House Speaker Jason White on Monday said he supports changing state law to make it easier for K-12 students to transfer to other public schools outside their home districts.
White, a Republican from West who just completed his first year as speaker, told attendees at the Stennis Capitol Press Forum in downtown Jackson that parents should have greater freedom to select which school district their child attends, though the state would not provide them transportation to attend a school outside their home district under his proposal.
“We want any public school student to be able to go to another public school without the home district being able to hold them against their will and the state portion of the per-pupil cost to follow that child,” White said.
Mississippi currently has a very limited form of “open enrollment” that allows students to transfer from their home district to a nearby school district. However, the transfer requires both the home school district and the receiving school district to sign off on it.
A senator and a House member filed legislation during the 2024 session to remove the current requirement that the home school district approve a student transferring to another district, but both bills died.
The first-term speaker also said he personally supports a robust school choice or school voucher system but believes the political realities at the Capitol, including within the state GOP, make it extremely difficult for the Legislature to pass such a policy.
“We’ve got to come to acknowledge and understand that there is a place for choice for some kids and some parents,” White said. “And somehow or another, I’ve got to be able some kind of way to earn Mississippians’ trust on that issue as we move in that direction.”
But White, who attended both public and private schools as a child, told attendees that while he supports a significant voucher system, his goal is not to “blow up public education.”
“The last thing I want to do is go after public education, and while Republicans have gotten a tough rap on some of that, maybe we’ve earned some of it,” White said. “I commit to you we simply want to make it better while acknowledging that our parents in this state have some rights when it comes to their kids and the education that they receive.”
Other priorities the speaker outlined for the 2025 session are:
Cutting the state income and grocery tax
Reforming the way Mississippi restores voting rights to disenfranchised felons
Tweaking the way the state determines whether school districts are successfully educating students
Unless Republican Gov. Tate Reeves calls lawmakers into a special session to consider a specific topic, the Legislature will not reconvene to consider new laws until January 2025. However, lawmakers typically form committees to study particular issues during the summer and the fall.
White announced last month that he was forming three committees that were expected to meet in the fall to explore the state’s tax structure, certificate of need laws and prescription drugs.
The Mississippi Democratic Party on Monday called for a boycott of this year’s state fair after state Agriculture Commissioner Andy Gipson held a support rally for former President Donald Trump last week.
“This event, hosted and funded by Ag Commissioner Andy Gipson’s campaign, comes in the wake of Trump’s conviction on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records to cover up a payment to adult film actress Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election,” a Democratic Party press release on Monday said. “… The Mississippi Democratic Party believes that this rally is not just a show of support for Trump, but a dangerous endorsement of criminal behavior and corruption.
” … In light of this event, we are calling for a boycott of the upcoming Mississippi State Fair, an event closely associated with the AG Commissioner’s office. By boycotting the State Fair, we aim to send a clear message that the citizens of Mississippi will not support or tolerate the actions of leaders who stand with a convicted criminal.”
Gipson responded to the call for a boycott in a statement on Monday: “The Mississippi Democrat Party’s statement and boycott of our State Fair is about as ridiculous as the charges brought against Donald Trump in New York City. I invite everyone to come enjoy the Mississippi State Fair October 3rd through 13th?”
Republican Gipson, who oversees the fair and state fairgrounds, called the New York trial and jury conviction of Trump a “rigged and politically motivated witch hunt.” He held a rally, funded by Gipson’s campaign according to ads for the rally, in support of Trump on Thursday night at the Mississippi Agriculture Museum.
The 165th Mississippi State Fair is scheduled for Oct. 3-13.
A successful boycott could have a large financial impact for Jackson and the state.
The capital city’s largest annual event last year drew more than 500,000 attendees, according to Gipson’s department. According to Visit Jackson, the fair generates more than $30 million a year in tourism spending in the city.
In the Democratic Party press release, party Chairman Cheikh Taylor said, “It is deeply concerning and frankly alarming to see our state leaders, including Attorney General Lynn Fitch and Governor Tate Reeves, supporting a convicted felon.”
“The time for action is now,” Taylor said. “We must take a stand against those who would undermine our democracy and the values we hold dear.”
