Mississippi Today
Gov. Tate Reeves’ lonely last stand against Medicaid expansion
One year ago, Gov. Tate Reeves continued his years of steadfast defiance against Medicaid expansion and delivered a plea to his fellow Republican legislative leaders.
“Don’t simply cave under the pressure of Democrats and their allies in the media who are pushing for the expansion of Obamacare, welfare, and socialized medicine,” Reeves said in his January 2023 State of the State address. “You have my word that if you stand up to the left’s push for endless government-run healthcare, I will stand with you.”
Later today, Reeves will again deliver his annual State of the State address. But this year, he will be standing mostly alone in that fight. It very well could be his final stand.
Much to the governor’s chagrin, the very GOP legislative leaders he pleaded with last year are well underway this year in their push to pass Medicaid expansion — a policy that would have a profound effect on countless Mississippians, their families and their communities. Yes, there are a handful of anti-expansion Republicans in both the House and Senate, but whether Reeves can whip anywhere close to the number of votes needed to block it is in real question.
Medicaid expansion, which Republican Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann and Republican House Speaker Jason White are ushering this session, would provide health coverage to between 200,000 and 250,000 poor, working Mississippians and bring in more than $1 billion in additional federal funds to the state each year.
Proponents say the policy would save the lives and livelihoods of countless Mississippians and provide hospitals with a cash boon that could help them keep their doors open. Opponents such as Reeves have decried the policy as “welfare expansion” and, despite dozens of economic studies that say otherwise, maintain the state cannot afford the state match.
Last week, the two legislative leaders — and the Medicaid committee chairs they appointed — remained unmoved by Reeves’ criticism about their pursuit of the policy.
“My position’s been pretty clear on the fact that we were going to explore and look at Medicaid as it affects hard-working, low-income Mississippians,” House Speaker Jason White told Mississippi Today. “My ideas and thoughts about that haven’t changed. He’s the duly elected governor and he’s certainly entitled to his opinions on that matter. I don’t hold any of those against him. We just maybe here in the House have a different view of it.”
No matter how hard Reeves fights back, the GOP legislative leaders pushing an expansion plan this year are not caving to Democrats or the media. They are seeking to help Mississippians of all backgrounds who have long struggled to keep their families healthy. They are responding to small town hospital leaders and business owners who are begging for a life-saving shot in the arm. They are trying to create solutions for our state’s dismal labor participation rate. They are modeling the success of 40 others states — including many GOP-controlled — where Medicaid expansion has unequivocally saved lives.
And, without question, many of the lawmakers know Medicaid expansion is a wildly popular public policy.
The vast majority of Mississippians want it. Business leaders want it, mayors want it, and hospital leaders want it. Republican voters want it, and Democratic voters want it. Big-time Republican donors want it. Health care organizations like the Mississippi State Medical Association, Mississippi Hospital Association, American Cancer Society, and the American Heart Association want it. A majority of legislative Republicans want it, and all legislative Democrats want it. The Republican lieutenant governor wants it, and the Republican speaker wants it.
But Tate Reeves doesn’t. And his last-stand defiance could define his legacy.
The governor has more policy staffers inside the Capitol this year than in his first term, and whether they can convince enough GOP lawmakers to stand with the governor could become the biggest question of the 2024 legislative session.
If legislative leaders do advance and pass an expansion proposal as expected, Reeves could veto the bill. To override his veto would require a two-thirds vote of both the House and the Senate chambers. The mad scramble to whip and wrangle votes during those few days would be unmatched by any legislative moment of Reeves’ governorship.
Many Capitol observers will be listening intently to the governor’s State of the State speech Monday evening. Hosemann and White will be sitting closely behind the governor’s podium, and how they respond to any renewed pleas or perhaps even attacks on their work will be very telling about the days and weeks to come.
To be sure, Reeves doesn’t seem to have much support right now where it matters most. Tonight, at least in his opposition to Medicaid expansion, he’ll be standing mostly alone.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
On this day in 1875
Nov. 2, 1875
The first Mississippi Plan, which included violence against Black Americans to keep them from voting, resulted in huge victories for white Democrats across the state.
A year earlier, the Republican Party had carried a majority of the votes, and many Black Mississippians had been elected to office. In the wake of those victories, white leagues arose to challenge Republican rule and began to use widespread violence and fraud to recapture control of the state.
