deadline.

Ballot initiative

Senate Concurrent Resolution 517, authored by Sen. David Blount, D-Jackson, and House Concurrent Resolution 26, authored by Rep. Tracy Rosebud, D-Tutwiler, are among multiple bills filed to revive the state’s initiative process where voters can bypass the Legislature and place issues on the ballot for the electorate to decide. The state Supreme Court rendered the state’s initiative process unconstitutional in 2020 on a technicality and the legislative leadership has vowed to renew it. But that did not occur in the 2021 session.

Medicaid expansion

Senate Bill 2070, authored by Sen. Angela Turner Ford, D-West Point, and House Bill 108, authored by Rep. Bryant Clark, D-Pickens, are among multiple bills filed to expand Medicaid coverage as is allowed under federal law to provide health care coverage to primarily the working poor. Under the proposal, the federal government would pay the bulk of the costs.

Postpartum coverage

Senate Bill 2212, authored by Sen. Kevin Blackwell, R-Southaen, and House Bill 426, authored by Missy McGee, R-Hattiesburg, are among multiple bills filed to extend Medicaid coverage from 60 days to 12 months for mothers after giving birth.

Health care & hospital crisis

Senate Bill 2371, Senate Bill 2372, Senate Bill 2373 and Senate Bill 2323, authored by Senate leaders with support from Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, are aimed at helping Mississippi’s struggling hospitals and shoring up the health care workforce. The bills would spend a combined $111 million of the state’s federal pandemic relief money. This includes $80 million in grants to hospitals based on their number of beds and type of care, a nursing student loan repayment program, grants to help community colleges beef up their nursing programs. Senate Bill 2323 would eliminate legal barriers to consolidation of or collaboration among hospitals.

Senate Bill 2793 and House Bill 1081 would create licensure and regulation — by a new board — for midwives in Mississippi. Currently, midwifery is not regulated in Mississippi as it is in 36 other states, meaning anyone here can claim to be a midwife without formal training or certification. More than half of Mississippi counties are considered “maternity care deserts,” with no hospitals practicing obstetric care, no OB-GYNs and no certified nurse midwives. Advocates say midwives could help in these areas. But many physicians groups say child delivery should be overseen by trained physicians.

Burn center

House Bill 469, authored by House Speaker Philip Gunn, would provide $12 million for Mississippi Baptist Medical Center to create a burn center or unit at the hospital in 2024. The state’s only accredited burn center closed last year, but recently the University of Mississippi Medical Center announced it will increase its burn treatment capabilities.

Welfare agency reform

House Bill 184 and House Bill 188, authored by Rep. John Hines, D-Greenville, would establish a board to oversee Department of Human Services, taking the agency out of the sole oversight of the governor’s office. House Bill 1054, filed by Rep. Robert Johnson, D-Natchez, would require legislative watchdog PEER to evaluate TANF subgrants. Senate Bill 2331, filed by Sen. Rod Hickman, D-Macon, would remove the child support cooperation requirement for TANF and SNAP beneficiaries.

Felony suffrage

Senate Bill 2405, authored by Sen. Sollie Norwood, D-Jackson, and House Bill 1247, authored by Rep. William Tracy Arnold, R-Booneville, are among multiple bills filed to change the state Constitution to allow people convicted of felonies to regain their voting rights at some point after finishing their sentence.

Elections & voting

Senate Bill 2299, authored by Jeremy England, R-Vancleave, would establish a mechanism for voters to recall state and local officials, including legislators.

House Bill 370, authored by Shanda Yates, I-Jackson, would establish a mechanism for voters to recall municipal officials.

Government accountability

Senate Bill 2667, authored by Sen. Jason Barrett, R-Brookhaven, with multiple co-sponsors, would reiterate that the open meetings law covers the Mississippi Legislature. The bill is a response to a controversial 2022 ruling by the state Ethics Commission saying the Legislature is not covered by the open meetings law. The bill also increases the fine for violations of the open records law from $100 to $500.

Gender procedures ban

House Bill 1125, the “Regulate Experimental Adolescent Procedures Act,” is similar to measures passed or debated in other states and was authored by Rep. Gene Newman, a Republican from Pearl. The bill, passed on a partisan 78-28 vote by the full House early in the session, would ban gender affirming surgery and drugs for Mississippians 18 and under.