Muhammad Ali lights the Olympic flame during the 1996 Summer Olympic Games opening ceremony in Atlanta. Credit: Michael Probst, AP
Today’s question: Who is the current heavyweight boxing champion of the world?
Someone asked me that recently. I had not a clue.
Two or three decades ago, this would have been unthinkable. For most of this writer’s life, the world’s heavyweight boxing champion was among the most famous human beings on the planet. You, as I, can probably name them: Joe Louis, Rocky Marciano, Floyd Patterson, Sonny Liston, Muhammad Ali, Smokin’ Joe Frazier, George Foreman, Mike Tyson, Evander Holifield, Lennox Lewis… and that’s where my interest pretty much ends.
Rick Cleveland
Before we go any farther, I should answer the original question. I googled the answer. The current heavyweight champion of the world is Oleksandr Usyk of Ukraine. He won the undisputed title last month, defeating Great Britain’s Tyson Fury in a split decision in a fight held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
I had not been aware.
This would have been heresy way back in the 20th century when boxing really mattered and even the most casual of boxing fans readily recognized the heavyweight champion of the world. I followed the sport closely then, and not just the heavyweights. Smaller guys such as Sugar Ray Leonard, Tommy “Hit Man” Hearns, Roberto “No Mas” Duran were international celebrities, well known to all.
Boxing was all over TV on the major networks. I grew up watching the Friday night fights with my dad on NBC. They were sponsored by Gillette razors, which at a tender age I thought quite appropriate since at least one of the combatants always appeared to have lost a battle with razor blades. I well remember my dad pointing out a Black fighter named Sugar Ray Robinson one Friday night and telling me, “That man is pound for pound the greatest boxer I’ve ever seen.” I don’t think I knew exactly what that meant but I do remember at fight’s end the other guy looked like he had lost a battle with razor blades.
We didn’t get much live professional boxing in Mississippi back then. The State Golden Gloves tournament was held each year at the Sports Arena at then-Mississippi Southern College, right across Highway 49 from where we lived. Brother Bobby and I thought we might want to try that one year and Dad went and bought us some 16-ounce gloves at Smokey’s Sporting Goods. After about two minutes of our first sparring session, we both decided we’d stick to Little League baseball. Boxing hurt. Bad. We said, “No more” long before Duran said “No was.”
But we continued to follow the sport, especially when a young, fast talking, faster punching man named Cassius Clay emerged as a contender to the heavyweight title then held by Sonny Liston. Liston was a heavily muscled, ferocious looking fighter. An ex-convict who had learned to fight in prison, Liston had won 28 consecutive fights, mostly by knockout. He had knocked out the great Floyd Patterson in the first round of his two immediately previous fights.
This was 1964. Clay whipped Liston, converted to Islam and changed his name to Muhammad Ali, and then whipped Liston again in a first-round knockout marred by controversy. Many observers thought Liston took a dive. After watching the replay, I sure thought he might have.
I’m going to make a really long story short here. Ali won a few fights as champion but refused to be drafted into the U.S. Army as a conscientious objector to the war in Viet Nam. He was stripped of his boxing license in all 50 states, and Joe Frazier became the heavyweight champion. Ali did not fight for more than three years, which should have been the prime of his boxing career.
Fight fans everywhere clamored for an Ali-Frazier fight. Problem was, there was no place that would sanction the fight, What many Mississippians might know is this: Ever so briefly, Ali and Frazier agreed to a fight at Mississippi Coliseum to be held on Dec. 15, 1969. At a press conference in Philadelpiha – the one in Pennsylvannia – Ali said he had been granted a license by the Mississippi Boxing Commission, something that had not been publicized at all in the Magnolia State. Turns out it was a most temporary license.
Cliff McCartstle, in the playful grasp of Muhammad Ali, was celebrating his 12th birthday when his mother walked him across the street in Natchez to the home where Ali was staying. Says McCarstle, now 49 and living in Tulsa, “Ali was in the yard playing with one of his daughters. My mother asked if he would have a photo made with me. He grabbed me, growled and rubbed my head. It was awesome. I’ve had the photo in every office I’ve ever had. It never fails as a conversation starter.” Credit: Photo courtesy McCartstle family
A few days later, the Mississippi Boxing Commission issued a statement that its members had voted unanimously not to issue a license to Ali. We missed out on a chance at being the center of the boxing universe.
