Mississippi Today
Unlike Reeves in 2020, Presley accepted election math on Nov. 7
Despite election problems in Democratic-voter rich Hinds County, Brandon Presley did not delay his concession speech to incumbent Republican Gov. Tate Reeves on the night of Nov. 7.
Reeves has not been as quick in the past to accept election results. In 2020, Reeves cast doubt on the loss by Republican incumbent President Donald Trump despite more than 60 court cases, many decided by judges appointed by Trump, validating the election and despite the election results being confirmed by numerous Republican state officials throughout the country.
Still, Reeves and other Mississippi election officials argued that the election was not secure and fair in states Trump lost, even though those states operated under the same rules as states that Trump won.
On social media in 2020, Reeves said: โa safe and fair election here in Mississippi โ not upended by last minute schemes to radically alter voting methods. Election integrity is vital.โ
Just as the math โ and remember, Reeves says he is “a numbers guy” โ confirmed Trump’s defeat in 2020, the math also confirmed Presley’s loss on Nov. 7.
Presley could have cited Hinds County election problems as a reason not to concede. But he did not. And that has proven to be the right decision.
Even if the Democrat Presley had garnered the level of support in Hinds County as Barack Obama did in 2012, he still would not have had enough votes to defeat Reeves.
In 2012, Obama received 76,112 votes in Hinds County โ the most ever for a candidate there โ in his successful presidential reelection campaign. On Nov. 7, Presley won 54,006 votes in Hinds County โ 22,106 votes less than Obama garnered in 2012. Reeves defeated Presley by 26,619 votes, meaning an Obama level of support in Hinds would not have put Presley over the top statewide.
The vote in Hinds County is important for a couple of reasons.
First of all, it is the state’s largest county and by far the biggest base of support for Democrats.
Second of all, there were numerous election problems in Hinds County on Nov. 7. Multiple precincts โ at least eight, reportedlyย โย ran out of ballots. There were reports of people leaving after waiting in lines for hours and, in some cases, not being able to vote at all.
It is difficult to believe that Presley, despite his and his team’s effort to get supporters to the polls, could have outdistanced the turnout Obama received in 2012. It was a watershed year in terms of turnout for Mississippi Democrats.
Granted, if Presley got all the votes that Obama received in Hinds County in 2012 and Reeves did not garner all the votes that Republican Mitt Romney won that year in Hinds County, there would have been a runoff election. Remember, Obama got 22,106 votes more than Presley in Hinds County. Presley came up only 15,466 votes short of what was needed to force a runoff. But it is unlikely to believe that Presley could match Obama numbers in Hinds County for a number of reasons, including the fact the county has lost significant population since 2012. The U.S. Census Bureau reported Hinds had a 4.4 % population loss during just a two-year period from 2020 to 2022. Numerous studies highlight much larger losses since 2010.
We will never know for sure how many people did not vote in Hinds County because of the election problems, but it is safe to say the numbers were not enough to cost Presley the election or even the chance of a runoff.
It also should be pointed out that the people running the elections in Hinds County are locally elected Democrats. The problems that occurred were unfortunate. But it is reasonable to assume they were not intentionally sabotaging Presley.
Going back a few years, it can be and has been mathematically proven that local Democratic officials did cost Democratic nominee Al Gore the White House in 2000.
The infamous butterfly ballot was designed by Democrats and used in Democratic-controlled Palm Beach County Florida. In that county, many people โ 15,000 or more โ thought they were voting for Gore, but accidentally voted for Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan because of the confusing design of the ballot or voted for both Gore and Buchanan causing the ballot to be disqualified.
In an interview just after the election, Buchanan admitted, “When I took one look at that ballot on election night โฆย it’s very easy for me to see how someone could have voted for me in the belief they voted for Al Gore.”
Gore lost Florida and thus the White House by 537 votes.
Despite that math, Gore conceded.
Presley did the same on Nov. 7.
Reeves and other Mississippi elected officials did not in 2020.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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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: โIt was a well-known fact that in 1875 nearly every Democratic club in the State was converted into an armed military company.โ
A federal grand jury concluded: โFraud, intimidation, and violence perpetrated at the last election is without a parallel in the annals of history.โ
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
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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 โoverly broadโ 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 โfederal intrusion into RDC’s budgetโ โ 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.ย
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.
โBut 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,โ 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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