OurTupelo

The Mississippi Division of Medicaid removed another 22,000 Mississippians from its rolls in July in the second wave of disenrollments after the end of pandemic-era protections. 

That brings the agency up to 51,967 disenrollments total during the unwinding process, with those numbers set to increase.

Beginning in March 2020, federal law prohibited state divisions of Medicaid from removing people from their rolls due to the COVID-19 public health emergency.  

The emergency ended in May, and now agencies are reviewing the eligibility of their beneficiaries for the first time in more than three years.

According to one expert, Mississippi’s total number of disenrollments is not the most concerning statistic: It’s the fact that 80% of the people dropped so far have been disenrolled because of issues with their paperwork, which could mean many of them were still eligible. 

“It’s very high,” said Joan Alker, executive director of Georgetown University’s Center for Children and Families.  “Yeah, that’s very problematic.”

Many of the people who have been procedurally disenrolled could be children. Kids in low-income families make up more than half of Mississippi’s overall Medicaid beneficiaries. 

According to Mississippi Medicaid’s enrollment reports, 18,710 children have lost Medicaid coverage from June of this year to July. It’s unclear how many children have been dropped since — the agency has not yet updated its August numbers.

Mississippi is one of only three states that does not have Medicaid online accounts as of January 2023, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, though people do have the option to complete their renewal online.

According to a July press release, Mississippi Medicaid enrollment increased by 187,894 people, or 26%, from March 2020 to June 2023, bringing Mississippi’s Medicaid rolls over 900,000 people for the first time in the agency’s history.

In June, Mississippi Medicaid was set to examine the records of 67,695 Mississippians whose coverage was up for review.

It found that a little under half of those, or 29,460, were no longer eligible. According to the agency, about 60% of the people who were removed had remained insured during the pandemic because of the extended eligibility rules.

The latest data release shows that of the 75,110 Mississippians who had their eligibility evaluated in July, 22,507, or 30%, were unenrolled. 

The majority of those were terminated because of “procedural reasons,” meaning they lost coverage for not returning paperwork or related reasons. 

That means many of the people dropped so far could be people who are still eligible. 

Alker said Mississippi’s ex-parte rate was “relatively low” — ex-parte renewals are automatic renewals, and the best case scenario during unwinding. Mississippi Medicaid spokesman Matt Westerfield said that the agency is focused on increasing those ex-parte approval rates. 

“If individuals qualify for Medicaid coverage, we’d rather make that determination without having to mail a form that they have to fill out and that a Medicaid specialist then has to process,” he said. 

Combined with the high rate of procedural terminations — only 11 states have higher percentages, according to Alker’s organization — it’s cause for concern, she said, enough that she suggested Gov. Tate Reeves should step in. 

“The governor should absolutely pause these procedural terminations and figure out what’s going on,” Alker said. 

According to Westerfield, the Division requested permission from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services on Aug. 7 for “four additional flexibilities that could help reduce procedural disenrollments while increasing ex-parte renewals.”

A letter provided to Mississippi Today by the Division shows that those “flexibilities” included permitting managed care plans to help beneficiaries submit renewal forms, renewing coverage for people whose information “is not returned or is not returned within a reasonable amount of time” and reinstating eligibility for people who were previously unenrolled more quickly. These allowances have not yet been approved, but Westerfield said the agency anticipates that soon.

People who were dropped because they didn’t submit the needed information can be reconsidered without a new application if they submit that information within 120 days of the disenrollment. 

Though Mississippi Medicaid launched the “Stay Covered” outreach campaign that included postcard mailing, flyers and text and email blasts to make people aware of the unwinding process, the leader of a local health advocacy organization that has partnered with the agency previously told Mississippi Today that he doesn’t believe Mississippi Medicaid is doing enough to inform beneficiaries. Additionally, it’s not clear how many emails or letters have been disseminated — Westerfield previously did not respond to that question.