But when the first of three All-Frazier fights finally did happen on March 8, 1971, at Madison Square Garden, Mississippi Coliseum did provide a closed circuit televised viewing of the match. Tickets were scaled from $5 all the way up to $12. I made the trip from Hattiesburg to watch. I sprung for a $12 ticket – pretty much a king’s ransom for me at the time, on the lower level, near the screen.
My guess would be the crowd was upwards of 4,000 in attendance, nearly all male and about 50-50 African American and Caucasian. I do remember well that most of the Black attendants were clearly pulling for Ali, and most of the white ones, present company excluded, were pulling for Frazier. And I do remember that we missed the first two of three rounds because of technical issues with the closed circuit feed. Trust me: Nobody, Black or white, was happy about that. We seemed a few seconds away from a riot before we finally got a picture.
It was, as all three eventual Frazier-Ali fights were, a brutally contested classic. Frazier floored Ali with an evil hook in the 15th round and eventually won a unanimous decision. You probably know that Ali would go on to win difficult fights when they met again three and four years later.
I covered the Sept. 15, 1978, fight at the Louisiana Superdome when Ali decisioned Leon Spinks to regain the heavyweight title for an unprecedented third time. As fate had it, I sat near the ring in the VIP-media section, right next to Larry Holmes, who had formerly been Ali’s sparring partner. On the other side of Holmes, was promoter Don King. Both openly cheered for Ali, perhaps in anticipation of the huge pay day that would come two years later when Holmes easily defeated Ali in Las Vegas, That was Ali’s next-to-last fight. I was present, chills running down my spine, when Ali, trembling noticeably from Parkinson’s, lit the Olympic torch in 1996 in Atlanta.
Ali died 20 years later on June 3, 2016. He had outlived Joe Frazier by nearly five years. As it turns out, boxing has died a much slower death.
The governing board of Mississippi’s public universities is seeking to dismiss a federal lawsuit from Debra Mays-Jackson, a former Jackson State University vice president who says she was discriminated against when two less-qualified Black men were hired over her to lead the historically Black university in Mississippi’s capital city.
Mays-Jackson can’t prove the Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees passed her up for the top job at Jackson State because she is a woman, the board has argued in recent filings.
At most, her allegations may show the 12-member IHL board and its commissioner, Alfred Rankins, hired from their personal network, not that it violated her rights.
In 2020, the board picked Thomas Hudson, a former special assistant to the Jackson State president whom Mays-Jackson alleged she had supervised. Then, after Hudson’s resignation last year, after a national search, the board appointed Marcus Thompson, a deputy commissioner at IHL who hadn’t worked in a university administration, to lead Jackson State.
“Even assuming the truth of Mays Jackson’s allegations for purposes of this motion only, they at best suggest that Rankins sought to promote Hudson based on his alleged personal friendship,” an attorney for the IHL board members argued in an April 1 filing. “They do not plausibly suggest that the treatment of Mays Jackson stemmed from her status as a female.”
The board, in multiple filings that also enumerated spelling errors in Mays-Jackson’s complaint, further argued it can’t be sued as an “arm of the state” and that the 12 board members enjoy qualified immunity, a legal standard that helps protect public officials from liability.In an email, IHL spokesperson John Sewell wrote “it is our policy not to comment on pending litigation.”
Lisa Ross, Mays-Jackson’s attorney, said she expects to defeat IHL’s motion to dismiss.
“We believe our complaint is sufficient,” Ross said. “Many times I’ve filed discrimination lawsuits. Do all of my claims survive? No. But my major claims of sex discrimination against IHL for the hiring of Thomas Hudson and the hiring of Marcus Thomspon, we expect those to survive any challenge on a motion to dismiss because that’s where we are at this stage.”
Ross added she is looking forward to discovery to prove new allegations she has introduced in the suit this year, including that Thompson closed an investigation into a sexually explicit photograph Hudson sent while serving as Jackson State interim president without questioning the female employee who allegedly received it.
A Jackson State spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment from Mississippi Today. The university told the news organization last year it had no comment on the lawsuit.
It is very difficult to prove sex discrimination, especially in the conservative 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, said Matthew Steffey, an attorney and a professor at the Mississippi College School of Law.
