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OXFORD — Police disbanded a pro-Palestinian student protest at the University of Mississippi less than an hour after it officially started when counter-protesters threw a water bottle and other items at the protest, prompting the protesters to respond in kind with water.

When police removed the pro-Palestinian students from the Quad, a grassy area behind the library, the largely white male students roared.

“Nah, nah, nah, nah, hey, hey, hey, good bye,” the counter-protesters chanted. 

The confrontation was in reaction to a largely peaceful protest held by a group called UMiss for Palestine that called on the university to divest from companies tied to Israel, a common demand at student protests across the country in the wake of the Israel-Hamas War. The university has said it doesn’t have any direct investment in Israeli-based companies, and that no arrests were made or injuries reported. Nationally, about 2,000 arrests have been made, according to AP.

Many of the roughly 60 protesters wore masks, chanting “free, free Palestine” and “disclose, divest, we will not stop, we will not rest.” 

But they were vastly outnumbered by more than 200 counter-protesters, who drowned them out with shouts of “fuck Joe Biden,” “whose your daddy,” “USA” and “we can’t hear you.” Some of the counter-protesters shouted racist remarks, such as “hit the showers” and “your nose is huge.”

The campus in north Mississippi had seen two gatherings last fall after the Oct. 7 attacks — a vigil organized by Hillel, a Jewish organization, and a rally for humanitarian aid for Palestinians — but multiple students on both sides said Thursday’s protest was the tensest they had seen. Ole Miss, a largely white university, has few Palestinian and Jewish students.

It was the first pro-Palestine protest at a Mississippi university since students at Columbia University set up an encampment about two weeks ago.

The sheer novelty seemed to draw some of the counter-protesters who came from Fraternity Row, a few blocks away from the Quad.

“Um, we were gonna go to the pool, but then we heard this was gonna happen so we were like fuck that, we’re gonna come over here and counter-protest it,” said Trevor Lahey, a 21-year-old business major, who said he came out with his fraternity brothers, though he wouldn’t say which one. 

Though the pro-Palestinian students have a right to free speech, Lahey added, he thought they were taking it too far. 

“I don’t care that much, I just don’t want them to encamp on my school,” Lahey said. “It looks ugly. I’m paying for them to be there.” 

The Pro-Palestinian protesters were not setting up camp. They wouldn’t speak to a reporter beyond a statement they had prepared, but Mississippi Today couldn’t obtain it by press time.  

Earlier in the day, Gov. Tate Reeves said he was aware of the protest and that campus, city, county and state law enforcement were “being deployed and coordinated.” 

“Peaceful protests are allowed and protected – no matter how outrageous those protesters views (sic) may seem to some of us,” he wrote. “But unlawful behavior will not be tolerated. It will be dealt with accordingly. Law and order will be maintained!”

University police had initially erected metal barricades separating the student protesters from the Phi Mu Fountain, but the counter-protesters began to congregate behind the library. Just steps separated the two camps, with a handful of officers standing between them.

The situation began to escalate when a student in hot pink athleisure exchanged words with a student protester wearing a keffiyeh. The student protester charged at her, but others held her back. 

Then a half-eaten sandwich was thrown at the protesters, prompting the police to hem them in with the barricades. 

It’s pointless to protest in the U.S., said a 21-year-old student who only gave his name as Dillon. The student protesters could better support Palestine by going “over there,” he said, adding he thought it was a “stupid war” that he doesn’t support.  

But he still decided to join the counter-protesters, Dillon said.

“I just wanted to see it for myself,” he said. “I wanted to be a part of something. I love my country. I love them, too. I just don’t think what they’re supporting is right, in my opinion.”

“They shouldn’t be throwing shit, in my opinion,” he added, referring to both sides. 

That’s when a counter-protester threw a water bottle. The student protesters threw something back, and soon, food-related items were volleying across the barricade. 

In an attempt to de-escalate, the police began to escort the protesters away. The counter-protesters cheered and started running after them, which some police and staff with the University of Mississippi First Amendment Support Team tried to prevent, leading one student to shout, “I’m not walking with them, I’m just walking this way!” 

“Nobody fucking cares, shut up!” a white female protester yelled as she swatted him with a plastic bag of takeout. 

“Assault!” The counter-protesters shouted. 

A police officer in a vest pulled her aside. Her mouth trembled, and she initially refused to give her full name. A legal observer with the Mississippi Center for Justice slipped her his card. 

“I’m trying to let you go,” the officer said, exasperated. “But I’m going to annotate that this happened. If you don’t want to cooperate, I’ll just take you to jail.” 

Police warned other students for their behavior. On Chapel Lane, where the student protesters waited to go inside the School of Applied Science, four officers escorted two Black students to their cars as the counter-protesters jeered. 