Westerfield did say the Division did not process renewals for a few months for beneficiaries in the Delta affected by tornadoes this spring, though it’s not clear if the agency is doing anything in particular to reach those people — who may be displaced — now.

The new data also reveals a growing backlog in Mississippi.

In June, about 5,000 renewals that were up for review were not completed. The new numbers show that an additional 15,000 reviews went uncompleted last month. Westerfield blamed it on the larger review group in the July reporting period compared to June.

Alker says the backlog isn’t uncommon, and it’s neither good nor bad news. 

“We want states to take their time, and they still have a lot of time,” she said. States have until May 2024 to complete the unwinding process.

“But it speaks to the backlog and the system, and the fact that they don’t have enough staff to begin with in many states, including Mississippi,” Alker said. “The backlog will keep getting bigger, and that’s going to be a problem.”

And as unwinding continues and a mounting number of Mississippians are potentially without health care coverage, stress continues to mount on Mississippi’s health care infrastructure. 

As Reeves and other Republican state leaders continue to oppose expanding Medicaid to the working poor, one report puts almost half of the state’s rural hospitals at risk of closure, and data from Alker’s organization shows that rural populations will be the ones most affected by unwinding.

“If there’s a big unwinding problem, it’s going to be really devastating for these rural communities,” she said. 

CMS sent letters to all state Medicaid division directors last week, including Mississippi’s director Drew Snyder. Because Mississippi started disenrollments in June, CMS did not have comments about Mississippi’s procedural termination rate — they analyzed states’ May numbers in their letters. 

However, the letter indicated they would continue to keep an eye on deficiencies in individual states’ unwinding processes. 

“I think what was important about the letters is that CMS, this is the first time that they’ve done something publicly like this,” Alker said. “I took it as a sign that they’re stepping up their enforcement.”

As of August, almost 5 million people have been disenrolled from Medicaid nationwide, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. The organization says up to 24 million people could end up losing coverage during the unwinding.  

The post ‘Very problematic’: Medicaid drops another 22,000 Mississippians, mostly for paperwork issues appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Brandon Presley, the Democratic nominee for governor, hammered Republican Gov. Tate Reeves on Thursday for not doing enough to prevent the state’s massive welfare scandal while Reeves served eight years as lieutenant governor. 

Speaking in front of the state Department of Human Services building in downtown Jackson, Presley told reporters that Reeves could have used the lieutenant governor’s role as state Senate president to push lawmakers to conduct more robust hearings over state agencies, including MDHS, which was at the center of the scandal. 

“Because it’s politically convenient for him, Tate Reeves now wants to deflect blame on his own failure to protect millions of dollars that were under his so-called watch as lieutenant governor,” Presley said. “He will say or do anything to get elected.” 

Reeves’ campaign did not respond to a request for comment, but the governor has repeatedly said that he had no role in the roughly $77 million previous state agency leaders squandered and that the misspending occurred before he was elected governor. 

READ MORE: Gov. Tate Reeves airs ad responding to Brandon Presley welfare scandal attack

But Presley said the very fact that the misspending occurred before Reeves entered the Governor’s Mansion deserves an explanation on why elected officials within the state Capitol never discovered the impropriety. 

“When he first ran for lieutenant governor, Tate Reeves said a watchdog is exactly what they’re about to get,” Presley said. “The truth of the matter is, in 12 years of Tate Reeves’ reign in state government, he’s been a lapdog for his buddies, special interests and his campaign contributors.” 

State and federal prosecutors have not charged the first-term governor with a crime. But as lieutenant governor between 2012-2020, Reeves served a pivotal leadership role in the Legislature — including during the years of 2017-2020, when the bulk of the known welfare misspending happened.

Legislative committee leaders have broad power to conduct oversight of state agencies and compel state agency leaders to testify about their organizations. 

To date, no legislative committee has held a hearing to scrutinize the actions of the state welfare agency, though some Democratic lawmakers have organized their own hearings. 

