OurTupelo

The Senate Rules Committee on Monday afternoon killed a last-minute measure that would have turned two majority-Black state Senate districts back into majority-white districts if the U.S. Supreme Court weakens the federal Voting Rights Act as many expect.

With only days left in the 2026 legislative session, Sen. Jeremy England, a Republican from Vancleave, filed a so-called “trigger” resolution. It would revert Mississippi’s Senate districts to their original boundaries before a federal three-judge panel ruled in 2024 that the state unconstitutionally diluted Black voting strength when it redrew legislative districts in 2022. 

The federal judicial order resulted in 14 special legislative elections in Mississippi last year.

But no member of the Senate Rules Committee meeting voted to advance England’s measure out of committee. Sen. Dean Kirby, a Republican from Pearl, said since the committee did not want to take action on the measure, it was dead.

England told Mississippi Today that he decided to file the resolution because when the Legislature redrew its districts in 2022 to account for population shifts, it strongly considered factors such as preserving communities of interest and keeping districts compact. 

“I voted in favor of those maps when we debated them the first time,” England said. 

After lawmakers redrew their districts, voters sued the state and argued that Black voters in three areas of the state did not have a fair shot at electing a candidate of their choice. A panel of three federal judges agreed and ordered the Legislature to redraw certain districts again.

To comply with the order, lawmakers created a majority-Black House district in the Chickasaw County area, a majority-Black Senate district in the Hattiesburg area and a majority-Black Senate district in the DeSoto County area. Because of the domino effect of changing those district lines, the state had do-over elections for 14 legislative seats last year.

The special elections resulted in two new Democratic legislators — Johnny DuPree of Hattiesburg and Theresa Gillespie-Isom of Southaven —  being elected in areas that Republicans previously occupied. 

DuPree told Mississippi Today that he would oppose England’s resolution and believes it’s “way too early” for the Legislature to preemptively try to respond to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that it hasn’t been issued. 

“This is another barrier that prevents voters from electing a representative of their choice,” DuPree said. 

After the Mississippi special elections, a majority of U.S. Supreme Court justices signaled they were open to rolling back parts of the federal Voting Rights Act, which is the federal law that plaintiffs used to force the state to create additional majority-Black districts. 

But Sen. Derrick Simmons, a Democrat from Greenville who leads Senate Democrats, said he doesn’t believe the Mississippi litigation would be invalidated simply because the U.S. Supreme Court restricted parts of the Voting Rights Act. 

Lawmakers have sent a bill to Gov. Tate Reeves to reform the Mississippi’s opioid settlement laws as they seek to finalize their first spending decisions for the money.

The Senate bill would change how the state distributes hundreds of millions of dollars won in national lawsuits against companies accused of contributing to the opioid epidemic, a public health crisis that’s killed hundreds of thousands of Americans over the past two decades. Every state in the country is receiving millions to billions of dollars from these or similar lawsuits. 

The Legislature, which is expected to control at least $357 million from the lawsuits through 2040, passed a law last year to set up an advisory council independent of the Legislature to help oversee the funds. In that bill, lawmakers tasked this council with soliciting applications from organizations interested in addressing the opioid epidemic. The council would review and score those plans’ effectiveness and sustainability, and provide recommendations for the Legislature to approve or reject. 

That council, led by Attorney General Lynn Fitch, accomplished those tasks last summer and fall. But many Mississippi recovery advocates expressed concern about how the council made its decisions. At the last council meeting of 2025, one member asked for the help of a third party with expertise in the area to help guide the committee in making responsible decisions to prevent overdoses. 

This year’s bill, if it becomes law, would codify that ask. It would require the Attorney General’s Office to contract with a consultant within two months of the law’s enactment. Additionally, it would strengthen the council’s rules to prevent conflicts of interests with council members interacting with applications they may be associated with — a concern raised by recovery advocates during last year’s review process. 

The bill also would give lawmakers more power over opioid settlement funding. It expands the Legislature’s role from only approving or rejecting council applications to allowing the House and the Senate to amend recommended funding amounts.

Legislators are looking to use that potential power in this application cycle, as revealed by proposed appropriation bills at different stages. They are also looking to send money the council oversees for projects members didn’t review. 

The bill sent to the governor does not include a previous provision that would have required tens of millions of additional opioid settlement dollars to be spent on addressing addiction. While the Legislature controls most of Mississippi’s lawsuit money, about $63 million is expected to be sent to 147 towns, cities and counties. 

Fitch authorized those local governments to spend the money however their elected leaders wish without reporting their purchases, and many have done that. Of the $15.5 million local governments received as of last summer, over four times as much money was spent for general purposes than efforts to prevent overdoses. In early March, Republican House Public Health and Human Services Committee Chairman Sam Creekmore changed the bill to require all local governments to spend opioid settlement money on public health overdose prevention efforts.