A plainclothes officer told the crowd to get back. 

“I’m doing the same thing they’re doing — I have freedom of speech,” one student said to him. 

“Absolutely, 100%, but you can’t come up to them,” the officer said.

Inside the School of Applied Sciences, the pro-Palestinian protesters holed up in a classroom. They comforted each other, made a plan to leave campus and accounted for all their sashes and flags. Through windows covered in white vinyl, the visages of counter-protesters could be seen. 

“Y’all did beautifully,” said one student, who didn’t give a name, as students clapped for each other. “I’m so happy.”

Near tears, a student named Jana, whose family is from Palestine, thanked the group.

“Hey guys, I know that what just happened was really intimidating, and it was a little scary, but I just want to say I’m so proud of you guys,” she said. “This wasn’t going to happen in Oxford without all of you guys. Palestine was being heard. And I just want to thank you guys so much. I know that was such a big risk, but this is the most that people have ever thought for us, so don’t give up. I know that was really hard, but we need to keep fighting. This was just the start of it, okay?”

Jana grew up in Southaven, but her dad was born in a refugee camp in Jericho, in the Palestinian West Bank. She said her family still knows people in Gaza.

The idea that her university could be investing in companies connected to Israel is personal, she said. Along with other students, she’s tried to investigate Ole Miss’s ties to military defense contractors like Raytheon, and it’s something she plans to look into more. 

“Our university endowment has no direct investment in Israeli-based companies, the university offers no study abroad opportunities to Israel, and the university has no formal agreements with defense contractors,” Jacob Batte, the university’s media relations director, wrote in an email. 

Jana said she was surprised at how many students came out, considering many of them aren’t affected by the conflict. 

“I don’t even know if they were just against us, or if they were there to just like, get a good laugh,”she said. 

The police helped the protesters get to a bus that would take them to their cars. The counter-protesters started barking at the students, and as a student gave them a middle-finger, one of them shouted “at least it’s not a plane this time,” a possible reference to the Sept. 11 attacks.

As the crowd died down, three Black friends in the parking lots said they wished it would’ve been possible for the two groups to have a dialogue. They didn’t know much about the conflict and would like to learn more. 

But the counter-protesters made that impossible, they said. 

“They just conformed to the larger group,” Hannah Brock, a 21-year-old social work major observed. 

Both sides should’ve had representatives debate, they added. 

“It wasn’t equal, like—” said Victoria Fox, a 21-year-old criminal justice major.

“They were just throwing out insults,” 21-year-old Carlesis Ferguson said about the counter-protesters. “You couldn’t even hear (the Pro-Palestinian students) and it was their protest.” 

In the Circle, the former home of the campus’s Confederate monument and where the protest was slated to be held before the university convinced students to move it, Chancellor Glenn Boyce spoke at a ceremony for JROTC students. The mood was calm, as if the protest hadn’t happened.

“I’m humbled to be here with you today,” Boyce said. “Once again you represent this university’s legacy at its absolute finest.”

The post ‘It wasn’t equal:’ Counter-protesters overwhelm pro-Palestinian students at the University of Mississippi appeared first on Mississippi Today.

The Mississippi Supreme Court in a 7-2 ruling found that Parents for Public Schools does not have legal standing to challenge the constitutionality of the state Legislature sending public money to private schools.

The opinion, released Thursday, did not address the issue of whether the $10 million appropriation made in 2022 by the Legislature to private schools was constitutional.

Justice Robert Chamberlin of Southaven, writing for the majority, concluded Parents for Public Schools did not have standing to bring the lawsuit, in part, because harm to the public schools could not be proven.

Chamberlin wrote that the public education advocacy group says the legislative appropriation “will adversely affect the funding of public schools by legislating a competitive advantage to the independent schools who will receive the funds. This alleged future harm, however, is speculative and not sufficient to meet even Mississippi’s permissive standing requirements.”

Coloring the ruling of the majority at least in part, is that the funds appropriated to the private schools were federal COVID-19 relief funds and not state money.

The office of state Attorney General Lynn Fitch had argued that the case should be dismissed because of lack of standing.

“We are pleased with the court’s opinion, which will release $10 million in federal funding for infrastructure grants to schools across Mississippi,” Fitch said in a statement.

Will Bardwell, an attorney for Parents for Public Schools, told Mississippi Today that the Thursday ruling was “outrageous” because the organization he represents had a “direct interest” in ensuring Mississippi’s public schools were not undermined.

“This is not how courts are supposed to operate,” Bardwell said. “This is not how courts are supposed to work. When lawmakers ignore the constitution, courts are supposed to stand in their way. Other than Justice Leslie king and Justice Jim Kitchens, seven members of the Mississippi Supreme Court didn’t do that today. And that’s sad.” 