Though Reeves was never a member of the legislative committee created by state law to provide oversight of the Department of Human Services, he has often boasted about his direct control of the state budget during his time at the Capitol. Reeves served as chair or vice chair of the powerful Legislative Budget Committee that does provide oversight of agency budgets. 

Presley has seized on the state’s welfare scandal and used it as a focal point of his gubernatorial campaign. He previously said he would call lawmakers into a special legislative session to reform state ethics laws to prevent a similar scandal from occurring in the future.

READ MORE: New Brandon Presley ad claims Tate Reeves helped ‘rich friends’ in welfare scandal

The post Brandon Presley condemns Gov. Tate Reeves for not providing more oversight of welfare agency appeared first on Mississippi Today.

A Lincoln County judge declared a mistrial in the case of a white Brookhaven father and son accused of chasing and shooting at a Black FedEx driver last year.  

The ruling came Thursday during the third day of the trial of Brandon Case and his father Gregory Charles Case, who were charged with attempted first-degree murder, conspiracy and shooting into a delivery van that  D’Monterrio Gibson drove as he delivered packages Jan. 24, 2022.

Judge David Strong ended yesterday’s court session early because Brookhaven Police Detective Vincent Fernando said under oath, while the jury wasn’t in the courtroom, that he hadn’t previously given the prosecuting and defense attorneys a video statement police took from Gibson after his encounter with the Cases, AP reported. 

“In 17 years, I don’t think I’ve seen it,” Strong said Thursday about the errors.

As of late Thursday morning, Strong had not issued that ruling in writing. 

Attorney Carlos Moore, who represented Gibson, said it was concerning that the police withheld a potentially crucial piece of information, which necessitated a mistrial. 

“I share the deep disappointment and frustration expressed by Circuit Judge David Strong over this development,” Moore said in a Thursday statement. “A mistrial represents not just an administrative setback but also a delay in justice for Mr. Gibson and his family.”

He has asked the U.S. Department of Justice to look into the Brookhaven police’s conduct as potential obstruction of justice. 

During opening statements Monday, District Attorney Dee Bates told jurors Gibson was driving  a rental van with the Hertz logo on three sides when he dropped off a package at a home on a dead-end road. 

That was when Gregory Case drove a pickup to try and block Gibson from leaving, and his son came outside with a gun, Bates said. Three rounds hit the van as Gibson drove around the pickup. 

The elder Case’s attorney told jurors he saw a van outside his unoccupied mother-in-law’s house and went to see what was happening. He wanted to ask the van driver what was happening, but the driver didn’t stop. The sun had set and Case thought someone was in the wrong place, the attorney said. 

Gibson, who was 24 at the time of the incident, was not injured in the shooting. 

Moore, who also represented Gibson in a federal lawsuit, has compared what happened to his client to the killing of Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man who was chased by three white men and shot while exercising in 2020. 

U.S. District Judge Daniel Jordan on Aug. 10 approved motions to dismiss the $5 million lawsuit against FedEx, the city of Brookhaven, its police chief and the Cases last week. He said  Moore failed to prove the company discriminated against Gibson based on race, according to court records. 

AP reported that Moore said he plans to sue in state court. The attorney added that Gibson is still a FedEx employee and is currently out on workers’ compensation leave. 

“We remain committed to seeking justice for D’Monterrio Gibson and ensuring that the legal process is fair, transparent, and accountable,” Moore said in the Thursday statement.

The post Judge declares mistrial in case against father and son accused of attempted murder of FedEx driver appeared first on Mississippi Today.

A slim majority of the governing board for Mississippi’s eight public universities voted to allow Elayne Hayes-Anthony, Jackson State University’s temporary acting president, to apply for the permanent role. 

According to executive session minutes released Wednesday, seven trustees voted for the motion and five voted against, including Dr. Steven Cunningham, the only Jackson State alumnus on the board and the trustee who is leading the university’s presidential search.