But that language didn’t survive negotiations between a small group of senators and representatives, including Creekmore. In response to a question on the House floor Sunday night about the local government language from Rep. Bob Evans, a Democrat from Monticello, Creekmore said Fitch gave lawmakers an opinion that the local governments’ money was meant to pay back opioid-related expenses from the past two decades.

“We’re not requiring them to give any evidence whatsoever that they’ve actually spent one cent in opioid interdiction or otherwise, are we?” Evans, the only representative to vote no on the bill, asked Creekmore on the House floor.

“No sir, we’re not requiring it,” Creekmore responded.

“So if the mayor and board of aldermen wanted to give themselves big raises and whatnot, that’s fine, they can do that, right?” Evans asked later in the exchange. 

“That is their right to do so,” Creekmore said. 

Evans said the bill had been referred to the House’s Accountability, Efficiency, Transparency Committee. 

“Would you agree with me that in this bill, there is no accountability, no efficiency, or no transparency requirements whatsoever?” Evans asked Creekmore. “They don’t even have to tell us how they spent it, period, if they don’t want to, right?”

“The locals do not have to tell us, no sir,” Creekmore responded.  

In response to an emailed question about the attorney general’s legal opinion, MaryAsa Lee, a spokesperson for Fitch’s office, sent a statement that the office’s Chief of Staff Michelle Williams originally sent Mississippi Today in 2025. The statement outlines that the overdose crisis cost hundreds of billions of dollars, and the national settlements allow a minority percentage of a state’s total share to be used for non-addiction purposes. 

The national agreements say lawyers on both sides of the agreement do not recommend spending available money on purposes other than addressing addiction. Most states have taken steps to guarantee that more settlement money goes to overdose prevention than the settlements require. 

Rep. Jeffery Hulum III, a Democrat from Gulfport, on Sunday also expressed concern about Creekmore and the other lawmaker negotiators’ decision to remove the local government spending restrictions. When the Gulf States Newsroom hosted an event at the Capitol with audio testimonies of Mississippians impacted by the opioid epidemic, Hulum was one of two state lawmakers who stopped to listen to the recordings. 

Creekmore said he still believes local governments should use settlement money for treating and abating the opioid epidemic, and he said he may try again next year to add those provisions. But he did not try to make changes to the current bill. 

“It’s ready to go,” Creekmore said to Hulum. 

Although he voted to approve the bill, Hulum told Mississippi Today on Monday morning that he found Creekmore’s decision to sign off on removing the local government restrictions disturbing — a comment Creekmore declined to respond to. Hulum’s home county has one of the highest overdose rates in the state, and he knows those most impacted by the public health catastrophe have said they want this money to prevent others from dying. 

“When you take that restriction off, and you allow municipalities, towns or organizations to utilize that money in any form or fashion, how is that really helping to stop, prevent or treat opioid addiction?”

A bill that would create a separate water authority to run Jackson’s water and sewer systems is headed to Gov. Tate Reeves for consideration.

Lawmakers on Monday approved changes to House Bill 1677 after select members from both chambers discussed the proposal over the last week. The House and Senate initially proposed different versions of the makeup of the water authority’s board, the main point of contention over the last few legislative sessions.

The agreed changes to the board appointments are: three at-large appointments from the mayor of Jackson, two from the governor, one from the lieutenant governor, one each from the mayors of Ridgeland and Byram, and one who the governor and mayor of Jackson would consult with each other to decide.

Jackson’s mayor, currently John Horhn, would also be on the board as a nonvoting member. Appointments from the mayors would need the approval of their respective city council or board of aldermen, except for the one with the governor’s consultation.

Rep. Shanda Yates, an independent from Jackson who introduced the bill, said if the governor and mayor of Jackson couldn’t agree on the ninth member there would just be eight members instead.

Horhn has pushed for a majority of the board appointments to come from or through Jackson elected officials, which existed in the original House version of the bill. The Senate version, though, gave Byram and Ridgeland direct appointments rather than ones needing approval from the Jackson City Council.

The Jackson mayor agued the city should have a majority control because the city would be responsible for any debt payments the authority can’t make. Horhn’s office did not reply to a request for comment for this story.

Sen. Joel Carter, a Republican from Gulfport who led the Senate’s work on the proposal, raised two other changes in the latest version of the bill. The first is requiring the authority to conduct an independent rate study every two years. If two straight rate studies recommend a rate increase, and the authority hadn’t raised rates in two years, the new law requires the body to adopt a rate increase.

The other change is the authority will have to create a process for customers to dispute their bills, Carter said. Jacksonians have recently criticized the existing third-party utility, JXN Water, for not having such a process.

The law also says a two-thirds vote would be required for any rate increase or for any expenditure over $5 million.