IHL’s secret presidential searches don’t make that any easier, Steffey added. Neither do the board’s policies that empower trustees to select virtually anyone known to them to lead the eight public universities.
“The absence of true government in the sunshine makes the sort of ‘wink and a nod’ discrimination easier,” Steffey said. “The courtroom proof requires something more than a feeling or a hunch or even a recognition that societal discrimination is rampant.”
The already-winding case has seen multiple filings, including a motion from Mays-Jackson to amend her complaint after receiving a right-to-sue letter from the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. IHL has opposed that motion and has hired separate attorneys to represent the board as a state agency and the individual defendants.
This year, Mays-Jackson has also introduced new allegationsto support her argument that the board has repeatedly denied her the opportunity to lead Jackson State because she is a woman.
For instance, Mays-Jackson alleges that the board has only named Black women to lead the state’s three public HBCUs after a national search. That is, her lawsuit claims Black men come out on top when the board uses a search process that favors internal applicants.
In 2020, the lawsuit states the board permanently appointed Hudson president despite Rankins stating Hudson would not be allowed to apply for the job. The move prevented Mays-Jackson from applying for the position — a fact that IHL, in a recent filing, has used in its defense.
“Her Complaint wholly fails to identify how the individual trustees violated her constitutional rights when the IHL Board failed to appoint her to a position she did not apply for,” IHL wrote.
The following year, Mays-Jackson filed a complaint with the EEOC. In IHL’s response to her complaint, attached to one of her recent filings, an attorney hired by the board notes that its presidential hiring policy “plainly allows IHL to forgo an extended search process and to offer the presidency to any person known to them.”
After Hudson resigned in 2023, Mays-Jackson applied for the vacant role. IHL did not answer Mississippi Today’s questions about the race and gender of the 79 applicants to the role or how many were interviewed.
While the board did not interview Mays-Jackson, she alleged in a Feb. 15 filing that trustees interviewed Thompson, even though he did not apply through IHL’s search firm.
Though the lawsuit alleges Thompson was not as qualified as Mays-Jackson for the role, the February filing notes he, like Hudson, allegedly had one powerful qualification in his corner: The confidence of Rankins, the IHL commissioner.
Thompson, the filing states, was permitted by Rankins to investigate an alleged “unwanted and unwelcomed” sexually explicit photograph that Hudson had sent a female employee while serving as interim president.
“Thompson closed the investigation without questioning the female employee who received the sexually explicit photograph from Hudson,” a February filing states.
A thorough investigation, the lawsuit claims, would have revealed that Hudson had sent a student and at least one other female employee an uninvited photograph of his genitalia and “demoted a male employee who spoke against Hudson’s unlawful conduct.”
Hudson, the lawsuit states, then went on to write a letter supporting Thompson’s admission to Jackson State’s urban higher education executive doctoral program, a credential that was cited in IHL’s press release announcing Thompson’s appointment. The lawsuit also alleges that Hudson helped award the deputy commissioner “thousands of dollars in scholarship funding.”
IHL has not explicitly denied or admitted these allegations, so far sticking to legal arguments in its defense.
The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation is investigating the death of a patient at East Mississippi State Hospital in Meridian.
Keshawn Carpenter has been arrested and charged with murder in connection with the death, according to Lauderdale County Sheriff Ward Calhoun. He remains in the Lauderdale County Detention Center with a bond of $250,000.
MBI did not respond to questions from Mississippi Today by Friday morning.
Carpenter’s LinkedIn profile lists his occupation as a direct care worker at East Mississippi State Hospital. Calhoun could not verify Carpenter was an employee of the hospital.
The Department of Mental Health operates the behavioral health program in Meridian that serves people in a 31-county area. It offers inpatient psychiatric care, nursing home services and operates group homes that prepare people with mental illness for independent living.
Adam Moore, spokesperson for the agency, said the department can’t share information because of the ongoing investigation.
“The Department of Mental Health takes the safety and security of the people we serve seriously. Our staff and the staff of East Mississippi State Hospital (EMSH) are deeply saddened by this tragic incident,” Moore said in a statement to Mississippi Today. “EMSH immediately contacted emergency medical services and law enforcement to respond to the situation. Investigators with the office of the Attorney General and the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation have begun the investigation, and the hospital and department are fully cooperating.”