Cunningham, a Hattiesburg-based radiologist, told Mississippi Today that he didn’t want to dissuade outside candidates from applying for the role. In recent years, the IHL board has tended to hire interim presidents instead of conducting a full-blown national search at the state’s universities. 

“I just didn’t want anybody to be scared off,” Cunningham told Mississippi Today. 

The vacancy at Jackson State, a historically Black university and the largest university in Mississippi’s capital city, comes after Thomas Hudson, who had been interim before getting the permanent position, became the third president in a row to resign earlier this year. 

Though Hayes-Anthony said she was interested in the permanent post shortly after the board appointed her to the temporary position in March, trustees did not vote to allow her to apply until June, the minutes show. She could not be reached for comment by press time.

If the board hires Hayes-Anthony, the Jackson native and former chair of the university’s Department of Journalism and Media Studies would be the third consecutive internal hire within the state’s universities system. The tenures of the past two presidents at Jackson State — William Bynum, Jr., who was hired from Mississippi Valley State University, and Hudson — both ended in resignation. 

Cunningham said he was voting for a thorough national search. 

“It all comes down to the process,” he said. “As long as the process is an even process.” 

Earlier this week, the Jackson Advocate’s Ivory Phillips reported that IHL Commissioner Al Rankins said the presidential search committee is working to make a hire by the end of the calendar year. A high-profile alumnus and a previous applicant that was highly rated are among the current applicants. 

Cunningham told Mississippi Today that the search committee has received about 45 applications and is expecting more by the Aug. 21 deadline. 

At a March press conference, Hayes-Anthony said she would be in the role as long as she is needed. 

She also acknowledged the board has imposed various stipulations on her role. She said she could hire and fire people in coordination with Rankins. An IHL spokesperson said the board has not placed more restrictions on Hayes-Anthony than any other temporary or interim president in the system.

Last month, Hayes-Anthony wrote in a campus-wide email that Brandi Newkirk-Turner, the associate provost, had been reassigned but would remain as a faculty member in the Department of Communicative Disorders. Newkirk-Turner was among the administrators who received a no-confidence vote from the faculty senate earlier this year. 

Hours later, Hayes-Anthony sent another email that Newkirk-Turner’s reassignment had been rescinded and she would remain associate provost. 

READ MORE: ‘As long as I’m needed’: JSU acting president has no timetable from IHL for appointment

UPDATE 8/17/23: This story has been updated to include the IHL board response to restrictions on Elayne Hayes-Anthony as acting JSU president.

The post Only JSU alum on IHL board votes against allowing acting president to apply for permanent role appeared first on Mississippi Today.

If Elvis came back, I wouldn’t be surprised. Not much surprises me anymore.

The post Marshall Ramsey: Return of the King appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Mike Justice coached high school football in north Mississippi, central Mississippi and south Mississippi. He coached tiny schools and big schools. One constant: Wherever he went and wherever he coached, he won and won big. With the 2023 season fast approaching, the football coach-turned-champion golfer and bass fisherman joins the Clevelands to talk football.

Stream all episodes here.

The post Podcast: Legendary Mississippi high school football coach Mike Justice. appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Aug. 16, 1938

Legendary bluesman Robert Johnson lived mysteriously, and on this day, he died just as mysteriously at the age of 27. 

Born in Hazlehurst, Mississippi, he reportedly went from a young man with little talent for playing guitar to one of the most influential guitarists of all time. (According to myth, he went to a Delta crossroads and sold his soul to the devil in exchange for playing guitar.) 

His cause of death remains a mystery to this day, and so does his burial. There are three headstones in the Mississippi Delta that mark where he may or may not be buried. He

Johnson recorded his first session in Room 414 of the Gunter Hotel in San Antonio and reportedly sang while facing the wall. Despite the fact he recorded only 29 songs, his work became a huge influence, first in blues music, and then in the rock and roll that followed. 

