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State Republican Party raises fees for candidates to run for some public offices

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If Mississippians want to qualify to run for state office as a Republican, they’ll first have to open their wallets wider than ever.

Mississippi Republican Party leaders voted last year to increase candidate qualifying fees, the amount a candidate has to pay to run for office, to the maximum amount allowed under state law for all federal, statewide and regional offices in the state.  

Mississippi GOP Chairman Frank Bordeaux told Mississippi Today the fee increase is comparable to the figure the Republican Party in other states requires for their candidates to run for office.

“This increase is a way for us to make sure we can continue to provide quality resources to our Republican nominees,” Bordeaux said.

The Democratic Party, on the other hand, opted to keep their fees the same as prior years.

Qualifying fees for all political offices, regardless of party affiliation, were previously spelled out in statute. But state lawmakers in 2022 voted to give political parties a range for how much they can charge candidates and allow the party leaders to choose the specific amount.

The minimum fee parties can charge gubernatorial candidates, for example, is $1,000, and the maximum amount is $5,000. The Democratic Party opted to keep their fee at $1,000, while the GOP decided to raise the fee to $5,000.

New GOP candidate qualifying fees:

  • U.S. Senator: $5,000 (previously $1,000)
  • U.S. Representative: $2,500 (previously $500)
  • Governor: $5,000 (previously $1,000)
  • Other statewide offices: $2,500 (previously $500)
  • Transportation Commissioner: $2,500 (previously $500)
  • Public Service Commissioner: $2,500 (previously $500)
  • District Attorney: $250 (unchanged)
  • State Legislature: $250 (unchanged)

Republican state Sen. Joey Fillingane of Sumrall argued in favor of the 2022 legislation during the legislative session and said at the time that the main reasons for the new law was to give parties more latitude to conduct their primary elections and ensure only serious candidates run for office.

“I think we had a situation not too long ago where maybe a truck driver put his name on the ballot, didn’t campaign, didn’t really run,” Fillingane said. “He was running his 18-wheeler truck and ended up winning a major party primary for a major office in Mississippi. And I think you can argue that was a direct result of having extremely low filing fees in that particular race.”

Fillingane was referring to Robert Gray, a truck driver who won the 2015 Democratic nomination for governor and was handily defeated by former Republican Gov. Phil Bryant.

Opponents of the recent legislation believed higher qualifying fees could bar candidates from running for office and deter a competitive democratic system.

The final version of the bill passed the House 84-31 and the Senate 33-10. Republican Gov. Tate Reeves signed it into law.

Bordeaux doubted increased fees would keep candidates from entering the Republican primary because serious candidates are usually able to raise larger amounts of money. He pointed to the state’s recent gubernatorial election, when the Republican and Democratic nominees for the office collectively raised over $17 million this past year. 

This is now the first time under the new law that the state Republican Party has raised its qualifying fees. The new fees will primarily impact the Mississippi’s U.S. Senate race next year, when incumbent U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker is up for reelection. 

Wicker, a Tupelo resident, has previously announced he’s running for reelection. But two lower-profile candidates, Republican state Rep. Dan Eubanks of DeSoto County and retired Marine Col. Ghannon Burton, announced they intend to challenge Wicker in the Republican primary. 

The qualification period for the U.S. Senate, according to the Secretary of State’s website, opens on Jan. 2 and closes 10 days later on Jan. 12. 

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

Mississippi Today

On this day in 1865

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mississippitoday.org – Jerry Mitchell – 2024-12-24 07:00:00

Dec. 24, 1865

The Ku Klux Klan began on Christmas Eve in 1865. Credit: Zinn Education Project

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.

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Mississippi Today

An old drug charge sent her to prison despite a life transformation. Now Georgia Sloan is home

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mississippitoday.org – Mina Corpuz – 2024-12-24 04:00:00

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. 

Circuit Judge James “Jim” Kitchens of the 16th District.

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. 

Georgia Sloan, left, and Leisha Pickering, founder and CEO of Musee Bath, sit for a portrait at the Musee Bath facility in Canton, Miss., on Wednesday, Dec. 11, 2024. Pickering has supported Sloan through her journey of recovery and reentry, providing employment and advocacy as Sloan rebuilds her life after incarceration. Credit: Eric Shelton/Mississippi Today

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.

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On this day in 1946

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mississippitoday.org – Jerry Mitchell – 2024-12-23 07:00:00

Dec. 23, 1946

Chuck Cooper Credit: Wikipedia

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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