Mississippi Today
Secretary of State candidates vow sweeping campaign finance reform, enforcement
NESHOBA COUNTY FAIR — Incumbent Republican Secretary of State Michael Watson on Thursday vowed to reform Mississippi’s lax campaign finance and lobbying reporting and nearly nonexistent enforcement of laws if reelected.
He also vowed in his Neshoba County Fair speech to do away with politicians’ “legacy” campaign finance accounts — money still held in accounts under pre-2018 rules that allowed politicians to spend campaign money however they want and pocket the money when they leave office.
Watson’s Democratic opponent, Shuwaski Young, on Thursday at the fair also called for campaign finance reform, as did incumbent Republican Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann on Wednesday.
This statewide election cycle has seen several claims of campaign finance law or reporting requirement violations. It has also shown what appears to be a reluctance by Attorney General Lynn Fitch – the only statewide officer with clear authority to enforce campaign finance laws – to address or investigate complaints.
Mississippi’s campaign finance, lobbying and ethics laws and reporting requirements are weak, and contained in a piecemealed patchwork of confusing – some conflicting – laws passed over many years. The secretary of state’s office and Ethics Commission have for years said they lack enforcement or investigative authority. Most often, campaign finance violations go unchecked, leaving the state political system open to the corrosive influence of special interest money.
Mississippi’s system also lacks transparency. For instance, unlike all neighboring states, Mississippi’s campaign finance reports are not electronically searchable. They are PDF files, and some politicians still submit hand-written reports. One in recent years submitted hers in calligraphy.
Both Watson and Young have vowed to have electronically submitted and searchable campaign finance records.
Watson on Thursday said he is not seeking more responsibility or power for his office, but that he would take enforcement authority if no one else will, and lawmakers approve. He appeared to take a shot at incumbent AG Fitch in his statements.
“I want to be very clear here: I do not want more responsibility and I’m not seeking more power,” Watson said. “But when people do not do their jobs, I will stand in the gap for Mississippians.”
Watson called politicians’ grandfathered campaign accounts from pre-2018 “retirement accounts, golden nest eggs” and said they should be abolished. Mississippi’s old system of allowing politicians to pocket campaign money was called “legalized bribery.” Lawmakers passed some reforms in 2017 after two years of arguing, but grandfathered money held separately in old accounts, which allows politicians to keep the money when they leave office. Gov. Tate Reeves has such a legacy account, which contains about $1.9 million, which he could keep after he leaves office.
Last year, Reeves vetoed an effort by lawmakers to give the secretary of state’s office authority to levy civil penalties against candidates or political committees that fail to file campaign finance reports.
Young on Thursday noted that the portal for candidates to file campaign finance reports online is currently broken – during the busy statewide election season.
“We need a campaign finance system we can count on,” Young said. He also called for numerous election reforms to make voting and registration easier.
Hosemann, who has filed campaign finance complaints against his lieutenant governor’s race opponent Chris McDaniel that appear to be going unaddressed by Fitch, on Wednesday said lawmakers will likely tackle reform if such laws are going unenforced.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
On this day in 1865
Dec. 24, 1865
Months after the fall of the Confederacy and the end of slavery, a half dozen veterans of the Confederate Army formed a private social club in Pulaski, Tennessee, called the Ku Klux Klan. The KKK soon became a terrorist organization, brutalizing and killing Black Americans, immigrants, sympathetic whites and others.
While the first wave of the KKK operated in the South through the 1870s, the second wave spread throughout the U.S., adding Catholics, Jews and others to their enemies’ list. Membership rose to 4 million or so.
The KKK returned again in the 1950s and 1960s, this time in opposition to the civil rights movement. Despite the history of violence by this organization, the federal government has yet to declare the KKK a terrorist organization.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
An old drug charge sent her to prison despite a life transformation. Now Georgia Sloan is home
CANTON – Georgia Sloan is home, back from a potentially life-derailing stint in prison that she was determined to instead make meaningful.
She hadn’t used drugs in three years and she had a life waiting for her outside the Mississippi Correctional Institute for Women in Pearl: a daughter she was trying to reunite with, a sick mother and a career where she found purpose.