In 1986, he was inducted into the inaugural class of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and was later inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. The Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan and Led Zeppelin are among the many who have cited his influence. Guitarist Eric Clapton has called Johnson “the most important blues singer that ever lived.”

The post On this day in 1938 appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Even if one were to believe erstwhile candidate Chris McDaniel’s incomplete, conflicting, shifting accounting of hundreds of thousands in secretive campaign donations, it still begs the question: Where did the $15,000 go?

It also begs the question: Why is Attorney General Lynn Fitch overlooking what appear to be flagrant violations of campaign finance law by McDaniel, instead only going after his out-of-state campaign finance chairman and less-clear allegations?

Longtime state Sen. Chris McDaniel’s failed run for lieutenant governor is one for the record books. Primarily, it saw record amounts of out-of-state, secretly sourced campaign money pumped into his campaign and related state PACs. It also saw allegations of flagrant violations of state campaign finance laws and reporting requirements, and has led to calls for reform by multiple statewide elected officials.

Mississippi law says a candidate or state political action committee can accept no more than $1,000 a year from a corporation.

McDaniel, running for lieutenant governor this year, created a state PAC that accepted $475,000 from a mysterious Virginia-based dark-money corporation, the American Exceptionalism Institute.

McDaniel’s PAC then funneled $460,000 of that money to his campaign. It made up the vast bulk of his bankroll as he kicked off his campaign early this year.

But his initial PAC reports appeared to obfuscate this. For starters, is showed the PAC had collected hundreds of thousands of dollars the year before it was legally created, with no sources listed for the donations. After multiple revised reports, it became clear the PAC had received $475,000 from AEI.

Eventually, after questions from Mississippi Today and complaints to the attorney general by his opponent incumbent Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, McDaniel said he was returning the money to AEI.

Problem is, by McDaniel’s own accounting, his PAC only returned $460,000 to the corporation.

What happened to the other $15,000?

Mississippi voters will likely never know. His final “termination-amended” report for his PAC gave no accounting. And Fitch appears to have closed the book on that complaint.

And despite laws that require candidates to divulge the sources of campaign donations, they’ll likely never know the original source of the $475,000 from the American Exceptionalism Institute, which has pumped millions of secretly sourced dollars into campaigns across the country.

They’ll also likely never know all the sources of the total of nearly $1 million more pumped into a separate PAC that McDaniel’s Wisconsin based treasurer created in the eleventh hour of the 2023 race to run TV attack ads on Hosemann.

McDaniel has said he knows very little about the finances of his PAC or campaign, and as he faced questions about them over months, he often chalked problems up to “clerical errors” and provided few other comments.

But in a statement for this article, he refuted that $15,000 remains unaccounted for.

“As a candidate, I have no involvement in the financial operations of any committee or PAC,” McDaniel said. “But I’ve been advised that all the money from the (American Exceptionalism Institute) was refunded.”

McDaniel has refused to answer what he knows about AEI or why it would pump nearly half a million dollars into Mississippi’s lieutenant governor’s race. Little information on AEI is available online, and efforts by Mississippi Today — and several other media outlets over years — to contact the organization or find more details have been fruitless.

When he announced he was returning the money, McDaniel said he believes Mississippi’s corporate donation limit laws are unconstitutional and would fall to a legal challenge. But he said he did not have time or resources for such a challenge, so he was giving it back.

McDaniel has referred to the landmark U.S. Supreme Court Citizen’s United ruling in 2010, which held corporations and PACs can spend unlimited amounts on broadcasts and communications related to an election, provided they act independently of any candidate.

But courts have also upheld state limits or bans on corporate donations to campaigns or state PACs. Only five states allow unlimited corporate campaign donations, while 23 ban them. The other 22 set some restrictions on corporate donations.