The legislation sets a May 1 deadline to appoint the board members. Within 30 days of the appointment of a majority of board members, the authority would then consult with U.S. District Court Judge Henry Wingate, who is presiding over the federal lawsuit dealing with Jackson’s water system, to appoint a president. The president would then be a deputy under JXN Water manager Ted Henifin prior to Henifin’s departure. At that point, the president would then take over daily operations of the water and sewer systems.

Henifin, who took over in 2022, plans to leave his role and return to retirement in 2027. During a court hearing last week, JXN Water said it had completed seven of the 13 “priority projects” the 2022 federal order enlisted the utility to take on. The utility is set to complete two more projects by the end of the year, with the remaining four set to be done by October 2027, JXN Water attorney Paul Calamita said.

A breakdown of where each project stands is on the utility’s website.

The House adopted the new version of the bill by a vote of 78-40. Fifteen Democratic senators, including four who represent Jackson, voted against bill before it was also adopted in that chamber.

Attorneys and judges statewide are voicing opposition to a bill that would make joint custody of children the standard in all divorce cases. If the proposal becomes law, tens of thousands of Mississippi parents could be affected by the policy, which only exists in five other states. 

Proponents say the legislation would level the playing field for fathers and courts would reserve the right to award sole custody in cases that warrant it. But family lawyers who spoke to Mississippi Today say overriding a presumption of joint custody will be difficult and too many vulnerable parents will not receive sole custody when that’s best for them and their children. Critics say the legislation will not work well in practice, and it may violate the state constitution. 

While lawmakers are still hashing out details, versions of the bill garnered overwhelming support in both chambers. 

John Hatcher, a Booneville-based attorney, served as chancery court judge for eight counties in northeast Mississippi for 12 years. He told Mississippi Today he believes the bill is well-intended, but thinks it would be a “travesty if it passes.”

Judges should give children an impartial hearing without preference for a particular outcome, and there should be no presumption that each parent deserves equal time parenting, Hatcher said. 

“No person can have property rights over children,” Hatcher said. “They are not chattel.”

The legislation is also arguably at odds with the Mississippi Constitution, Hatcher said. Under state law, the chancery court has complete jurisdiction over divorce, alimony and the matters of children. Hatcher sees this bill as an attempt to diminish the court’s power. 

“Now the Legislature is going to be the superior guardian?” said Hatcher. “It’s wrong. I don’t believe it’s constitutional.”

Mississippi Today spoke to eight divorce attorneys in the state about the issue. They all said they were against the bill. Seven said it would be detrimental to women and children. 

Mack Varner, who has been practicing family law for 50 years in Vicksburg, was shocked to hear the bill’s author, Rep. Shane Aguirre, a Republican from Tupelo, is not an attorney but an accountant. Only 25% of Mississippi’s lawmakers are attorneys, and most don’t include family law in their area of practice. 

“The bottom line is, they don’t know what they’re doing,” Varner said. 

If passed, Varner believes the legislation would help fathers evade child support. 

“In a lot of instances, they don’t want joint custody,” Varner said. “They just don’t want to have to pay child support.”

Even under the current system, there are women who have joint custody but end up providing the majority of caregiving.  

Pamela Stokes of Madison endured a decade-long custody battle with her ex-husband, whom she divorced in 2006. In the beginning, they agreed on joint custody of their three children. But the children were primarily living with her, said Stokes, because her ex-husband was regularly intoxicated and unable to care for them. 

Mississippi Today reviewed court records showing that in 2010, the court ordered Stokes’ ex-husband, Robert Martin III, to undergo regular drug and alcohol testing. Martin did not respond to a request for comment from Mississippi Today. 

Stokes said she had almost no money after her divorce. She had to reinvent herself several times, worked in real estate and government contracts and eventually established her own swimming pool business, which she still operates. The money her ex-husband gave Stokes in monthly child support payments didn’t even cover the cost of daycare, she said, much less activities, food or clothing. As a single mother, she said the odds were stacked against her.

“They rape you financially and reduce you to poverty,” Stokes said of the legal system. 

What is in the best interest of children?

Research shows co-parenting is good for many children in low-conflict situations. But parents in low-conflict situations are often amicable and agree to joint custody outside of the court, experts told Mississippi Today, while cases that are litigated are typically more contentious. Those experts say mandating that courts use joint custody as a standard only serves to tie judges’ hands. 

While judges would still have the final say, a presumption can be difficult to override, said Douglas NeJaime, a family law professor at Yale Law School. And Mississippi’s legislation offers no exceptions for cases involving domestic violence or high conflict. That is problematic, NeJaime said.

“Those people might stay married rather than get divorced and have to confront this presumption of shared parenting time,” NeJaime said. 

