Mississippi Today
How to watch the Mississippi governor’s race results like a political pro
Mississippians cast their votes Tuesday in the contentious governor’s race between Gov. Tate Reeves and Democratic challenger Brandon Presley.
Independent candidate Gwendolyn Gray, who dropped out of the race in early October, withdrew too late to be removed from the ballot. Her candidacy could force the first gubernatorial runoff in the state’s history.
Mississippi Today’s political team compiled key themes to watch tonight as the results come in.
LIVE RESULTS: Mississippi’s general election 2023
Will there be a runoff?
Pre-election polling from both Democrats and Republicans showed Reeves right at or just under earning 50% of the vote. If Gray, the independent candidate, earned enough of a protest vote on Tuesday, the top two vote-getters will face each other in a Nov. 28 runoff election.
The number to watch here is between 3% and 4%. One Republican consultant shared with Mississippi Today that they believe if Gray gets at least 3% of the overall statewide vote, it could be enough to keep Reeves or Presley under 50% and force a runoff. A second Republican consultant said it may take 4% support for Gray to force a runoff.
In 2019, there were two third-party candidates who ran against Reeves, the Republican nominee, and Jim Hood, the Democratic nominee. Together, those two third-party candidates only garnered 1.3% of the overall vote.
Did Reeves get enough conservative support?
Reeves this cycle notably struggled with firing up voters of the Republican Party’s most conservative wing.
If counties that are considered conservative strongholds turn out in numbers equal to or better than 2019, this could be a sign that Reeves has weathered struggles with GOP voter enthusiasm.
Jones County, considered by many the state’s capital of the far-right conservative movement, is a bellwether here. In 2019, Reeves earned 13,784 votes in Jones County — 65% of the county’s total 21,257 residents who cast ballots. If Reeves gets anything less than 13,784 votes today, that could be a sign of lower-than-needed conservative support.
Pearl River County, another strongly conservative locale, is another to watch. In 2019, Reeves earned 10,083 votes here — 77% of the county’s total 13,151 residents who cast ballots. It looks like 10,000 is the magic number for Reeves here, and anything less could show broader problems among Mississippi conservatives.
Did Presley get enough Black voter support?
Presley, if he has any chance of winning or forcing Reeves to a runoff, needs high levels of Black voter support. He has spent 2023 earnestly trying to earn that support, and numerous Black local elected officials have served as his surrogate for months.
Hinds County, of course, is the most critical county in this regard. It’s the most populous county in the state, and it’s 69% Black. In 2019, Hood, the Democrat, beat Reeves here by 56 points (78% to 22%). Hood beat Reeves in Hinds County by 40,527 votes — by far the largest head-to-head defeat in that election.
If Presley has upped that Hinds County margin of victory today, that could be enough to vault the Democrat’s campaign.
Of major note in Hinds County tonight: There were reports of at least nine precincts across the county that ran out of ballots at various points during the day. Multiple lawsuits were filed attempting to extend precinct hours, and less than an hour before the schedule 7 p.m. polling close time, a chancery judge extended the hours at some precincts.
The Gulf Coast battleground
The populous three counties of the Gulf Coast, by many accounts, secured Reeves’ victory in 2019 as he ran up a more than 22,400 vote margin over Hood. Reeves’ margin of victory in those three counties was about half of his overall margin of victory statewide.
Reeves topped Hood by 18 points in the second-most populous Harrison County. The Coast is a Republican stronghold, but even by that measure Hood performed poorly in turning out Coast Democrats.
Presley and his campaign have worked hard on the Coast, and focused on turning out Black voters in North Gulfport and Turkey Creek in Harrison County, Moss Point in Jackson County, and other relatively large Democratic areas.
Presley stands little chance of winning the Republican-majority Coast, but if he can substantially reduce Reeves’ margin there he can remain competitive statewide.
How do suburban voters swing?
Presley’s campaign has also targeted voters in suburban counties that typically vote Republican but have trended more toward Democrats in recent years.