Taxes

House Bill 418, authored by Rep. Jansen Owen, R-Poplarville, and co-sponsored by others, would eliminate the sales tax on most grocery items.

The deadline to file tax bills is not until Feb. 22, so most likely others will be filed.

Education

House Bill 294, authored by Carolyn Crawford, R-Pass Christian, would prohibit public schools and universities from imposing mask mandates.

Senate Bill 2079, authored by Angela Hill, R-Picayune, would create the Mississippi School Protection Act and authorize that schools could designate personnel with gun permits, to be armed.

House Bill 112, authored by Bryant Clark, D-Pickens, would create the Mississippi Universal Preschool Act.

House Bill 595, authored by Bo. Brown, D-Jackson, would authorize the Department of Education to create curriculum for African American studies and racial diversity.

Law enforcement

House Bill 1070, authored by Lee Yancey, R-Brandon., would create grants for schools to teach patriotic education.

House Bill 1020, authored by Trey Lamar, R-Senatobia, creates a separate judicial district within the Capitol Complex Improvement District, which is an area around downtown Jackson where many of the state-owned buildings are located. The judges, who would hear civil and criminal cases, would be paid equivalent to chancery and circuit judges, but would be appointed by the Supreme Court chief justice instead of elected like other judges in state.

House Bill 1222, authored by Sam Creekmore, R-New Albany with other co-sponsors, would make a number of changes to state mental health policies, including requiring law enforcement agencies to offer “first aid mental health training.” It would appoint court liaisons to work with families in counties where more than 20 people are involuntarily committed each year, require chancery clerks to keep more detailed records on civil commitments, and aim to reduce delays in conducting screenings of people being civilly committed. Under the bill, community mental health centers would be required to hire an accountant and conduct regular audits. It would also change the composition of the board of mental health to include more subject matter experts and at least one sheriff and reduce board members’ term lengths.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Did you miss our previous article…
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Mississippi Today

On this day in 1939, Billie Holiday recorded ‘Strange Fruit’

Published

6 hours ago

April 20, 2025

Staff Editor

mississippitoday.org – @MSTODAYnews – 2025-04-20 07:00:00

by Jerry Mitchell, Mississippi Today
April 20, 2025

April 20, 1939

Billie Holiday recorded “Strange Fruit” about the lynchings of Black Americans.

Legendary jazz singer Billie Holiday stepped into a Fifth Avenue studio and recorded “Strange Fruit,” a song written by Jewish civil rights activist Abel Meeropol, a high school English teacher upset about the lynchings of Black Americans — more than 6,400 between 1865 and 1950.

Meeropol and his wife had adopted the sons of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who were orphaned after their parents’ executions for espionage.

Holiday was drawn to the song, which reminded her of her father, who died when a hospital refused to treat him because he was Black. Weeks earlier, she had sung it for the first time at the Café Society in New York City. When she finished, she didn’t hear a sound.

“Then a lone person began to clap nervously,” she wrote in her memoir. “Then suddenly everybody was clapping.”

The song sold more than a million copies, and jazz writer Leonard Feather called it “the first significant protest in words and music, the first unmuted cry against racism.”

After her 1959 death, both she and the song went into the Grammy Hall of Fame, Time magazine called “Strange Fruit” the song of the century, and the British music publication Q included it among “10 songs that actually changed the world.”

David Margolick traces the tune’s journey through history in his book, “Strange Fruit: Billie Holiday and the Biography of a Song.” Andra Day won a Golden Globe for her portrayal of Holiday in the film, “The United States vs. Billie Holiday.”

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Mississippi Today

Mississippians are asked to vote more often than people in most other states

Published

7 hours ago

April 20, 2025

Staff Editor

Mississippians are asked to vote more often than people in most other states

mississippitoday.org – @BobbyHarrison9 – 2025-04-20 06:00:00

by Bobby Harrison, Mississippi Today
April 20, 2025

Not long after many Mississippi families celebrate Easter, they will be returning to the polls to vote in municipal party runoff elections.

The party runoff is April 22.