Sen. Brice Wiggins, a Republican from Pascagoula, and Sen. Joey Fillingane, a Republican from Sumrall, serve on the Judiciary A Committee, where Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann originally sent the bill. Wiggins and Fillingane, two of six lawmakers tasked with deciding the final details of the bill, told Mississippi Today that the bill would create more equal opportunity for fathers to be involved in their children’s lives. Wiggins and Fillingane both practice family law and said they see the legislation as progressive and reflective of families today.

“In 2026, we shouldn’t be giving preferences to one gender over the other as it relates to custody,” Fillingane said.

Fathers should receive a fair hearing and be considered for custody, said Kelly Williams, a Ridgeland-based attorney and a child welfare law specialist certified by the National Association of Counsel for Children. But she said this happens under the current system. 

Doling out more rulings of 50-50 custody might give the appearance of equality, she said, but it will make the system less equitable – particularly for survivors of domestic violence, parents in low-income households and stay-at-home mothers. 

More importantly, the argument that fathers deserve a system they perceive to be more fair is misguided, William said. 

“We don’t take the focus off the best interest of children to satisfy or level the playing field for litigants,” Williams said. “That doesn’t even make sense.”

The bill is still in negotiations. The Senate made minor changes to the House bill, but both chambers’ versions would make joint custody the standard in all divorce cases if Gov. Tate Reeves signs the bill into law.

Lawmakers must agree on language by 8 p.m. Monday for the bill to survive, and the legislation would then go to the full House and Senate for a final vote. 

County and state officials are coordinating with volunteers in Carroll County to wrangle what they said is one of the five largest wildfires ever in Mississippi. As of Monday morning, the inferno had spread across 4,246 acres, or 6.6. square miles, the county’s fire coordinator Jake Hurst said.

There have so far been no injuries or damages to any structures, Hurst said. As a precaution, officials on Friday evacuated 10 homes along County Roads 218, 360 and 163.

Officials are still investigating the cause of the fire, which Hurst said began on Wednesday last week. Hurst said a lot of “fuel” in the area from the recent tornadoes and ice storm, like dead trees and limbs and also young pine trees, helped the fire gain momentum.

“It was thick, highly fueled terrain,” he described. “The dryness, the low humidity, the wind, anything you needed for a perfect storm, per se, we had from Friday until yesterday (Sunday).”

Based on information from the Mississippi Forestry Commission, the wildfire is the largest ever in Carroll County, and one of the top five largest in the state’s history, Hurst said. MFC did not respond to calls Monday to confirm.

“This honestly looked like something you would see in California on the news type of fire,” he said. “It was definitely something I hope I never have to deal with again. It was very challenging in the terrain and environment we were in. It was one for the history books for sure.”

Like many places across the country, Carroll County relies heavily on volunteer firefighters. Hurst, the only paid firefighter in the county, said 25 volunteers have worked on this response. The county is working together with the Mississippi Forestry Commission and the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency to attack the fire. Groups including the Cajun Navy and Red Cross are helping to feed first responders.

To contain fires of this size, he explained MFC will bring in bulldozers or plows to create “fire lanes,” which put a boundary around the fire to prevent it from spreading. A helicopter is also being used to drop 100 to 150 gallons of water at a time on certain “hotspots,” he added.

“A firetruck and water will not contain them,” Hurst said.

As of Monday officials had the fire 70% contained. The fire as of Saturday was 40% contained and had spread to 3,000 acres, Gov. Tate Reeves said on social media at the time.

WASHINGTON — Certain names will be familiar to the Supreme Court in the latest case involving a Black death row inmate from Mississippi, with arguments set for Tuesday.

Doug Evans, a now-retired prosecutor with a history of dismissing Black jurors for discriminatory reasons, knocked all but one Black person off the jury that tried and convicted Terry Pitchford.

Judge Joseph Loper allowed it to happen. The Mississippi Supreme Court upheld the conviction.

READ MORE: Mississippi Today investigation reveals details of jury selection in the case of death row inmate Terry Pitchford.

Just seven years ago, in a case involving the same district attorney, trial judge and state high court, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the death sentence and conviction of Curtis Flowers because of what Justice Brett Kavanaugh described as a “relentless, determined effort to rid the jury of Black individuals.”

Seven of the current nine justices were on the court then.

The Supreme Court has in recent years taken a dim view of defendants’ claims in capital cases, especially in the last-minute efforts to stave off execution. Last week, the court turned away the appeal of Texas death row inmate Rodney Reed over the dissent of three liberal justices, who believe he should be allowed to test evidence that he has argued would exonerate him.

Claim of racial discrimination

But the court in December agreed to hear Pitchford’s appeal relating to a claim of racial discrimination that, in other cases, has gained traction even among some conservative justices.

Pitchford was sentenced to death for his role in the 2004 killing of Reuben Britt, the owner of the Crossroads Grocery, just outside Grenada in northern Mississippi. Pitchford, now 40, was 18 when he and a friend went to the store to rob it. The friend shot Britt three times, fatally wounding him, but was ineligible for the death penalty because he was younger than 18. Pitchford was tried for capital murder and sentenced to death.