In 2019, Reeves shellacked Hood by 23 points — or nearly 8,600 votes — in the state’s third-most populous DeSoto County. While DeSoto remains strongly Republican leaning, its growing population has shifted to include a larger Black voting age population more likely to vote Democratic. Plus, Presley has performed well there in his district runs for Public Service Commissioner, and his campaign this cycle has focused much effort, including a get-out-the-vote ground game, in DeSoto County. It’s highly unlikely Presley could win DeSoto, but cutting losses drastically compared to those Hood suffered there would be something of a victory in an area where Reeves ran up his margin four years ago.
Rankin County, Reeves’ home county and the largest suburban county in the Jackson metro, is another one to watch. In 2019, Reeves won 29,861 votes in Rankin County — 64% of the county’s total 46,654 residents who cast ballots. Presley likely has no hopes of flipping this county, but watch for a smaller Reeves margin of victory in Rankin County. If the margin is less than 16,793 votes, that could be a sign that Presley’s strategy to appeal to moderates worked some.
Staying in the Jackson metro area, don’t forget about Madison County, which was a bright spot for Democrats in 2019. Hood garnered 19,670 votes or 50.4% to become the first Democrat since 1987 to win Madison County. Reeves won 48.7% of the vote in 2019. If Presley expects to win or force a runoff, he needs to at least match Hood’s performance from 2019.
Presley’s northeast Mississippi home
Another county to watch closely that could signal suburban voter support: Lee County in northeast Mississippi.
In the early 2000s, Presley served as mayor of Nettleton, which is situated on the Lee County/Monroe County line. To be successful, Presley needs to do much better in his backyard of Lee County, the most populous county in the area, than Hood did in 2019. Even though Hood is from Chickasaw County, which is contiguous to Lee, he was still swamped by Reeves in Lee County four years ago. In 2019, Reeves captured 14,672 votes or 58.3% in Lee to 10,293 or 40.9% for Hood.
Presley might not need to win Lee County to win or force a runoff, but he needs to do much better than Hood did in 2019. Needless to say, Presley needs to outperform Hood’s 2019 effort throughout northeast Mississippi.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
Central, south Mississippi voters will decide judicial runoffs on Tuesday
Some Mississippi voters head to the polls Tuesday to decide who should represent them on the state’s highest courts.
Polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Tuesday. Absentee voting has begun, and in-person absentee voting at county circuit clerk’s offices ends at noon on Saturday.
In the Jackson Metro area and parts of central Mississippi, incumbent Supreme Court Justice Jim Kitchens will compete against Republican state Sen. Jenifer Branning of Neshoba County. In areas on the Gulf Coast, Jennifer Schloegel and Amy St. Pé will face each other for an open seat on the Court of Appeals.
Candidates for judicial offices in Mississippi are technically nonpartisan, but political parties and trade associations often contribute money to candidates and cut ads for them, which has increasingly made them almost as partisan as other campaigns.
In the Central District Supreme Court race, GOP forces are working to oust Kitchens, one of the dwindling number of centrist jurists on the high Court. Conservative leaders also realize Kitchens is next in line to lead the court as chief justice should current Chief Justice Mike Randolph step down.
Kitchens is one of two centrist members of the high court and is widely viewed as the preferred candidate of Democrats, though the Democratic Party has not endorsed his candidacy.
Kitchens, first elected to the court in 2008, is a former district attorney and private-practice lawyer. On the campaign trail, he has pointed to his experience as an attorney and judge, particularly his years prosecuting criminals and his rulings on criminal cases.
In an interview on Mississippi Today’s ‘The Other Side’ podcast, Kitchens said his opponent, who primarily practices real estate law, would be at a “significant disadvantage” because the state Supreme Court often reviews criminal cases and major civil lawsuits that are sent to them on appeal.
“I’m sure she has an academic knowledge about the circuit courts that she perhaps learned in law school or perhaps has been to some seminars, but she does not have the hands-on trial experience that I have,” Kitchens said. “And that’s so important to the work that I do.”