The lawsuit revolved around Section 208 of the Mississippi Constitution, which declares simply that no public funds shall go to any school “that at the time of receiving such funds is not conducted as a free public school.”

During oral arguments before the Court in February, attorneys for Parents for Public Schools contended that it made no difference whether the funds were state or federal funds, only that they were public funds.

Parents for Public Schools argued that it was a group composed of parents of public school children so it should have standing to pursue the lawsuit.

Hinds County Chancellor Crystal Wise Martin agreed with that argument, but the state’s highest court overturned her ruling.

Chamberlin wrote that because the funds were federal, “state taxpayer standing
is untenable under the facts of this case.”

Justice Leslie King of Greenville argued that Parents for Public Schools did have standing. King, who was joined in his opinion by Justice James Kitchens of Crystal Springs, questioned whether anyone would have standing to file a lawsuit under the majority’s opinion.

King wrote, “The majority’s holding today flies in the face of our longstanding liberal standing jurisprudence and severely limits the ability of Mississippi citizens to challenge government actions that violate the constitution.”

Mississippi Today’s Taylor Vance contributed to this report.

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A bill to correct an outdated law barring in vitro fertilization children from next of kin inheritance passed both chambers Wednesday afternoon and now heads to the governor to be signed into law. 

This is the fifth year Rep. Dana McLean, R-Columbus, filed the measure to give inheritance rights to children conceived via IVF after the death of one parent, as 27 other states have done. These bills died in the legislative process the last four years.

“What a relief … I am just so thrilled that after all this time we came to an agreement that will soon be law,” McLean said. “This will help countless families and children have the right to be able to receive these benefits as they should.”

McLean’s legislation was inspired by the personal story of one of her constituents, Katie Studdard, whose 5-year-old daughter has been denied Social Security benefits from her late biological father since birth. 

READ MORE: Five years later, this Mississippi mom is still fighting an outdated law blocking her child’s inheritance

“And that’s how a lot of bills that we end up sponsoring come to us – from stories, from an issue someone is having where we need to make adjustments to state law,” McLean said.

Studdard, who lives in Columbus, started fertility treatments with her late husband, Chris McDill, before he died of cancer. She did not have success with the embryos while her husband was alive, but decided to continue trying for a baby after her husband’s death. She conceived her daughter Elyse a year after her husband died. 

House Bill 1542 passed the House unanimously in mid-March and overwhelmingly passed the Senate in mid-April at the eleventh hour. But the Senate passed it with a reverse repealer, referring it to conference in the hopes of expanding the bill beyond its original scope to protect in vitro fertilization and other forms of assisted reproduction, in the wake of recent events calling fertility treatments into question in Alabama. 

Ultimately, that was too big a task to take on at the end of the session, with pro-life groups coming out publicly to express concern about new language they didn’t have time to vet, explained Sen. Joey Fillingane, R-Sumrall. Fillingane was one of the lawmakers tasked with debating the details of the bill in conference. 

House and Senate conferees reverted the bill back mostly to its original language and were able to achieve the primary goal of securing inheritance rights for posthumously-conceived children with the final version. In addition to that goal, Fillingane said, conferees were able to come up with a definition for “alternative reproduction,” which didn’t previously exist in Mississippi. 

“I think Chairman (Brice) Wiggins and Chairman (Joey) Hood (of the Judiciary A committee where the bill was assigned) thought … ‘let’s get this issue addressed for this family in Columbus that has waited (five) years … and let’s at least get a definition in place sort of as a starting point to build a framework out hopefully over the next sessions to add to protect the IVF procedures and processes and surrogacy,’” said Fillingane.

Fillingane had two of his own children through surrogacy, but traveled to California to do so – because the state has clear statutory guidelines around parental rights in surrogacy cases. 

“I did not feel comfortable having my kids in Mississippi … there were absolutely no protections that the state of Mississippi offers for parents who have children this way. As a family lawyer, I was uniquely situated to see some of these things,” he said.

Senate Judiciary A Chairman Brice Wiggins, R-Pascagoula, who was instrumental in getting the bill to the finish line, wasn’t available for comment. 

Although it’s been a trying few years, Studdard said she has a newfound appreciation for the Legislature. As a teacher, she has live streamed floor debates during her lunch period at school, has become acquainted with the legislative language of various iterations of the bill, and talked extensively with lawmakers. She says that every time she hears a new legislative word that she doesn’t know, she googles it.

“I’ve learned a lot,” she said. “I think anybody going through any life-changing event, like I did with (my husband’s) cancer, and then IVF, and now this bill …you gain a whole new appreciation and so much knowledge you never thought you’d know.”