After police responded to a call at the hospital, the patient was transferred to Jackson for medical care on May 31 and died two days later, according to the ScottyRay Report. The cause of death has not been disclosed.
Donna Echols lost her ex-husband after having to wait 90 minutes for an ambulance to come to her Jackson home. A new law that goes into effect July 1 could prevent something similar from happening to someone else.
The state Legislature passed House Bill 1644, which the governor signed into law in April. Now, contracts between a county or municipality and a private ambulance service must allow a mutual aid agreement to allow other ambulance services to respond to 911 calls when the main ambulance service can not.
Echols was a major advocate for the bill, sharing her story with media and legislators. “What I did is talk to legislators about what happened to us and told them that it didn’t need to happen to any other family in Mississippi,” she said.
Echols says this new law gives her a sense of relief. “It will be available to help other people in their time of need,” she said.
At the local level, there’s been some backlash against AMR, the company contracted to provide ambulance service in Hinds County. An investigation by WLBT found that AMR met its contractually obligated response times around half the time. Hinds County did not fine the company for this, although it could have.
In city council meetings last summer, city leaders from Biloxi, Jackson and Gulfport discussed creating their own citywide ambulance districts.
In the fall, Hinds County successfully sued to prevent Jackson from doing so. In an order, Hinds County Chancery Judge Dewayne Thomas said Jackson’s proposal violated AMR’s contract with the county, and that switching ambulance providers would harm many Jackson residents.
By contrast, Gulfport and Biloxi faced little to no resistance. Biloxi announced its decision in December, and the Gulfport City Council unanimously approved the switch in February. Both are now serviced by Pafford EMS.
Harrison County also ended its 50-year relationship with AMR and switched to Louisiana-based Acadian Ambulance Services.
AMR referred all comments to Mississippi Ambulance Alliance board president Julia Clarke.
Clarke said that problems any ambulance company may be experiencing are part of larger, systemic issues with the state and national healthcare system. One of the biggest is the shortage of staff.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ projections, there will be 194,500 openings for registered nurses and 20,700 for emergency medical technicians by 2030.
Last August the alliance’s board ran an op/ed in the Clarion Ledger arguing that ambulance response times were just one part of the larger problem.
“The ambulance you are waiting on is more likely than not already at an emergency room,
waiting to unload a patient at an understaffed hospital. That hospital can’t find enough nurses
to hire to care for those and other patients, meaning EMTs can’t transfer the patient in the
back of their ambulance,” the board wrote.
Jim Mabus, center, leaves behind four sons, including two with Donna Echols: Denver Mabus, left, and Jake Mabus Credit: Courtesy of Donna Echols
In April 2023, when Echols’ ex-husband, Jim Mabus, was experiencing a series of strokes, eight AMR ambulances and two sprint medics were already responding to other calls and the central Mississippi service area received six service requests, including one for a heart attack, an AMR spokesperson said at the time.
Julia Clarke said that the alliance worked with the bill’s author to make sure the wording didn’t accidentally complicate dispatch protocols. The alliance supported the bill, but Clarke pointed out that the staff and ambulance shortages would still impact response times.
“We always welcome any discussion centered on improving EMS, but we do not think it is fair to blame dedicated first responders for issues beyond their control,” she said.
Update 6/7/24: This story has been updated to clarify that Julia Clarke was not addressing problems at any specific ambulance service provider.
The beauty shop is an American staple right up there with apple pie and baseball.
Call it what you will — beauty parlor, style shop or hair salon, everyone has probably stepped foot in one, sat in a chair, thumbed through the year-old magazines, watched soap operas, chatted and caught up on “the latest,” and gotten the works. Or as some would say, got “fried, dyed and laid to the side.”
Learning the proper technique when rolling sectioned hair one of Delta Technical College’s Cosmetology classes. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Maybe it started in MeeMaw’s or Big Mama’s kitchen – permanents and hot combs, playing with dolls or putting ribbons in the pet dog’s hair. Whatever planted the seed — a yearning to “do” hair and nails and learn the trade, grew into a passion that can lead to working in one of those beauty places or owning one, being a hairstylist and make-up artist to the stars or even a beautician for the dearly departed. The options are endless.