Mississippi’s campaign finance laws are seldom enforced, and allegations of violations seldom investigated. The state’s laws regulating a politician’s campaign cash and reporting appear to fall under a special Oops Doctrine. If a campaign accepts an illegal contribution or makes a glaring omission or mistake on a report, it can typically avoid investigation or prosecution by giving the money back, amending reports or filing them later. Few other laws offer this escape.

But typically, these appear to be legitimate mistakes and oversights by large campaigns for far smaller donations. They are typically flagged by the campaigns themselves, the money returned promptly and the transactions duly noted on finance reports.

McDaniel’s PAC and campaign appear to have held onto AEI over-the-limit money for months, and its reporting was confounding. At one point, McDaniel’s PAC reported it returned $460,000 to AEI on the same day it received $237,500 from the corporation. His many amended reports have been difficult to follow.

READ MORE: Chris McDaniel’s reports deny accurate public accounting of campaign money

Mississippi Today first raised questions about McDaniel’s campaign finances in February, and Hosemann filed his first legal complaint with the attorney general’s office in March. For months, AG Fitch’s office’s only response was, “We are looking into it.” This prompted calls for investigation and enforcement. Secretary of State Michael Watson at the Neshoba County Fair called for lawmakers to give his office campaign enforcement authority. He said, “When people do not do their jobs, I will stand in the gap for Mississippians” — a clear dig at Fitch.

Amid this pressure, just days before the primary election, Fitch announced she was investigating the separate PAC run by McDaniel’s campaign treasurer. The Invest in Mississippi political action committee was created in July by Wisconsin political operative Thomas Datwyler, who McDaniel also listed as his campaign’s treasurer. Datwyler has a history of running afoul of Federal Election Commission campaign finance rules with several congressional campaigns.

Datwyler’s PAC ran ads against Hosemann late in the race, fueled by at least $885,000 in donations from out of state super PACs. Hosemann’s campaign had filed another complaint late in the race that the PAC-to-PAC donations were an attempt to dodge the $1,000 corporate donation limits, and that the PAC cannot claim it is independent of McDaniel because it’s run by his campaign treasurer.

READ MORE: Out of state PACs dump dark money into McDaniel’s lieutenant governor’s race

In a statement announcing the investigation, Fitch said, “The people of Mississippi should be able to expect that those who participate in our electoral process will not seek to exploit this careful balance and step over that line, and in this instance, there is evidence to suggest that has occurred here.”

Fitch did not mention McDaniel in her announcement of the investigation, but a spokeswoman for her office later indicated the office was also investigating another complaint raised by Hosemann.

READ MORE: Fitch says she’s investigating PAC run by Chris McDaniel treasurer

But the spokeswoman also said another earlier complaint had been looked into and closed. This, the Hosemann campaign confirmed, was the original complaint about McDaniel’s PAC, the campaign and the $475,000 AEI donation.

Fitch’s office has declined comment on why it would not pursue the original complaint, including where the unaccounted-for $15,000 went. McDaniel appears to have acknowledged violation of the campaign donation limit laws, saying repeatedly he would likely win a legal challenge of the law.

Many political observers have surmised Republican Fitch is loathe to go after complaints about McDaniel for fear of angering his conservative base in the state GOP. Fitch’s office has faced some complaints of failing to fulfill responsibilities of the office, instead focusing on big headline-grabbing national issues and cases.

READ MORE: Chris McDaniel, Lynn Fitch show that Mississippi might as well not have campaign finance laws

In a statement, Hosemann spokeswoman Leah Smith said: “When our opponent received $475,000 from the corporation and returned only $460,000, we contend a violation of the campaign finance laws occurred. It was impossible to determine what happened with those funds because accounting was so poor throughout, in addition to all of the other violations. We anticipate a number of legislators will be enthusiastically interested in reform this year and our office is, too.”

McDaniel, who after his defeat for lieutenant governor will be vacating his state Senate office in January after 16 years, was once himself a vocal champion for campaign finance reform and more transparency for voters of the source of politicians’ money. His latest campaign’s legacy, it appears, may be an invigorated push for reform.