Studdard is overjoyed that the Senate proposed naming the law after her late husband, Chris McDill, and is proud to model for her daughter and her students that it is possible for an everyday person to enact policy change. 

Primarily, she hopes the benefits her daughter will start receiving next year will go toward her future education.

“I just think this financially will create so much security for her and her education, that’s number one for me,” Studdard said. “I want her to not have to worry about taking out a student loan. I want her to have a good financial start to life when she goes to college. To be able to hand that to your child is a gift.”

When McLean first authored a bill to address Studdard’s predicament, it was the first year of her first four-year term. Now, it’s the first year of her second term, and she says it feels full circle. 

“When (Studdard) first told me about her little girl and being a single mom, at that time Elyse was just a baby, and it really hit home to me because I am also a single mother of a daughter, and I understood the significance of this and how we really need to protect children and women and mothers and families,” McLean reflected. “I felt like it was really something I could get behind.”

The post IVF heir bill heads to governor’s desk appeared first on Mississippi Today.

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The final version of Medicaid expansion in the Legislature could leave tens of thousands of uninsured, working Mississippians waiting indefinitely for Medicaid coverage – unless the federal government makes an unprecedented move.

The compromise lawmakers reached minutes before a legislative deadline on Monday night makes expansion contingent on a work requirement. That means even if both chambers pass the bill, the estimated 200,000 Mississippians who would qualify for coverage would need to wait until the federal government, under either a Biden or Trump administration, approved the waiver necessary to implement a work requirement – which could take years, if ever.

Lawmakers in favor of the work requirement have not been open to allowing expansion to move forward while the work requirement is in flux. The House bill proposed expansion be implemented immediately but included a “trigger law” similar to North Carolina’s. The “trigger law” mandated that if the federal government ever changed its policy on allowing states to implement a work requirement, Mississippi would move to implement one immediately.

Senator Brice Wiggins, R-Pascagoula, one of the Medicaid expansion conferees, posted on social media “if CMMS wants people covered then it will approve (the work requirement). Nothing prevents them from approving it other than POTUS/CMMS philosophy.” 

But even in states where a work requirement was approved, litigation ensued, with the courts finding the approval of the work requirement unlawful for a number of reasons, according to a KFF report. 

Senate Medicaid Chairman Kevin Blackwell, R-Southaven, did not respond to Mississippi Today by the time the story published. 

Will a Biden – or Trump – administration approve the work requirement?

The Biden administration has never approved the waiver necessary for a work requirement and has rescinded ones previously granted under the Trump administration. Waivers granted under the Trump administration were not granted under the current circumstances as Mississippi. 

Mississippi Today reached out to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services for comment but did not hear back by the time of publication. 

Joan Alker, Medicaid expert and executive director of Georgetown University’s Center for Children and Families, explained that the Trump administration has never approved a work requirement up front for a traditional expansion plan like Mississippi’s.  

In states like Kentucky and Arkansas, Alker explained, the Trump administration approved work requirements as a means of limiting already-existing expansion plans. In Georgia, an outlier state that remains in litigation with the Biden administration for rescinding the state’s work requirement waiver, the Trump administration approved a work requirement for a plan that isn’t considered full “expansion” under the Affordable Care Act and doesn’t draw down the increased federal match rate.

“If the Legislature passed a bill with both of those requirements being non-negotiable, (the work requirement and the enhanced match) they need to know that there is no precedent for that kind of approval from either a Biden or a Trump CMS,” she said.

What happens if a work requirement is approved?

In the best case scenario – that a work requirement is approved by some administration in the near future – its implementation could mean an increase in administrative costs and a decrease in eligible enrollees getting the coverage for which they qualify. Georgia’s plan, for example, requires people document they’re in school, working or participating in other activities. The requirement has cost taxpayers at least $26 million, and more than 90% of that has gone toward administrative and consulting costs, according to KFF Health News.    

“Even if CMS does approve (it), actually implementing and administering work requirements is costly and complex,” explained Morgan Henderson, the principal data scientist on a study commissioned by the Center for Mississippi Health Policy and conducted by the Hilltop Institute at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. “This would almost certainly significantly dampen enrollment relative to a scenario with no work requirements, and cost the state millions to implement.”

Many of the cases where work requirements were approved but then deemed unlawful were due to court rulings that found that the work requirement resulted in lower enrollment, counterproductive to the primary goal of Medicaid. 

In addition to lowering enrollment, the work requirements have not led to increased employment, the primary goal of the work requirement, explained Alice Middleton, deputy director of the Hilltop Institute and a former deputy director of the Division of Eligibility and Enrollment at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. 