An instructor prioritizes a “to-do” list for a student at Delta Technical College’s cosmetology school. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Braids, weaves, relaxers, dye-jobs, extensions, skin-care, perms, manicures, wigs, touch-ups, trims, cuts and even emergency assistance when that home treatment goes sideways. The salon is where it’s happening. Cosmetology is popular, big business and ever growing.
Enter, Delta Technical College and its School of Cosmetology, located in Ridgeland.
Students learn haircare and maintenance during Cosmetology classes at Delta Technical College in Ridgeland. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
There’s Theory, where students in classrooms learn the ins-and-outs, do’s and don’t of the business from veterans with real-world experience. And Practical, where students are in a salon setting receiving hands-on training from seasoned instructors, all of which leads to testing to become board certified.
An instructor demonstrates the correct way to section and detangle hair. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
“I have a passion for it,” said instructor Marcia Williams, who teaches a Theory class at the school. “I’m a 22-year instructor and, honestly, I know these students want to take it to another level and I help them to do that.”
A student is shown by an instructor how to detangle hair during a Cosmetology class at Delta Technical College in Ridgeland. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
“I ask students what their short and long term goals are. I help them to know, whether opening their own salons or being an educator, you don’t have to go to a four-year college. It’s about work and passion. I see their dreams and ideas. It can be 10 years later, and I’ll hear from former students and they’ll ask me, remember when…? That’s what it’s all about.”
A student works on a wet head of hair during a Cosmetology class at Delta Technical College in Ridgeland. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi TodayCosmetology students attending Delta Technical College learn every facet of haircare. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi TodayCosmetology students at Delta Technical learn about and practice what they’ve learned using heads such as these to hone their skills. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi TodayCosmetology students theory class conducted by instructor Marcia Williams (center) at Delta Technical College in Ridgeland. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
The richest man in the poorest state in America is contemplating a run for Mississippi governor.
Advisers to Thomas Duff, 67, who along with his brother Jim has been perennially listed as the richest in the state, said he’s very seriously considering a run for the open governor’s seat in 2027. They said he will make a decision “sooner rather than later.” Business and political leaders have been encouraging the billionaire to run, and he has reportedly considered such a run in the past but demurred. Duff himself declined comment.
Duff, of Hattiesburg, has been involved in state politics, but only peripherally or behind the scenes. He recently finished an eight-year stint on the state Institutions of Higher Learning Board, first appointed by former Gov. Phil Bryant. Duff has been a major contributor to many Republican campaigns in Mississippi, including most of the current GOP congressional and statewide officeholders. He and his brother are major supporters of higher education and have donated millions to Mississippi universities.
As Duff contemplates a gubernatorial run, so reportedly are numerous more traditional Republican candidates, including Attorney General Lynn Fitch, Agriculture Commissioner Andy Gipson, former state House Speaker Philip Gunn, former U.S. Rep. Gregg Harper, Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, Secretary of State Michael Watson and state Auditor Shad White.
Some political observers figure Duff entering the race could at least partially “clear the field” in a Republican primary. Some potential candidates might balk at facing someone who could easily write his own campaign an eight-figure check, and whom they had hoped might help fund theirs.
“If he decides to run for governor, he’s absolutely among the top runners if not the top runner,” said Austin Barbour, a state and national GOP strategist and lobbyist.
Some, it appears, might recalculate their next political move because they would support Duff as governor.
“For me it’s really exciting when you see somebody who has been a great American success story built on hard work and good vision — someone like that running for governor is exciting,” said Watson, who also has been widely mentioned as a candidate for lieutenant governor. “… For me, I want to make sure we have a great candidate for governor, someone who could really excite all of Mississippi, and somebody like Tommy Duff fits that bill for me, and really frees me up to know that a lieutenant governor with a good relationship with someone like (Duff) would be great for this state, working together with a vision for the same destination.”
For the voting masses, Duff would start any campaign as an unknown entity. While he has had the ears of the state’s most powerful politicians, he’s stayed out of the political fray and other than with IHL and philanthropic work, stayed out of the spotlight. His views on most major policy issues are at this point publicly unknown.