In his victory speech on primary election night, Hosemann said: “When you have this much dark money pumped into a race — almost $1 million in the last week — it screams for reform. We are going to listen to those screams.”

The post Chris McDaniel, Lynn Fitch and the case of the missing $15,000 appeared first on Mississippi Today.

The post Marshall Ramsey: Greetings appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Tupelo Councilwoman Nettie Davis on Monday reached an agreement with local prosecutors and a state judge to plead guilty to a misdemeanor count of violating an election law, but she will avoid the penalty of being removed from office.

Senior Circuit Judge Paul Funderburk signed off on a “non-adjudication” agreement that accepts Davis’ guilty plea, requires her to pay $5,000 with $4,500 suspended, pay $227.75 in court fees and avoid a public trial. 

Jim Waide, Davis’ attorney, told Mississippi Today that he wishes state prosecutors would have never brought the charge forward against his client, but he believes Monday’s plea deal with prosecutors was appropriate.

“Once the charges were brought, we didn’t have any choice but to accept an agreement where she wouldn’t be removed from office,” Waide said. 

Her criminal case stemmed from comments she made in a 2021 “get out the vote” rally encouraging people to vote in the municipal elections. In her recorded comments, she said if voters brought back an “I voted” sticker, their name would be placed in a raffle for cash prizes.

The video did not record Davis advocating for any specific candidate or a particular political party. The raffle also never took place. 

John Weddle, a northeast Mississippi district attorney, alleged Davis’ comments violated a law that prohibits anyone from offering “any prize, cash award or other items of value to be raffled, drawn for, played for or contested for in order to encourage a person to vote or to refrain from voting in any election.”

The penalty for violating the statute is only a misdemeanor and carries no jail time. But if the person convicted is an elected official, like Davis, the law calls for them to be removed from office.

Weddle, a Republican, began investigating Davis’ comments shortly after the video circulated online. He, along with Secretary of State Michael Watson, issued a press release just two days after her comments saying prosecutors would investigate the remarks.

The district attorney’s office presented Davis’ case to a grand jury, and it returned an indictment, sparking community leaders to decry Weddle’s prosecution of the local figure, a Democrat and civil rights veteran, and claim the efforts were politically motivated. 

Those calls grew even more acute after Mississippi Today reported that a Republican candidate for state Senate, Lauren Smith, appeared to acknowledge in a video that she had voted in a Lee County district outside of her legal residence. 

Smith’s political opponent and an independent election attorney believed Smith’s remarks were an admission she broke the law. Smith rejected that claim and said she did not violate any statute.

It’s unclear what will happen to Smith. Waide attempted to subpoena Smith’s testimony for Davis’ trial, but Monday’s agreement means she will not have to testify in the criminal case.   

Weddle appears to have filed a sealed motion with the court, but it’s unclear what the motion specifically states. On behalf of Davis, Waide filed court documents saying Weddle’s sealed motion was an effort to block Smith from testifying in the case. 

Waide alleged in the court document that Weddle was selectively prosecuting local candidates based on race and political party affiliation. 

“Evidence will establish that the District Attorney has known since April 2023 of this misdemeanor election law violation by a white Republican candidate,” Waide’s motion reads. “The District Attorney has not announced any intent to prosecute this misdemeanor election law violation by a white Republican candidate.”

Weddle did not respond to a request for comment. 

Incumbent state Sen. Chad McMahan defeated Smith in the Republican primary on August 8 by garnering around 55% of the vote. 

A Lee County citizen has also filed an affidavit against McMahan accusing him of “voter intimidation.” A judge has yet to rule on whether the allegation meets the the threshold for a criminal act, and McMahan claims the allegations are a “political stunt.”

The post Tupelo city councilwoman reaches plea deal with prosecutors over voter raffle comments appeared first on Mississippi Today.