“Recent guidance has been clear that work requirements would jeopardize health coverage and access without increasing employment,” Middleton said. “While a future Trump Administration may revisit these decisions and approve work requirements again, legal challenges are likely to follow …”

Senate leaders compromised with the House on a number of fine points regarding the work requirement: reducing the mandatory employment from 120 to 100 hours a month; reducing the number of employment verification renewals from four times to once a year; and removing the clause that would require the state to enter into litigation with the federal government, as Georgia did, if the federal government turns down the work requirement. 

“It was encouraging to see both sides compromising, but, ultimately, the inclusion of work requirements presents multiple sets of challenges to successful expansion,” Henderson said.

The post Work requirement will likely delay or invalidate Medicaid expansion in Mississippi appeared first on Mississippi Today.

For a decade, House Democrats have been beating the drum — often when it seemed no one else was listening — to expand Medicaid to provide health care for working poor Mississippians.

It looks as though a large majority of those House Democrats as early as Wednesday will vote against and possibly kill a bill that purports to expand Medicaid.

They say the agreement reached late Monday between House and Senate Republicans may be called Medicaid expansion, but it is not written to actually go into effect or help the hundreds of thousands of Mississippians who need health care coverage.

“It is just like an eggshell with no egg in the middle,” said Rep. Timaka James-Jones, a Democratic from Belzoni in her first term. “It does not make sense.”

Republicans, who have have supermajorities in both the House and Senate and do not need a single Democratic vote to pass any bill, have for years relished their power over legislative Democrats. But when a three-fifths vote is needed and Republicans aren’t in unanimous agreement like on this current bill, Democrats have real power to flex.

Earlier on Tuesday, after a closed-door luncheon meeting of House Democrats, Rep. Robert Johnson of Natchez, the minority leader, informed Speaker Jason White that 32 of the 41 House Democrats planned to vote no. That news sent shockwaves through the Capitol.

With several House Republicans also expected to vote no, that number of dissenting Democrats would likely prevent the legislation from getting the three-fifths majority needed to pass. And no votes by 32 Democrats would surely mean the proposal would fall short of the two-thirds majority that would be needed later to override an expected veto from Gov. Tate Reeves, who is opposed to accepting more than a $1 billion a year in federal funds to provide health care for an estimated 200,000 Mississippians.

At issue for the House Democrats is a work requirement that Senate Republicans insisted be placed in the bill and that House negotiators agreed to minutes before the Monday night deadline to reach an agreement between the two chambers.

Federal officials have made it clear in the past that they would not approve a work requirement as part of Medicaid expansion. But in the proposal that House and Senate leaders agreed to, Medicaid expansion would not go into effect until federal officials approve a work requirement.

Senate leaders have expressed optimism that the Biden administration would be so pleased with longtime Medicaid expansion holdout Mississippi making an effort that it would approve a work requirement, or that the conservative federal 5th Circuit Court would approve it if litigated.

“It is tough. For the 11 years I have served in the House, I have supported the state expanding Medicaid,” said Rep. John Faulkner, D-Holly Springs. “But the truth is this conference report really doesn’t do anything to help poor people who need it.”

The comments made by Faulkner were echoed by multiple House Democrats at the luncheon meeting, according to numerous sources inside the meeting.

After that meeting, Democratic leader Johnson relayed those sentiments and the Democrats’ plans to vote against the proposal to White.

So White called a Tuesday afternoon meeting with Johnson. After the Republican speaker and Democratic leader met behind closed doors, Johnson announced on the House floor that House Democrats would hold another caucus meeting. It did not last long.

After that meeting, several Democrats said their plans to vote against the bill had not changed, though some acknowledged privately that voting against the bill would be difficult. One member, when asked if the Democrats still planned to vote against the proposal in large numbers, replied, “It is fluid. I don’t know. We will see.”

Many of the Democrats praised White, a first-term speaker, for finally tackling Medicaid expansion. And they praised the original House bill that that allowed Medicaid expansion to go into effect in Mississippi like it had in 40 other states even if a work requirement was struck down by federal officials. They also praised Republican Medicaid Chairwoman Missy McGee for her work to pass “a clean” Medicaid expansion bill.

READ MORE: House agrees to work requirement, Senate concedes covering more people in Medicaid expansion deal

But they expressed disappointment with the final agreement worked out between House and Senate leaders with the non-negotiable work requirement. They said they had informed House leaders all along that they would oppose a compromise that included a work requirement.

“We know all eyes are on us right now because the Republican supermajority couldn’t reach an agreement among themselves,” said Rep. Daryl Porter, D-Summit. “Republican infighting on Medicaid expansion becoming our responsibility to referee feels unfair when they’re the ones who couldn’t get the support for their own bill. They’re waiting to see if we’ll bail them out.”