Branning, a private-practice attorney, was first elected to the Legislature in 2015. She has led the Senate Elections and Transportation committees. During her time at the Capitol, she has been one of the more conservative members of the Senate leadership, voting against changing the state flag to remove the Confederate battle emblem, voting against expanding Medicaid to the working poor and supporting mandatory and increased minimum sentences for crime.
While campaigning for the judicial seat, she has pledged to ensure that “conservative values” are always represented in the judiciary, but she has stopped short of endorsing policy positions — which Mississippi judicial candidates are prohibited from doing.
Branning declined an invitation to appear on Mississippi Today’s podcast.
“Mississippians need and deserve Supreme Court justices that are constitutionally conservative in nature,” Branning said in a recent interview with radio station SuperTalk Mississippi. “And by that, I mean justices that simply follow the law. They do not add or take away.”
The two candidates have collectively raised around $187,00 and spent $182,00 during the final stretch of the campaign, according to campaign finance reports filed with the Secretary of State’s office.
Since she initially qualified in January, Branning has raised the most amount of money at $879,871, with $250,000 of that money coming from a loan she gave her campaign. She spent around $730,000 of that money. Several third party groups have supported her campaign.
Kitchens has raised around $514,00 since he qualified for reelection. He’s spent roughly $436,000 of that money, and some of his top contributors have been trial attorneys.
For the open Court of Appeals seat, Schloegel and St Pe, two influential names on the Gulf Coast, are working to turn out their voters in a close election.
Schloegel is a Chancery Court judge in Harrison, Hancock and Stone counties. St. Pé is an attorney in private practice, a municipal court judge in Gautier, and a city attorney for Moss Point.
Schloegel has raised roughly $214,000 since she qualified, and has spent almost that same amount of money this election cycle. St. Pé has raised around $480,000 this year and spent approximately $438,067 during that timeframe.
Whoever wins the race, it ensures that a woman will fill the open seat. After the election, half of the judges on the 10-member appellate court will be women, the most number of women who have served on the court at one time.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
On this day in 1961
Nov. 22, 1961
Five Black students, made up of NAACP Youth Council members and two SNCC volunteers from Albany State College, were arrested after entering the white waiting room of the Trailways station in Albany, Georgia.
The council members bonded out of jail, but the SNCC volunteers, Bertha Gober and Blanton Hall declined bail and “chose to remain in jail over the holidays to dramatize their demand for justice,” according to SNCC Digital Gateway. The president of Albany State College expelled them.
Gober became one of SNCC’s Freedom Singers and wrote the song, “We’ll Never Turn Back,” after the 1961 killing of Herbert Lee in Mississippi. The tune became SNCC’s anthem.
After her release from jail, Gober joined other students, and police arrested her and other demonstrators. Back in the same jail, she sang to the police chief and mayor to open the cells, “I hear God’s children praying in jail, ‘Freedom, freedom, freedom.’”
Albany State suspended another student, Bernice Reagon, after she joined SNCC. She poured herself into the civil rights movement and later formed the Grammy-nominated a cappella group Sweet Honey in the Rock to educate and empower the audience and community.
“When I opened my mouth and began to sing, there was a force and power within myself I had never heard before,” a power she said she did not know she had.
Other members of the Freedom Singers included Cordell Reagon, Bernice Johnson, Dorothy Vallis, Rutha Harris, Bernard Lafayette and Charles Neblett. On the third anniversary of the sit-in movement in 1963, they performed at Carnegie Hall.
“This is a singing movement,” SNCC leader James Forman told a reporter. “The songs help. Without them, it would be ugly.”
Today, the Albany Civil Rights Institute houses exhibits on these protesters, Martin Luther King Jr. and others who joined the Albany Movement.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
IHL deletes the word ‘diversity’ from its policies
The governing board of Mississippi’s public universities voted Thursday to delete the word “diversity” from several policies, including a requirement that the board evaluate university presidents on campus diversity outcomes.
Though the Legislature has not passed a bill targeting diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives in higher education, the Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees approved the changes “in order to ensure continued compliance with state and federal law,” according to the board book.