A year does not pass when there is not a significant election in the state. Mississippians have the opportunity to go to the polls more than voters in most — if not all — states.

In Mississippi, do not worry if your candidate loses because odds are it will not be long before you get to pick another candidate and vote in another election.

Mississippians go to the polls so much because it is one of only five states nationwide where the elections for governor and other statewide and local offices are held in odd years. In Mississippi, Kentucky and Louisiana, the election for governor and other statewide posts are held the year after the federal midterm elections. For those who might be confused by all the election lingo, the federal midterms are the elections held two years after the presidential election. All 435 members of the U.S. House and one-third of the membership of the U.S. Senate are up for election during every midterm. In Mississippi, there also are important judicial elections that coincide with the federal midterms.

Then the following year after the midterms, Mississippians are asked to go back to the polls to elect a governor, the seven other statewide offices and various other local and district posts.

Two states — Virginia and New Jersey — are electing governors and other state and local officials this year, the year after the presidential election.

The elections in New Jersey and Virginia are normally viewed as a bellwether of how the incumbent president is doing since they are the first statewide elections after the presidential election that was held the previous year. The elections in Virginia and New Jersey, for example, were viewed as a bad omen in 2021 for then-President Joe Biden and the Democrats since the Republican in the swing state of Virginia won the Governor’s Mansion and the Democrats won a closer-than-expected election for governor in the blue state of New Jersey.

With the exception of Mississippi, Louisiana, Kentucky, Virginia and New Jersey, all other states elect most of their state officials such as governor, legislators and local officials during even years — either to coincide with the federal midterms or the presidential elections.

And in Mississippi, to ensure that the democratic process is never too far out of sight and mind, most of the state’s roughly 300 municipalities hold elections in the other odd year of the four-year election cycle — this year.

The municipal election impacts many though not all Mississippians. Country dwellers will have no reason to go to the polls this year except for a few special elections. But in most Mississippi municipalities, the offices for mayor and city council/board of aldermen are up for election this year.

Jackson, the state’s largest and capital city, has perhaps the most high profile runoff election in which state Sen. John Horhn is challenging incumbent Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba in the Democratic primary.

Mississippi has been electing its governors in odd years for a long time. The 1890 Mississippi Constitution set the election for governor for 1895 and “every four years thereafter.”

There is an argument that the constant elections in Mississippi wears out voters, creating apathy resulting in lower voter turnout compared to some other states.

Turnout in presidential elections is normally lower in Mississippi than the nation as a whole. In 2024, despite the strong support for Republican Donald Trump in the state, 57.5% of registered voters went to the polls in Mississippi compared to the national average of 64%, according to the United States Elections Project.

In addition, Mississippi Today political reporter Taylor Vance theorizes that the odd year elections for state and local officials prolonged the political control for Mississippi Democrats. By 1948, Mississippians had started to vote for a candidate other than the Democrat for president. Mississippians began to vote for other candidates — first third party candidates and then Republicans — because of the national Democratic Party’s support of civil rights.

But because state elections were in odd years, it was easier for Mississippi Democrats to distance themselves from the national Democrats who were not on the ballot and win in state and local races.

In the modern Mississippi political environment, though, Republicans win most years — odd or even, state or federal elections. But Democrats will fare better this year in municipal elections than they do in most other contests in Mississippi, where the elections come fast and often.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Mississippi Today

On this day in 1977, Alex Haley awarded Pulitzer for ‘Roots’

Published

1 day ago

April 19, 2025

Staff Editor

On this day in 1977, Alex Haley awarded Pulitzer for 'Roots'

mississippitoday.org – @MSTODAYnews – 2025-04-19 07:00:00

by Jerry Mitchell, Mississippi Today
April 19, 2025

April 19, 1977

Alex Haley was awarded a special Pulitzer Prize for “Roots,” which was also adapted for television.

Network executives worried that the depiction of the brutality of the slave experience might scare away viewers. Instead, 130 million Americans watched the epic miniseries, which meant that 85% of U.S. households watched the program.

The miniseries received 36 Emmy nominations and won nine. In 2016, the History Channel, Lifetime and A&E remade the miniseries, which won critical acclaim and received eight Emmy nominations.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.