Several House Democrats said it would be difficult to go back home and explain to their constituents that they voted against Medicaid expansion.

But Rep. Rickey Thompson, D-Tupelo, said people should not view them as voting against Medicaid expansion simply because the bill would not expand Medicaid.

“It just puts something on paper, but it does not do anything,” said Thompson.

“It is not Medicaid expansion,” said Zakiya Summers, D-Jackson, who said she campaigned on Medicaid expansion when she first ran and was first elected in 2019. She spoke as a surrogate for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Brandon Presley last year in support of Medicaid expansion.

Rep. Bryant Clark, D-Pickens, said it would be more difficult to explain to constituents that they could not get health care through Medicaid even after the Legislature approved it than to vote against it and explain the reason for that vote.

Numerous members said Rep. Percy Watson, D-Hattiesburg, made the most salient point at the Democrats’ first caucus meeting on Tuesday.

Watson, the longest serving member of the House, told the story of a vote in the 1982 session on a bill that would have allowed local school districts to enact kindergarten and require mandatory school attendance. Watson said he voted for the bill, but later was pleased that it died.

If that bill had passed, there would not have been the landmark special session later that year when statewide kindergarten was created and school attendance was mandated statewide.

“Sometimes it takes more than one session to pass something important,” Watson said.

Everyone at the Capitol is closely tracking what the House Democrats decide — including Senate Republicans, who are reportedly struggling to get a three-fifths vote of their own to pass the bill in that chamber.

After word spread Tuesday of the House Democrats’ meeting and potential killing of the expansion bill, Senate Medicaid Chair Kevin Blackwell, R-Southaven, said he would not present the expansion proposal in his chamber until after the House acted.

The bill, which faces a Thursday evening deadline, could be sent back for additional negotiations where the work requirement could be removed. But the Senate has thus far not yielded on the work requirement — something that House Democrats, clearly, believe would result in the bill never going into effect.

READ MORE: Back-and-forth: House, Senate swap Medicaid expansion proposals, counter offers

The post Why many House Democrats say they’ll vote against a bill that is ‘Medicaid expansion in name only’ appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Following a contentious hearing Tuesday in the disappearance and death of a Jackson man, a Hinds County judge said he intends to keep an injunction in place until the state can complete an autopsy. 

Chancery Court Judge Dewayne Thomas heard arguments Tuesday morning in a lawsuit to determine who will decide what happens to the remains of Belhaven Heights resident Dau Mabil and whether an independent autopsy can happen. 

Mabil, 33, disappeared March 25, and three weeks later, his body was found over 50 miles away in the Pearl River in Lawrence County. 

The day that a preliminary autopsy determined that the body was that of Mabil, his brother, Bul, filed the lawsuit against Mabil’s wife, Karissa Bowley, and state investigators: the Capitol Police and the State Crime Lab. None of the defendants said they were notified of the April 18 hearing when Thomas entered the emergency temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction. 

Bul Mabil and his attorneys have raised suspicions about what led to Dau Mabil’s death, and they argue that an independent autopsy is the only way to be certain there was no foul play – contrary to what the Lawrence County sheriff has said. U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson has requested the Justice Department investigate.

On Tuesday, that led to pointed questions by Bul Mabil’s attorney Lisa Ross to Bowley, who testified for nearly two hours. 

Ross’ questions included implications about whether Bowley or some of her family members  had something to do with Mabil’s disappearance, including introduction of text message evidence showing that the couple had fought and spent a few days apart in the weeks leading up to him going missing. 

The questioning culminated when Paloma Wu, who is representing Bowley, asked if she killed Mabil or knew who did, and Bowley said no.

Ross also asked Bowley other reasons why her husband went missing, including past arguments they had, money, whether Mabil was suicidal and why she didn’t accompany him on March 25. 

Throughout testimony, Wu made multiple objections to Ross’ questioning, asking about how they were relevant, saying they were hearsay and they should be stricken from the record. Judge Thomas allowed most of the questions. 

“This has become a performance for free-wheeling defamation,” Wu said about the attorney’s questioning. “This is not a murder trial against Karissa.” 

To date, there has been no evidence of foul play and nobody has been criminally charged. 

Bowley said she would have agreed to an independent autopsy if Bul Mabil had just asked, and she would have preferred the family to have a conversation rather than having to go to court.  

Multiple times, Ross asked Bowley if she would agree to make the results of the state’s autopsy public and to allow an independent autopsy on Mabil’s body.

“I have no reason not to,” Bowley replied. 

In court filings, Bul Mabil argued he should be considered the next of kin who can make decisions about his brother’s body rather than his brother’s wife. Wu said the state law is clear that a surviving spouse takes precedence as next of kin over siblings and other descendants. 

