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Mississippi spends more annually on beaver control — $1.1 million — and regulating cosmetologists — $1 million — than it does on monitoring ethics in state government, at $730,000 a year.

Penalties for leaking info about a Mississippi Ethics Commission complaint against a politician or filing one with false info carry jail time and hefty fines.

But actually violating most of Mississippi’s ethics, conflict of interest, open meetings, public records and campaign finance laws carry no jail time or felony charges. Fines start as low as $50 and can be waived.

How can you tell it’s statewide election time in Mississippi?

Because there’s talk of reform, ethics, transparency, preventing corruption and getting to the bottom of the latest mega-thievery scandal plaguing the Magnolia State. This time it’s tens of millions of welfare dollars meant for the poorest of the poor that were stolen or misspent.

But corruption is like the weather in Mississippi — lots of people talk about it, but nobody ever seems to do anything, unless it’s the feds doing one of their once-a-decade or so roundup operations. State lawmakers have been loathe to enact meaningful reform, transparency or oversight of the intersection of politics and money. This leaves the door wide open for corruption.

Mississippi’s campaign finance and lobbying laws are extremely confusing, conflicting and lax, but that’s almost beside the point. Alleged violations are seldom investigated or enforced. The attorney general’s office appears to be the only state agency with clear authority to investigate and enforce, but it almost never does. AG actions on campaign finances or lobbying over the years have been so rare that, when they do happen, they bring outcry of selective enforcement.

Mississippi allows politicians (except some judges) to take unlimited campaign contributions from individuals, LLCs and PACs. Unlike some other states, Mississippi has no general “pay-to-play” prohibition on campaign contributions from people or companies doing business with government.

Unlike many other states, Mississippi has no “gift law” banning or limiting how much money lobbyists or others can spend on “gifts” for lawmakers.

Mississippi politicians are supposed to at least accurately report the money they receive, but this is enforced with the same fervor and similar penalties as jaywalking laws. And unlike most other states, Mississippi politicians’ reports are not electronically searchable. Transparency has never been Mississippi government’s strong suit.

Bribery of a politician is, ostensibly, illegal in Mississippi, but the state has a long-running tradition of leaving any enforcement of that up to the feds.

This statewide election cycle has already brought allegations of campaign finance law violations.

Mississippi’s campaign finance laws are aimed at providing transparency to the voting public and limiting the corrosive influence of big money in politics. But the laws are a confusing, often conflicting patchwork that’s been piecemealed into the state code books without providing clear authority. The secretary of state’s office is responsible for receiving campaign finance reports, but serves mainly as a repository, with no real investigative or enforcement authority. The Ethics Commission, after some changes to laws in recent years, appears to have some authority, but it’s really unclear.

“It’s a mess,” state Ethics Commission Director Tom Hood said of Mississippi’s campaign finance laws. “Changes have been made multiple times over multiple years, and it’s like trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle that doesn’t fit.

“For instance, (state code) 23-15-803 says the Ethics Commission can impose penalties on political committees,” Hood said. “But then it refers to another section of law that doesn’t appear to apply, and it doesn’t say what our authority is or give us a process.”

In other states, ethics commissions have more authority, funding and staff. In Alabama, for instance, its Ethics Commission receives more than $3 million a year in funding, and has about 20 employees. Mississippi’s has six employees — including only one investigator for the whole state — and for the coming year was budgeted at $730,000.

Alabama in the mid-1990s reformed and revised its ethics laws and gave its commission clearer authority. Violations of that state’s ethics laws carry prison sentences up to 20 years. Over many years, Alabama has seen numerous public officials and employees who run afoul of its laws fined, removed from office and-or jailed. For example, former Gov. Guy Hunt was convicted and removed from office for using $200,000 from his inaugural fund for personal use. Former Gov. Robert J. Bentley pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations, resigned, was given a suspended sentence and agreed to a lifetime ban on running for office in Alabama.

Hood said he’s not pushing lawmakers for large increases in funding or authority for the Mississippi’s Ethics Commission. But he would like for laws and responsibilities to be clearer, particularly with campaign finance issues.

“Somebody needs to have clear authority and responsibility to enforce the law — that would be a good first step,” Hood said. “… If you want to prevent somebody from stealing, then you should promote transparency. I feel like our laws do a pretty good job of that, except for campaign finance.”

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What should have been a lifeline for Mississippi’s struggling hospitals is proving to be out of reach for the facilities that need it the most. 

State lawmakers approved sending millions of dollars to save Mississippi’s struggling hospitals during the session, but now many hospital leaders are running into difficulties trying to access that money.

A third of Mississippi’s rural hospitals are at risk of closure — many of them were counting on the state grants to survive the year. 

Legislators in February established the grant program, part of Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann’s plan to “save rural hospitals,” in lieu of expanding Medicaid. A month later and just days before the end of the legislative session, they decided on the amount: $103 million to be disseminated among the state’s struggling health care providers.

It was millions less than the Mississippi Hospital Association had advocated for — despite a $4 billion surplus in the state budget — but health care leaders said they would take what they could get.

Hospitals were allocated varying amounts through a formula that accounted for bed counts, hospital designation, emergency rooms and other factors. 

But there was a hitch — the money wouldn’t come from the state general fund. Instead, it would come from American Rescue Plan Act funds, federal money meant to ease the financial hits taken by the pandemic. 

MHA director Tim Moore, whose organization helped craft the program, said it wasn’t clear then how much the source of the money would affect hospitals’ ability to access it.

“I think the Legislature felt that it would not be a problem … to get the money out,” he said. “We were looking at them actually cutting grant checks to the hospitals. When ARPA money was applied, that changed the whole thing.”