“I don’t know him well, but I see him as someone who has been involved in state government, in policy matters in his own way as a member of the IHL board for eight years, obviously involved in a lot of things locally as well,” Barbour said. “From all accounts, he is a conservative who has an interest in seeing Mississippi continue to become a better place.”
Could a billionaire gubernatorial candidate connect with the rank-and-file in poor Mississippi?
“There’s certainly a lot of history with independently wealthy people running for office and winning,” Barbour said. “Look at West Virginia — Jim Justice ran as the richest man in West Virginia, got elected there, won reelection and now is about to win a Senate seat … It’s always a balancing act for a self-funding candidate. You’ve got to come across that you can connect with the average voter. I’m sure Tommy Duff could do that … This man didn’t wake up as a billionaire. He obviously has achieved this success and probably had to overcome a lot of failure like a lot of us have.”
Duff and his brother turned a small, struggling company into Southern Tire Mart, the nation’s largest truck tire dealer and retread manufacturer. They created Duff Capitol Investors, the largest privately held business in Mississippi, with ownership in more than 20 companies, including KLLM Transport, TL Wallace Construction and Southern Insurance Group.
The Duff’s father, Ernest, started a tire business in 1973 to supply tires for his trucking business and as teens, the Duff brothers started working there. When the two brothers took over the tire business in the early 1980s, it was struggling and Thomas reportedly had to work without a paycheck for a while. But the brothers figured out how to speed up the retread process, and by the mid-1990s the company was flourishing. The family sold it in 1997 to an Iowa-based tire business, with the brothers joining the company.
But the two were unhappy with the new management, and in 2003, bought back the business for $15 million. They have since grown the company to nearly 300 stores, which did about $3.5 billion in business last year. The brothers are now reportedly worth a combined $7 billion.
Talk of Duff running for governor in recent years has typically brought analogy to the late former Gov. Kirk Fordice, owner of a large industrial and bridge construction company who ran as a businessman and political outsider and who in 1992 became the first Republican governor in Mississippi since Reconstruction.
Barbour said Duff’s wealth compared to Fordice’s “is not apples to apples with the wealth disparity — Kirk Fordice was successful in business, but Tommy Duff is the richest person in Mississippi.” Fordice’s famous gruffness and irascibility — he was known to threaten to whip the occasional reporter or Democratic attorney general — would also appear to be in contrast to Duff’s calm and friendly demeanor.
But successful businessmen who turn politician often grapple with politics and governance.
“Government doesn’t move at the fast pace that business does,” Barbour said. “Government is sometimes more like an aircraft carrier than a ski boat — it’s hard to turn it on a dime. But I’m sure he’s surrounded by smart people, and has had enough interaction with governors and government … He would know what he’s getting involved in.”
And the media and political spotlight can be harsh for someone who has been mostly behind the scenes.
“Everybody’s got their own level of — you used the term — baggage,” Barbour said. “but I’ve never heard anything negative about Tommy Duff. He’s built a business empire rivaled by none in Mississippi, and has done it without dirtying his reputation — he has a very good reputation in Mississippi.”
Duff’s was in the state and national media spotlight in Mississippi years ago, when authorities in 2016 thwarted a plot by three men to kidnap and extort money from him. A man the would-be kidnappers tried to include in the plot called and warned Duff, who contacted police. The three were convicted and sentenced to prison for the plot.
A 2018 Forbes article about the Duff brothers stated: “Despite their successes, Jim and Tom have maintained a veil of privacy over their affairs, giving only a handful of interviews. What is known about them gives them a salt-of-the-Earth persona: proud Mormons, donors to Tom’s alma mater, the University of Southern Mississippi — the exact sum fittingly never disclosed, though confirmed to be over to be over $5 million …”
Mississippi Today took an extraordinary step this afternoon in asking the state Supreme Court to overturn a lower court order that threatens the constitutional rights and privacy of journalists and every Mississippi citizen.
Given this matter of grave constitutional concern and the critical decision our state’s highest court must soon make, I want to be transparent with you, our reader, about what’s going on and what’s at stake.
In July 2023, former Gov. Phil Bryant sued our newsroom and our CEO Mary Margaret White, arguing that we defamed him in three separate characterizations of our 2022 Pulitzer Prize-winning “The Backchannel” investigation. We continue to confidently defend ourselves against a lawsuit we believe has no legal basis.