The case has been making its way through the court system for 20 years. In 2023, U.S. District Judge Michael P. Mills overturned Pitchford’s conviction, holding that the trial judge did not give Pitchford’s lawyers enough of a chance to argue that the prosecution was improperly dismissing Black jurors.

Mills wrote that his ruling was partially motivated by Evans’ actions in prior cases. A unanimous panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the ruling.

In the course of selecting a jury, lawyers can excuse a juror merely because of a suspicion that a particular person would vote against their client.

The Supreme Court tried to stamp out discrimination in the composition of juries in Batson v. Kentucky in 1986. The court ruled then that jurors could not be excused from service because of their race and set up a system by which trial judges could evaluate claims of discrimination and the race-neutral explanations by prosecutors.

In Pitchford’s case, the prosecution excused four of the five remaining Black people in the jury pool and defense lawyers objected. Loper, the judge, accepted all four explanations and moved on without analyzing whether race was the reason, Mills wrote.

Issues in Pitchford’s case

The Supreme Court case focuses on whether Pitchford’s lawyers did enough to object to Loper’s rulings and whether the state Supreme Court acted reasonably in ruling they had not.

Joseph Perkovich, who will argue Pitchford’s case Tuesday, said the record in the case clearly favors his client. Loper “did not grasp he had to a constitutional duty to determine whether the reasons the district attorney gave for striking the Black citizens were credible and truthful,” Perkovich wrote in an email. “The judge simply failed even to try to discharge that critical duty, despite the defense’s efforts.”

In the state’s written filing, Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch defended the state Supreme Court decision and said Evans did not inappropriately strike Black people from the jury.

Pitchford should be released or retried if he wins at the Supreme Court, his lawyers argued in written filings. Mississippi said the case should return to the state Supreme Court to review his arguments that the jury strikes were discriminatory.

Flowers was tried six times in the shooting deaths of four people. He was released from prison in 2019 and the state dropped the charges against him the following year, after Evans turned the case over to state officials. Evans stepped down from his job in 2023.

On its own, Mills wrote, the Flowers case does not prove anything. But he said that the Mississippi Supreme Court should have examined that history in considering Pitchford’s appeal.

“The court merely believes that it should have been included in a ‘totality of the circumstances’ analysis of the issue,” Mills wrote.

Lawmakers on Sunday night passed much of the state’s budget for next fiscal year, planning to spend nearly $7.4 billion, $225 million more than the current year, or about a 3% increase.

Although lawmakers by late last week said they had reached agreement on most major spending, they still have some details to hash out and pass on to the governor for his consideration. Legislative leaders said they hope to finish work and end the 2026 regular session as early as Wednesday.

Lawmakers appeared to reach agreement through the weekend on two major spending items – the K-12 education budget, including a teacher pay raise, and how much extra to pump into Medicaid, hoping to avoid a shortfall in the coming year after agency leaders warned them federal pandemic funds that had helped keep the agency afloat have been depleted.

Lawmakers announced Friday they had reached an agreement on a teacher pay raise of $2,000, far short of the $5,000 the House had proffered and $6,000 the Senate had approved. Legislative leaders said the expected Medicaid shortfall and other fiscal issues forced them to reduce the proposed raise. The Senate on Sunday night passed the $3.3-billion education budget, but the House did not. Some lawmakers and education advocates said they are holding out hope that lawmakers might increase the raise with some last-minute negotiations, albeit doubtful.

For Medicaid, lawmakers increased the agency’s spending by about $200 million, with a $35 million “deficit appropriation” to cover the remainder of this fiscal year through June, and an increase of $165 million for the coming budget year.

Lawmakers have a deadline Monday night for filing agreements on general bills and constitutional amendments.

Some major agency budget agreements lawmakers announced over the weekend:

Quote of the Week

In Brief

Charter school bills dead

Even though there were a handful of charter school bills on the table when the session began, most have died as the session comes to a close.

House Bill 1395, which now contains the Senate’s teacher pay raise proposal, includes a provision that would make it easier for school districts to get rid of unused buildings and clarifies the process that gives charter schools first dibs.

It’s the only major charter school bill still in play, aside from the K-12 appropriations bill that gives the charter authorizer board its annual allocation, according to the board’s executive director Lisa Karmacharya.

The board’s main request — which would have allowed charters to expand into areas beyond those with failing districts — is dead.

In the months leading up to the legislative session, Senate leaders made clear their disappointment in the performance of the state’s charter schools. Most of Mississippi’s few charter schools are considered “failing” by the state Department of Education. – Devna Bose

Prison health reforms killed again

Senate Corrections Committee Vice Chairwoman Lydia Chassaniol, a Republican from Winona, has again killed a vehicle for prison health care reforms.