Over several days in September 1875, about 50 Black Mississippians were killed along with white supporters, including a school teacher who worked with the Black community in Clinton.
The governor asked President Ulysses Grant to intervene, but he decided against intervening, and the violence and fraud continued. Other Southern states soon copied the Mississippi plan.
John R. Lynch, the last Black congressman for Mississippi until the 1986 election of Mike Espy, wrote: “It was a well-known fact that in 1875 nearly every Democratic club in the State was converted into an armed military company.”
A federal grand jury concluded: “Fraud, intimidation, and violence perpetrated at the last election is without a parallel in the annals of history.”
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
Mississippi Today’s NewsMatch Campaign is Here: Support Journalism that Strengthens Mississippi
High-quality journalism like ours depends on reader support; without it, we simply couldn’t exist. That’s why we’re proud to join the NewsMatch movement, a national initiative aimed at raising $50 million for nonprofit newsrooms that serve communities like ours here in Mississippi, where access to reliable information has often been limited.
In a time when trusted journalists and media sources are disappearing, we believe the stakes couldn’t be higher. Without on-the-ground, trustworthy reporting, civic engagement suffers, accountability falters and corruption often goes unaddressed. But it doesn’t have to be this way.
Here at Mississippi Today we act as watchdogs, holding those in power accountable, and as storytellers, giving a platform to voices that have been ignored for too long. And we’re committed to keeping our stories free for everyone because information should be accessible when it’s needed most.
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We’ll examine what’s at stake if local newsrooms lose press freedoms and will discuss how you, as members of the public, can help protect it. This event is open to Mississippi Today and Verite News members as a special thank-you for supporting local journalism and standing with us in this mission. Donate today to RSVP!
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This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
Hinds County loses fight over control of jail
The Hinds County sheriff and Board of Supervisors have lost an appeal to prevent control of its jail by a court-appointed receiver and an injunction that orders the county to address unconstitutional conditions in the facility.
Two members from a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with decisions by U.S. District Judge Carlton Reeves to appoint a receiver to oversee day-to-day jail operations and keep parts of a previous consent decree in place to fix constitutional violations, including a failure to protect detainees from harm.
However, the appeals court called the new injunction “overly broad” in one area and is asking Reeves to reevaluate the scope of the receivership.
The injunction retained provisions relating to sexual assault, but the appeals court found the provisions were tied to general risk of violence at the jail, rather than specific concerns about the Prison Rape Elimination Act. The court reversed those points of the injunction and remanded them to the district court so the provisions can be removed.
The court also found that the receiver should not have authority over budgeting and staff salaries for the Raymond Detention Center, which could be seen as “federal intrusion into RDC’s budget” – especially if the receivership has no end date.
Hinds County Board of Supervisors President Robert Graham was not immediately available for comment Friday. Sheriff Tyree Jones declined to comment because he has not yet read the entire court opinion.
In 2016, the Department of Justice sued Hinds County alleging a pattern or practice of unconstitutional conditions in four of its detention facilities. The county and DOJ entered a consent decree with stipulated changes to make for the jail system, which holds people facing trial.
“But the decree did not resolve the dispute; to the contrary, a yearslong battle ensued in the district court as to whether and to what extent the County was complying with the consent decree,” the appeals court wrote.
This prompted Reeves to hold the county in contempt of court twice in 2022.
The county argued it was doing its best to comply with the consent decree and spending millions to fix the jail. One of the solutions they offered was building a new jail, which is now under construction in Jackson.
The county had a chance to further prove itself during three weeks of hearings held in February 2022. Focuses included the death of seven detainees in 2021 from assaults and suicide and issues with staffing, contraband, old infrastructure and use of force.
Seeing partial compliance by the county, in April 2022 Reeves dismissed the consent decree and issued a new, shorter injunction focused on the jail and removed some provisions from the decree.
But Reeves didn’t see improvement from there. In July 2022, he ordered receivership and wrote that it was needed because of an ongoing risk of unconstitutional harm to jail detainees and staff.
The county pushed back against federal oversight and filed an appeal, arguing that there isn’t sufficient evidence to show that there are current and ongoing constitutional violations at the jail and that the county has acted with deliberate indifference.
Days before the appointed receiver was set to take control of the jail at the beginning of 2023, the 5th Circuit Court ordered a stay to halt that receiver’s work. The new injunction ordered by Reeves was also stayed, and a three-person jail monitoring team that had been in place for years also was ordered to stop work.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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