After the hearing, Ross said her questions highlight how there is no Mississippi case law that defines who counts as a surviving spouse. In other states, she found that courts have ruled that an estranged or separated spouse does not count as next of kin. 

A motion by Capitol Police and the State Crime Lab filed late last week asks the judge to dismiss the temporary restraining order and lawsuit complaint. 

Thomas said he plans to issue an order Thursday to address pending motions and issues raised in the hearing, and he said he will release a separate order addressing Bowley’s request to be added as a plaintiff. 

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Rev. Reginald Buckley joined hundreds of doctors, clergy, and Mississippians from over 35 communities at the Capitol in Jackson for a “Full Expansion Day” rally, urging legislators to expand Medicaid coverage under the federal Affordable Care Act on Tuesday, April 16, 2024.

READ MORE: ‘A matter of life and death’: Hundreds rally at Capitol for full Medicaid expansion

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Hearings for new members of the governing board of Mississippi’s public universities last week were in a small, out-of-the-way room on the fourth floor of the Capitol that does not have live-streaming capabilities. 

Senate committee meetings are usually broadcast on YouTube, a point of pride for the chamber where lawmakers occasionally mock the Mississippi House for not doing the same. 

But the failure to broadcast the hearings for Gov. Tate Reeves’ nominees to the Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees means there is no way for students, faculty or staff who could not make it to Jackson to observe the proceedings to know what occurred, even as, according to multiple senators, the meeting was standing-room-only. 

This is noteworthy because the IHL Board meetings are pro forma; the 12 trustees almost always vote in lock-step and rarely discuss policy proposals during regular open meetings in Jackson. The Senate has advise-and-consent power on the governor’s nominees, so its confirmation hearings are one of the few times trustees, who serve nine-year terms, must take questions from representatives of the public. 

Though Reeves’ four nominees were asked by Sen. Nicole Boyd, R-Oxford, the chair of the Senate Colleges and Universities Committee, about why they wanted to serve on the IHL board, multiple senators told Mississippi Today they could not recall, or did not ask, the appointees any questions about higher education issues. The nominees were confirmed by the full Senate with no questions on Sunday afternoon. 

The committee hearing occurred on April 23 at 1 p.m. in room 407, a small room tucked away in a corner of the fourth floor observation balcony, behind a scanner, a security guard, an assistant’s desk and a sign that says “NO ADMITTANCE Senate Staff Only.” (John Sewell, IHL’s spokesperson, said he did not recall the sign being outside the door that day.)

“I really don’t think I thought about how it didn’t have live-streaming capabilities,” said Boyd, who is also a Senate conferee embroiled in the contentious Medicaid expansion negotiations. “There wasn’t anything sinister about it.” 

Boyd added that before the committee hearing, she and the chair of the House Colleges and Universities Committee had interviewed the four nominees. She said she was excited about the different experiences the new trustees would bring to the board. 

“Our committee really wants to work closely with the college board and the community college board,” Boyd said. “I wish there were cameras in there because it’s more of an intimate setting. I would like to have more meetings in there … just because the room is small and you’re around the table.”

New IHL board member Jerry Griffith, a retired IRS agent who previously served on the Gaming Commission, said he was even confused if the hearing was public or private when he was contacted by Mississippi Today. 

“Please forgive me, I’m not trying to be ugly or anything, but I’m so new to the board,” Griffith said. “I’m not sure if I can share anything.” 

Griffith said he would be happy to chat with Mississippi Today after he made some calls, but he did not respond to further inquiries. Charlie Stephenson, the president of the Mississippi State Bulldog Club Board of Directors, and Don Clark, an attorney at Butler Snow, did not respond to Mississippi Today’s requests for comment. 

The final new board member, Jimmy Heidelberg, an attorney from Pascagoula, said he did not know all the committee members, but that Boyd and several other senators asked him about his education and professional experience. 

“She just said we’ve all got your information and your background, is there anything else you want to add or ask me and I said, ‘well, it was pretty thorough,’” Heidelberg recalled, adding that he told the committee he was also concerned with Mississippi’s declining population of college-aged residents. 

“I said, ‘we need the best universities that we can have to keep kids home,’” he added. 

Heidelberg was not asked about any policies he would support to achieve that goal, and he said he wouldn’t speak on that because he is not yet familiar with the board’s inner workings. 

Mississippi Today asked if he supported the proposal from State Auditor Shad White to defund college degrees that don’t contribute to the state’s economy. 

“I don’t know specifically what you’re talking about, but I think everybody would share if you go to college and study and achieve a degree, hopefully you will come out to be a contributing citizen with a skill that you can support yourself and your family on,” he said. “That’s the point of education.” 