Chassaniol, who has been running the committee while Chairman Juan Barnett, a Democrat from Heidelberg, is out with an illness, declined to either concur with House’s changes or invite more negotiation on SB 2041. House Corrections Chairwoman Rep. Becky Currie, a Republican from Brookhaven, had the House insert her proposals into the measure after Chassaniol killed them with an earlier committee deadline.

The proposals in the now-dead Senate bill included a policy requiring the creation of a hepatitis C program and an HIV program aimed at improving the treatment of prisoners and taking the power to award health contracts away from the Department of Corrections. But the later proposal is still alive through the budget process lawmakers are aiming to finish up this week. Lawmakers could spend over $480 million on the Department of Corrections over the next fiscal year, and Currie hopes to condition some of the spending on the implementation of reforms. – Michael Goldberg

New law defines artificial intelligence

Gov. Tate Reeves signed into law a bill to create a state definition for artificial intelligence.

HB 1723 defines AI as a “machine-based system that can, for a given set of human-defined objectives, make predictions, recommendations or decisions influencing real or virtual environments.”

This is now the third state law enacted to deal with AI. The other two deal with deepfakes in political attack ads and sexually explicit deepfakes of children. There were other bills attempting to regulate AI this session but they all appear to be dead. – Katherine Lin

Supreme Court redistricting heads to final negotiations

House and Senate negotiators are haggling over legislation to redraw the Mississippi Supreme Court districts.

House Speaker Jason White named Republican Rep. Kevin Horan of Grenada, Republican Rep. Jansen Owen of Poplarville and Republican Rep. Joey Hood of Ackerman as the House negotiators.

Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann named Republican Sen. Brice Wiggins of Pascagoula, Republican Sen. Joey Fillingane of Sumrall and Republican Sen. Dean Kirby of Pearl as the Senate negotiators.

A federal judge ruled that one of Mississippi’s Supreme Court districts violates the federal Voting Rights Act because it does not give Black voters a fair shot at electing a candidate of their choice. The judge gave the Legislature a chance to adopt a new map during the 2026 session.

Lawmakers have not yet unveiled a new map for the three districts, and legislative leaders have said they’re waiting to see if the U.S. Supreme Court’s pending ruling in the Louisiana v. Callais decision will impact.

Negotiators have until Monday to file their initial compromise proposal. – Taylor Vance

Reeves vetoes medical marijuana bills

Gov. Tate Reeves has vetoed two bills authored by Rep. Lee Yancey, a Republican from Brandon, that would have eased some regulations on medical marijuana in Mississippi.

The first, HB 895, would have removed the requirement for patients to have a follow-up visit with their doctor six-months after obtaining access to cannabis, would have extended the length of validity of registry ID cards and would have lifted the limit on potency for tinctures, oils and concentrates. In his veto message, Reeves wrote that the legislations would erode safeguards “to minimize the potential diversion of medical marijuana for recreational purposes.”

The second bill, HB 1152, would have created new pathways for patients who suffer chronic, progressive, severely disabling or terminal illnesses that do not meet the current qualifying conditions under Mississippi’s Medical Cannabis Act to access the drugs, including people from other states. Reeves said he agreed with the original intent of the bill, but opposed amendments that would have extended the right to try medical cannabis “to every person on the planet” and posed “an unreasonable risk of pushing the medical marijuana program in the direction of facilitating recreational use.” – Michael Goldberg

By the Numbers

$108 million a year

Total cost of the teacher pay raise compromise lawmakers reported reaching over the weekend.

More Legislative Coverage

Lawmakers strike deal on lower, $2,000 teacher pay raise. Educators say they ‘desperately need’ more

At one point weeks ago, dueling offers of raises from the Senate and House had reached $6,000. Read the story.

After House kills pharmacy benefit manager reform, speaker asks governor to call a special session

The lone remaining bill intended to enhance the regulation and transparency of pharmacy benefit managers died Thursday after the Mississippi House of Representatives chose not to advance the Senate’s versions of the bill or pursue further negotiations on an issue that has long divided the chambers and lawmakers within them. Read the story.

Lawmakers revive ice storm relief after governor’s veto

After Gov. Tate Reeves vetoed a bill that attempted to provide low-interest loans to local governments impacted by Winter Storm Fern, lawmakers on Wednesday night revived the program in another piece of legislation. Read the story.

Lawmakers on Sunday evening finalized the bulk of the state’s $7.36 billion budget for the next fiscal year to fund state agencies and signaled they will conclude their 2026 session by the end of the week.

Legislators still have to pass final budgets on Monday for roughly eight state agencies, but they are on track to spend roughly $225 million more on state services than the current year, or about a 3% increase.

House and Senate leaders told reporters that state spending is growing this year primarily because they’re giving teachers a $2,000 pay raise and pumping more money into the state’s Medicaid program.

