Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today

A festive reminder to vote placed at St. John M.B. Church for those traveling the Northside Drive/Medgar Evers Blvd. corridor in Jackson on Tuesday.

Mississippi voters on Tuesday re-elected a U.S. senator, four congressmen and three state Supreme Court justices, and they voted to pass three key ballot initiatives.

Here’s a recap of what happened on Election Day 2020:

• “How long did you have to wait?” Long lines, record turnout became the big story of 2020 Election Day in Mississippi. Mississippi Today reporters filed dispatches from 24 of the state’s counties to tell the story.

• Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith defeated Democrat Mike Espy for a full six-year term. Hyde-Smith barely campaigned this cycle, while Espy was historically well-funded. Hyde-Smith boastfully critiqued Espy from the stage after her win.

• Mississippians voted to adopt a new state flag after the Confederate emblem flew over the state for 126 years. Voters ratified a new state flag design featuring the words “In God We Trust” after the old flag, the last in the nation containing the Confederate battle emblem, was removed by lawmakers earlier this year.

• Mississippians voted to adopt a medical marijuana program. Many state leaders worked hard to oppose it, arguing the program was too broad and the state would become awash in pot. Voters definitively rejected that argument Tuesday, and the program will likely soon be implemented.

• For the first time in the state’s history, voters — not the federal courts — chose to remove a Jim Crow provision from the state constitution. The provision, effectively a state electoral college, dealt with how statewide candidates were elected.

• All four U.S. congressional incumbents — Republicans Trent Kelly, Michael Guest and Steven Palazzo, and Democrat Bennie Thompson — were reelected. Mississippi Supreme Court Justices Josiah Coleman, Leslie King and Mike Randolph were reelected. Just one outstanding question remains: Who won central district Supreme Court race between Kenny Griffis and Latrice Westbrooks? Mississippi Today will provide Wednesday updates on that race.

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