During 10 months of incarceration, Sloan, who spent over half of her life using drugs, took classes, read her Bible and helped other women. Her drug possession charge was parole eligible, and the Parole Board approved her for early release.
At the end of October, she left the prison and returned to Madison County. The next day she was back at work at Musee, a Canton-based bath products company that employs formerly incarcerated women like Sloan and others in the community facing difficulties. She first started working at the company in 2021.
“This side of life is so beautiful. I would literally hold on to my promise every single minute of the day while I was in (prison),” Sloan told Mississippi Today in December.
Next year, she is moving into a home in central Mississippi, closer to work and her new support system. Sloan plans to bring her daughter and mother to live with her. Sloan is hopeful of regaining custody of her child, who has been cared for by her aunt on a temporary basis.
“This is my area now,” she said. “This has become my family, my life. This is where I want my child to grow up. This is where I want to make my life because this is my life.”
Additionally, Sloan is taking other steps to readjust to life after prison: getting her driver’s license for the first time in over a decade, checking in monthly with her parole officer and paying court-ordered fines and restitution.
In December 2023, Sloan went to court in Columbus for an old drug possession charge from when she was still using drugs.
Sloan thought the judge would see how much she had turned her life around through Crossroads Ministries, a nonprofit women’s reentry center she entered in 2021, and Musee. Her boss Leisha Pickering who drove her to court and spoke as a witness on Sloan’s behalf, thought the judge would order house arrest or time served.
Instead, Circuit Judge James Kitchens sentenced her to eight years with four years suspended and probation.
He seemed doubtful about her transformation, saying she didn’t have a “contrite heart.” By choosing to sell drugs, Kitchens said she was “(making) other people addicts,” according to a transcript of the Dec. 4, 2023, hearing.
“I felt like my life literally crumbled before my eyes,” Sloan said about her return to prison. “Everything I had worked so hard for, it felt like it had been snatched from me.”
She was taken from the courtroom to the Lowndes County Detention Center, where she spent two months before her transfer to the women’s prison in Rankin County.
Sloan found the county jail more difficult because there was no separation between everyone there. But the prison had its own challenges, such as violence between inmates and access to drugs, which would have threatened her sobriety.
She kept busy by taking classes, which helped her set a goal to take college courses one day with a focus on business. Visits, phone calls and letters from family members and staff from Musee and Crossroads were her lifeline.
“I did not let prison break me, I rose above it, and I got to help restore other ladies,” Sloan said.
She also helped several women in the prison get to Crossroads – the same program that helped her and others at Musee.
Sloan credits a long-term commitment to Crossroads and Musee for turning her life around – the places where she said someone believed in her and took a chance on her.
Pickering, Musee’s CEO, said in the three years she’s known Sloan, she’s watched her grow and become a light for others.
The bath and lifestyle company has employed over 300 formerly incarcerated women in the past dozen years, but Pickering said not everyone has had the same support, advocacy and transformation as Sloan. Regardless, Pickering believes each person is worth fighting for.
When Sloan isn’t traveling for work to craft markets with Pickering, she shares an office with her Musee colleague Julie Crutcher, who is also formerly incarcerated and a graduate of Crossroads’ programs. She also considers Crutcher a close friend and mentor.
Sloan has traveled to Columbus to see her mother and daughter whom she spent Thanksgiving with. She will see them again for Christmas and celebrate her daughter’s 12th birthday the day after.
Her involvement with the criminal justice system has made Sloan want to advocate for prison reform to help others and be an inspiration to others.
“I never knew what I was capable of,” Sloan said. “I never knew how much people truly, genuinely love me and love being around me. I never knew how much I could have and how much I could offer the world.”
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
On this day in 1946
Dec. 23, 1946
University of Tennessee refused to play a basketball game with Duquesne University, because they had a Black player, Chuck Cooper. Despite their refusal, the all-American player and U.S. Navy veteran went on to become the first Black player to participate in a college basketball game south of the Mason-Dixon line. Cooper became the first Black player ever drafted in the NBA — drafted by the Boston Celtics. He went on to be admitted to the Basketball Hall of Fame.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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