This session, a failed effort to rename Mississippi University for Women threw a spotlight on the ailing enrollment of the state’s regional colleges. Lawmakers introduced several controversial proposals to reduce the number of public universities in the state, prompting outcry, particularly from supporters of Mississippi’s historically Black public universities — Jackson State University, Alcorn State University and Mississippi Valley State University. 

Now, just one graduate of those three universities will sit on the IHL board after the Senate confirmed Reeves’ nominees. Griffith’s background report shows he graduated from Delta State University and had attended Jackson State, Boyd said. 

But senators barely, if at all, asked the nominees questions about higher education, multiple sources told Mississippi Today. 

“I really didn’t have that many questions, and I don’t remember that many questions being asked of really any of them,” said Sen. Scott DeLano, R-Biloxi. 

That’s not the purpose of these hearings, DeLano added. He noted Room 407 was so packed, extra chairs had to be brought in. The presidents of Mississippi State University and Delta State University were in attendance.  

“Generally speaking, we don’t get into that kind of stuff,” DeLano said. “It’s very rare, unless it was a reappointment, but other than that, you don’t want to catch somebody off guard or flat-footed on an issue they do not have … background information to understand why we’re asking.” 

The hearings are more about affirming the nominees’ backgrounds, multiple senators said, after an investigation by the legislative watchdog. Boyd asked the nominees why they wanted to be on the IHL board. 

“We got a really good sense of who they are and what they’re going to bring to the college board, and I’m appreciative of people of that caliber, who could go sit and retire, giving back because the college board takes a ton of time,” Boyd said. 

The last time the Senate used its power to reject an IHL appointee was in 1996 when it repeatedly turned down four of Gov. Kirk Fordice’s nominees: Hassell Franklin of Houston, Ralph Simmons of Laurel, John McCarty of Jackson and Tom McNeese of Columbia. The four nominees were later confirmed in a special session.

“We want to have some general idea of where someone stands,” DeLano said, “but for the most part those boards are supposed to be independent, and they’re supposed to be subject-matter experts.” 

Sen. Briggs Hopson, R-Vicksburg, said he couldn’t recall much of the meeting because it is the busiest time of year for him. Like other senators who spoke with Mississippi Today, he complimented the accomplishments of two of Reeves’ nominees: Clark, the attorney for Butler Snow, and Heidelberg, the Pascagoula attorney, who both graduated from University of Southern Mississippi before attending the University of Mississippi School of Law. 

“I don’t remember exactly, and I don’t know what questions were asked,” Hopson said. “I know I complemented two of the nominees that I’ve known … My experiences with them have always been positive.”

DeLano said that he had worked with Heidelberg on insurance policies affecting the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Boyd recalled that Clark and Griffith discussed the enrollment cliff that will uniquely affect the regional colleges. 

“We’ve got to make sure that we’re progressively and actively managing that and that we’re helping our regional universities make sure that they have strong enrollment numbers and growing enrollment numbers,” Boyd said. 

Ultimately, the meetings are more about jumpstarting a working relationship than they are fact-finding missions, DeLano said. After the committee wrapped, he said he spoke with Clark about public-private partnerships, because it is relevant to a bill this session that would authorize IHL to enter into a long-term lease agreement on behalf of the University of Mississippi. The bill died in conference yesterday.

“It just gives me a good opportunity to shake hands with whoever those people are and look them in the eye and tell them I look forward to working with them in my role,” DeLano said. “I’ve seen some committee meetings where they might get partisan on this issue. I don’t care about partisanship as much as I care about their willingness to dive deep into the issues and try to understand the totality of the duties that they have.” 

Sen. Sollie Norwood, D-Jackson, concurred. He said he did not ask the new trustees any questions but that he hopes to meet with them later this summer to discuss issues pertaining to the HBCUs, mainly the end of the Ayers settlement, which was meant to redress the IHL’s historically underfunding of those institutions, and IHL’s presidential selection process. 

“I want to let them get a chance to get in and get familiar with it and then we can have those conversations,” he said. 

Multiple committee members did not return inquiries from Mississippi Today or declined to comment, including: Sen. John Polk, Sen. Daniel Sparks, Sen. Josh Harkins,Sen. Alfred Butler and Sen. Tyler McCaughn. 

“I am away from the Capitol and I suggest you call the committee chairwoman Senator Nicole Boyd,” Sen. Walter Michel wrote in a text. 

“I wouldn’t be the one to talk to,” wrote Sen. Joel Carter, also over text. “I was late due to negotiations on a conference report. I know there weren’t very many questions.”

Update 4/30/24: This story was updated to include a comment from IHL spokesman John Sewell.

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