Bryant’s lawsuit does not challenge a single word of our original “Backchannel” investigation, which revealed for the first time the extent of the role the former governor and others played in the Mississippi welfare scandal. We have not let this lawsuit intimidate us, and we continue to closely cover the ongoing investigations into the misspending — including accusations made by key defendants that Bryant was directly involved. In May of this year, Bryant added me and Mississippi Today investigative reporter Anna Wolfe as defendants, along with five of Anna’s more recent news articles, to his baseless lawsuit.
Bryant has attempted to use this lawsuit as a vehicle to go back in time and obtain unconditional access to all of our internal documents, including notes and interviews with sources regarding “The Backchannel” — despite never raising questions about the original investigation and long missing deadlines to challenge it in court.
Given this glaring overstep and our steadfast effort to protect our journalists and our sources, we declined to turn over that information, citing a First Amendment protection called “reporter’s privilege.” Reporter’s privilege, which is recognized by 40 states based on numerous legal interpretations of the United States Constitution, serves as a basis of protection and privacy for journalists and the sources who share important information with the press.
But last month, the court issued an order that because Mississippi’s appellate courts have never recognized reporter’s privilege, our citation of the privilege did not necessarily stand as valid reason to withhold our information from the plaintiff. The order issued on May 20 gave us a deadline of today, June 6, to turn over any information in our possession related to potential confidential sources.
We believe this court order is unconstitutional, so we have no choice but to appeal it to the Mississippi Supreme Court. We have also asked both the circuit judge and the Supreme Court to stay the troubling order while the high court considers taking up our appeal.
With our appeal, the stakes are incredibly high: The Supreme Court could guarantee these critical rights for the first time in our state’s history, or it could establish a dangerous precedent for Mississippi journalists and the public at large by tossing aside an essential First Amendment protection.
We at Mississippi Today take seriously our job as journalists to unveil government corruption and wrongdoing, and we’ve done it well in a state that has too little investigative reporting. We are proud to carry on the long legacy of journalists who have so often served as the only hope for true justice among Mississippians who are cheated, overlooked or ignored.
Every single Mississippi citizen benefits from these vital constitutional protections. In a state with little government accountability, Mississippians routinely learn about the actions of their public officials only because of journalism like ours. Eroding these protections could have a detrimental impact on how effectively journalists here can uncover potential wrongdoing. Worse, it would have a chilling effect on whistleblowers and other brave sources who often come forward to journalists because they have no other way to hold power to account.
If the lower court’s order is upheld, every Mississippian would stand to lose a fuller understanding of how some government leaders truly operate when their doors are closed and they think no one is watching.
It’s important to note that journalists, even in the 40 states that recognize the reporter’s privilege, do not have unlimited, blanket protection from having to turn over sensitive materials. But in those states — and we hope in Mississippi very soon — there is an appropriately high threshold that a plaintiff in a defamation suit must first reach before journalists are compelled to turn over their documents and notes.
Under the reporter’s privilege, a plaintiff in a defamation suit should first prove that what a journalist reported was false, defamatory and based upon unreliable sources before documents are turned over to anyone. Those standards have not been met in the 13 months since Bryant first threatened this lawsuit against Mississippi Today.
There has been no evidence presented to demonstrate our reporting was false because it wasn’t. There has been no evidence presented that our reporting was defamatory because it wasn’t. There has been no evidence presented that we relied on an unreliable source because we didn’t. For those reasons, we should not be compelled to turn over privileged information.
We stand by every word of our reporting, and we are confident we will prevail in our defense. Toward that end, we are obligated to appeal this order not only to protect ourselves and a free press, but also to uphold the rights guaranteed to all Mississippians by the United States Constitution.
In the meantime, please know that Mississippi Today will never stop investigating government corruption and working to provide accountability. We will never be afraid to reveal how powerful leaders truly serve their constituents. And we will always stand up for Mississippi journalists and sources who come forward to us with information the public needs to know.
If you have anything you’d like to share, my email inbox is open. If you’d prefer to communicate via encrypted channels, you can find our contact information by clicking this link. As ever, we appreciate your support, and we are honored to serve you with the quality journalism you’ve come to expect from Mississippi Today.