Senate Appropriations Chairman Briggs Hopson, a Republican from Vicksburg, said lawmakers had very little wiggle room left for other large spending items once an increase in Medicaid and education spending was factored into the overall budget.

But Sen. Hob Bryan, a Democrat from Amory, said state money is spread thin over the needs of state agencies largely because of recent tax cuts and the ongoing phase-out of the state income tax passed last year.

“It’s very obvious this budget is the first splash of water from what could be a Category 5 hurricane,” Bryan said. “These are self-inflicted structural deficiencies.”

Below are agreed amounts lawmakers said they reached on major state agency budgets over the weekend:

Some other highlights from Sunday night’s budget work includes: 

K-12 education budget still not passed 

The House did not join the Senate in passing the proposed framework for a $3.4-billion K-12 education budget, an increase of about $121 million over the current year. The House skipped over the education budget because the Senate had at that point failed to deliver a report on agreements negotiators reached on other education policies, House lawmakers told Mississippi Today. 

After the House skipped over the education budget bill on Sunday, Senate Education Chairman Dennis DeBar hand-delivered the “conference report” for general education legislation, which includes a teacher pay raise proposal and changes to math and literacy programs, about three hours after the House began plowing through its appropriations calendar.

“I don’t know why they wouldn’t pass it yet,” DeBar said. “Everything I have discussed in the appropriations bill is in that conference report, and a few other things that we incorporated.”

The Senate education chairman did not explain why the Senate hadn’t already sent the House a report for general education legislation by the time lawmakers reconvened on Sunday afternoon, only that the report had been in “drafting.”

House Education Vice Chairman Kent McCarty, a Republican from Hattiesburg, said the House was not going to approve the massive education budget without reviewing legislative agreements on a host of other education priorities. 

“We received the conference report just before 5 p.m. on Sunday evening,” McCarty said. “The budget came up on the calendar hours before. So no, we’re not going to vote on a budget that accounts for half of the general fund and spends millions of new dollars on new programs for literacy, math, and teacher pay without even having a chance to read the conference report that authorizes those programs.”

The House can still pass the K-12 education budget on Monday before a deadline for appropriations and revenue bills. If it doesn’t approve the education budget, lawmakers would have to push back deadlines or come back in a special session to approve an education budget. 

Medicaid costs spike

Both chambers voted to spend $1.17 billion to fund the Mississippi Division of Medicaid, the second largest expense for a state that struggles with abject poverty and poor health. 

Lawmakers were stunned earlier this year by the division’s initial request for a $390-million increase in state funding over the current year, despite the state Medicaid program’s enrollment dropping to its lowest level in over a decade. 

Lawmakers were also baffled, in part, because of a $160-million discrepancy between the agency’s request and a November budget proposal from Gov. Tate Reeves, whose office oversees the Division of Medicaid.

But House and Senate leaders ultimately settled on funding the agency at a $165 million increase from the current year, and also provided an extra $35 million to cover a shortfall in this year’s budget.

A big reason why the state is having to spend more state dollars on funding the agency is that federal pandemic relief dollars that for years bolstered it are now depleted. 

Hopson said providing more state funds to the Division of Medicaid left very little wiggle room in the budget for other spending increases. 

“Medicaid is always an item that we never know exactly what it’s going to be, but you just base it on the best estimates,” Hopson said. 

The agency’s budget increase this year is covered in part with $100 million in capital expense money, or cash reserves, something Hopson said was the first time in recent years that the Legislature has spent what lawmakers call “one-time money” on recurring expenses.

Additional child care assistance stripped from DHS

Lawmakers approved a nearly $50 million cut to the budget for the Department of Human Services, which provides public assistance programs and social services for children, low-income individuals and families. 

Both chambers voted to spend about $103 million on the agency, a 32% reduction from this year’s $152 million appropriation. The diminished spending on human services prompted opposition from House Democrats, who took umbrage with the removal of a provision that would have appropriated an additional $15 million in child care assistance. 

“If we are not providing money for child care assistance, parents are not going to be able to go to work,” said Rep. Zakiya Summers, a Democrat from Jackson.

Rep. Clay Deweese, a Republican from Oxford, said the overall reduction to DHS’s budget was the result of one-time federal money drying up this year. Justifying the removal of additional child care funding, Deweese said lawmakers were constrained by other costs, such as the increase for Medicaid this year.

“It is difficult putting this together,” Deweese said. “This is how this year’s budget came in, and this is what both chambers agreed upon.”

Rep. John Hines, a Democrat from Greenville, said the Legislature’s decision not to approve the additional child care funding was indefensible given Mississippi’s high concentration of residents living in poverty.   

“I don’t know why it is so hard in the poorest state in this country to take care of working-class people,” Hines said. 