The move comes on the heels of the re-election of former President Donald Trump and after several universities in Mississippi have renamed their diversity offices. Earlier this year, the IHL board approved changes to the University of Southern Mississippi’s mission and vision statements that removed the words “diverse” and “inclusiveness.”
In an email, John Sewell, IHL’s communications director, did not respond to several questions about the policy changes but wrote that the board’s goal was to “reinforce our commitment to ensuring students have access to the best education possible, supported by world-class faculty and staff.”
“The end goal is to support all students, and to make sure they graduate fully prepared to enter the workforce, hopefully in Mississippi,” Sewell added.
On Thursday, trustees approved the changes without discussion after a first reading by Harold Pizzetta, the associate commissioner for legal affairs and risk management. But Sewell wrote in an email that the board discussed the policy amendments in open session two months ago during its retreat in Meridian, more than an hour away from the board’s normal meeting location in Jackson.
IHL often uses these retreats, which unlike its regular board meetings aren’t livestreamed and are rarely attended by members of the public outside of the occasional reporter, to discuss potentially controversial policy changes.
Last year, the board had a spirited discussion about a policy change that would have increased its oversight of off-campus programs during its retreat at the White House Hotel in Biloxi. In 2022, during a retreat that also took place in Meridian, trustees discussed changing the board’s tenure policies. At both retreats, a Mississippi Today reporter was the only member of the public to witness the discussions.
The changes to IHL’s diversity policy echo a shift, particularly at colleges and universities in conservative states, from concepts like diversity in favor of “access” and “opportunity.” In higher education, the term “diversity, equity and inclusion” has traditionally referred to a range of efforts to comply with civil rights laws and foster a sense of on-campus belonging among minority populations.
But in recent years, conservative politicians have contended that DEI programs are wasteful spending and racist. A bill to ban state funding for DEI in Mississippi died earlier this year, but at least 10 other states have passed laws seeking to end or restrict such initiatives at state agencies, including publicly funded universities, according to ABC News.
In Mississippi, the word “diversity” first appeared in IHL’s policies in 1998. The diversity statement was adopted in 2005 and amended in 2013.
The board’s vote on Thursday turned the diversity statement, which was deleted in its entirety, into a “statement on higher education access and success” according to the board book.
“One of the strengths of Mississippi is the diversity of its people,” the diversity statement read. “This diversity enriches higher education and contributes to the capacity that our students develop for living in a multicultural and interdependent world.”
Significantly, the diversity statement required the IHL board to evaluate the university presidents and the higher learning commissioner on diversity outcomes.
The statement also included system-wide goals — some of which it is unclear if the board has achieved — to increase the enrollment and graduation rates of minority students, employ more underrepresented faculty, staff and administrators, and increase the use of minority-owned contractors and vendors.
Sewell did not respond to questions about if IHL has met those goals or if the board will continue to evaluate presidents on diversity outcomes.
In the new policy, those requirements were replaced with two paragraphs about the importance of respectful dialogue on campus and access to higher education for all Mississippians.
“We encourage all members of the academic community to engage in respectful, meaningful discourse with the aim of promoting critical thinking in the pursuit of knowledge, a deeper understanding of the human condition, and the development of character,” the new policy reads. “All students should be supported in their educational journey through programming and services designed to have a positive effect on their individual academic performance, retention, and graduation.”
Also excised was a policy that listed common characteristics of universities in Mississippi, including “a commitment to ethnic and gender diversity,” among others. Another policy on institutional scholarships was also edited to remove a clause that required such programs to “promote diversity.”
“IHL is committed to higher education access and success among all populations to assist the state of Mississippi in meeting its enrollment and degree completion goals, as well as building a highly-skilled workforce,” the institutional scholarship policy now reads.
The board also approved a change that requires the universities to review their institutional mission statements on an annual basis.
A policy on “planning principles” will continue to include the word “diverse,” and a policy that states the presidential search advisory committees will “be representative in terms of diversity” was left unchanged.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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