Reform on prison spending dies in negotiations

Lawmakers approved a slight reduction to the budget for the Mississippi Department of Corrections, reversing an earlier framework that would have resulted in more spending on state prisons. 

Under the new budget agreement, Mississippi will spend $434 million on the Department of Corrections, nearly $18 million less than the current fiscal year.

Efforts by House Corrections Chairwoman Becky Currie, a Republican from Brookhaven, to condition the agency’s spending on reforms to prison health care policies did not survive negotiations with the Senate. 

The Senate has blocked proposals to improve health care in Mississippi’s prisons, some of which have come to light through an ongoing Mississippi Today investigation. 

Currie said she plans to try again next year.

“Next year is the last year of the term, and I’m looking forward not backward,” Currie said. “I’ve tried hard, it is very frustrating, but all we can do is look forward. We have to fix this.”

A smoother budget process

This year’s budget process appears to be remarkably smoother so far than last year’s, when lawmakers failed to adopt a budget because of political fighting between the two legislative chambers. 

Gov. Tate Reeves was then forced to call legislators into a special session during the summer last year to pass a budget. 

Political pundits wondered if the same thing would happen again this year, considering the two chambers had killed the other’s main legislative priorities. But it appears budget negotiators have avoided much of the political infighting that plagued last year’s budget.  

“I’ve been doing this for about six years now, and this is the smoothest I’ve ever seen it go,” House Appropriations Committee E Chairman Karl Oliver said.

Based on the recent party primary elections results for the United States Senate seat, even Mississippi Democrats see a glimmer of hope for the November general election.

Granted, it is only a glimmer. Republican U.S. Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith remains a heavy favorite in Mississippi to win reelection this November and continue the GOP dominance in the state.

But across the nation, Democrats are licking their lips, believing based on turnout in party primaries and special elections, that they have an excellent chance to capture a majority of the U.S. House seats and a reasonable opportunity to win a majority in the Senate.

Time will tell, but multiple results across the nation have bolstered Democrats’ hopes as President Donald Trump remains unpopular. The belief is that strong performances in current party primary elections and special elections will bode well for the Democrats nationwide in the November midterm election, when one-third of the U.S. Senate seats and all of the 435 U.S. House seats will be on the ballot.

Democrats continue to overperform and even win in Republican strongholds. Heck, even Trump is now represented by a Democrat in the Florida state House. A Democrat just won a special election to represent the area that includes Trump’s beloved Mar-a-Lago.

In ruby red Texas, surprisingly more people voted in the Democratic primary for the United States Senate than did in the Republican primary. The 2.3 million Texans who voted in the Senate primary where James Talarico, a state House member and Presbyterian minister, defeated U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett, represented a record in the Lone Star state for a Democratic primary.

The large Democratic turnout occurred even though the hotly contested Republican primary included U.S. Sen. John Cornyn and state Attorney General Ken Paxton.

Many believe that the strong turnout in the Democratic primary could portend Republicans losing the Senate seat in November.

The Texas party primary totals are of note because the mechanics of elections there are much like those in Mississippi. In both Texas and Mississippi, people do not declare before Election Day as a Republican or Democrat. They select on Election Day in which primary to vote.

Unlike Texas, in the recent Mississippi primary for the Senate, more people, though not significantly more, voted in the Republican primary.

On the Republican side, a little more than 156,000 people voted in the election where incumbent Hyde-Smith faced one challenger. On the Democratic side, just under 150,000 voted in a three-way race where Lowndes County District Attorney Scott Colom won as easily as Hyde-Smith did on the Republican side.

While Democrats in Mississippi did not make as strong a showing as they did in Texas, they still have reason for optimism.

After all, in the last Mississippi Senate primary held in a midterm, when the office of president was not on the ballot, many more people voted on the Republican side than in the Democratic contest.

In 2018, 157,170 voted in the Republican primary where incumbent Roger Wicker’s only opponent was little known Richard Boyanton.

On the Democratic side the same year, 87,931 people voted in a six-candidate field that included then-state House Democratic leader David Baria, state Rep. Omeria Scott and philanthropist Howard Sherman, the husband of Meridian native Sela Ward, an Emmy winning actress.

Not surprisingly, Wicker won comfortably against Baria in November.

In the 2019 party primaries for Mississippi governor, significantly more people voted for the Republican candidates than the Democratic candidates. At one time, when Democrats had firm control of the state, Republican primaries seldom even occurred. But now it is the Republicans who control the state.

One of the first significant Republican primaries occurred in 1987 for governor. But in that race only 18,855 voted in the Republican primary compared to the 802,572 who voted on the Democratic side.

In the 2000s as Republican strength in the state continued to grow, their primary eventually surpassed the Democrats’ primary in terms of turnout.

The question is: Will the relatively strong showing for the Democrats in Mississippi in their recent U.S. Senate primary portend any surprises for November?