ARPA funds can only be used to cover COVID-related expenses, and many hospitals have already claimed those federal pandemic reimbursement dollars. Expenses claimed through ARPA cannot have been claimed under any other federal and state reimbursement programs, rendering the grant money useless to many Mississippi hospitals. 

According to Paul Black, CEO of Winston Medical Center in Louisville, that makes the grant bill more of a reimbursement bill. 

“I don’t know who came up with the bright idea to use ARPA money. If they did, they definitely did not understand what that meant to this program,” he said. 

“It’s just extremely frustrating that one of the pieces of the legislation … is one thing and the appropriations is something completely different. I don’t understand how they can do that, I really don’t.”

Gov. Tate Reeves, who sent out a release emphasizing his role in the program’s passage, declined to comment about the grant situation.

In a statement sent to Mississippi Today after this story published, Hosemann said, “Our intention was to provide $103 million to hospitals based on a formula related to type of operation and bed count to help stabilize them. If any hospital is shorted because of complications with the federal ARPA structure of the grant, I will support legislation at the beginning of the Session to make up the difference.”

House Public Health Chair Sam Mims, author of House Bill 271 which funded the program, did not respond to a request for comment.

Senate Medicaid Chairman Kevin Blackwell, author of Senate Bill 2372 which established the program, deferred questions about hospitals’ issues with the grant program to state Health Officer Dr. Daniel Edney. 

The state health department is tasked with distributing the funds, and because it’s now tied to federal ARPA funds, has to work with the state department of finance and administration to do so, Edney said. 

During the bill process, Edney said the health department pointed out the pitfalls of using the ARPA money.

“Federal money … doesn’t take up state resources from other places,” he said. “The downside is it has to follow federal guidelines versus state general funds.”

One of those downsides has already become clear: The allocation based on hospitals’ number of licensed beds has been struck, on account of federal guidelines. That means hospitals, if they get money at all, will definitely be getting less than expected. 

Senate Public Health Chair Hob Bryan said he’s received questions about the grant program from hospital officials and others, and that he still doesn’t have all the answers.

“I’ve asked questions, and I’m still confused,” Bryan said. “I talk with A, and A says one thing, then I talk with B, and B says something else.”

“I think there’s a lot of confusion over whether a hospital would have to have already spent money on COVID expenses and can be reimbursed, or whether they can spend in the future. One of the things I’ve been told is that if you are improving things at your hospital to deal with COVID, or to prepare for the next COVID, then you will be eligible under the regulations.

“Hospitals’ reactions appear to be, ‘That’s all well and good, but I’m going broke and this says I can spend more money and get reimbursed, but that doesn’t help me right now,’” Bryan continued.

Bryan said he believes questions and confusion about the program are in part because of the hasty, secretive process Mississippi legislative leaders have used to set budgets in recent years.

“We do everything in secret, and then put it all together at the last minute,” Bryan said. “Transparency, like say, in conference committees and the rest of the process might help, in that issues like this could be identified and addressed before it’s passed. Discussing these things more in the open could provide better results … Of course, we had the House refusing to negotiate on this or anything else because they were holding out for tax cuts, then they tried to do everything in the last 36 ½ minutes.”

Black agreed that hammering out funding details at the last-minute likely contributed to this oversight — an oversight that’ll have grave consequences for state’s hospitals.

“We got all these legislators that are patting themselves on the back for doing something for the hospitals,” Black said. “When it comes out, they didn’t do anything. At least for us to get what was promised in the Senate bill is not what is taking place now.”

Some of the state’s larger hospitals might be able to get their hands on some of the money. But it’s less likely that the state’s smaller, rural hospitals, who are in much more dire financial straits, will be able to.

“The whole intent of this was to help small rural hospitals,” Moore said. “That’s going to be much more of a challenge.”

Winston Medical Center was set to receive a little less than a million through the grant program. Because of the funding complications, the hospital actually won’t get anything at all. 

“Unless the Department of Health comes up and finds out some way to get around some of the issues … as things sit right now, there’s no avenue for us to claim any money,” Black said. 

The money would’ve been enough to cover about a month’s worth of payroll, Black said, but in the larger scheme of things, it would’ve helped Winston stay open until the end of the year and staunch the “slow bleed.”

Winston, though, is in a far more stable financial state than many other rural hospitals.

Before the grant money and a big credit line approval, Greenwood Leflore Hospital was weeks from shutting down. It’s not clear how the new developments will affect its financial viability.

Gary Marchand, the hospital’s leader, said it was too early in the process to answer Mississippi Today’s questions, but said he believes the complications caused by the ARPA funding will just slow down when the hospital will receive its allocation.  

“We understand MSDH is moving quickly,” Marchand said. 

Hospitals can apply for the money during a one-month window that starts June 1. Edney said once a hospital’s application is approved, he’s hoping to get the money over immediately. 

However, Black is more cynical about the reality of the situation.

“That’s what they said when they passed the bill back in April, and now it’s the end of May going into June,” Black said. “If anybody gets it by September, it’ll be a miracle.”

Unless a special session is called to address the funding issue, Moore and Black are looking toward the next legislative session for help. They’re hoping that most hospitals survive until then and that state leaders come around to seeing the economic advantages to expanding Medicaid in Mississippi, which would bring millions of dollars to the state’s hospitals. 

“The analogy I keep thinking about is Charlie Brown, Lucy and the football,” Black said. “Lucy holds the ball for Charlie Brown to kick, and at the last minute, she pulls it back. He falls on his rear end. 

“That’s what this has been like.”

Reporter Geoff Pender contributed to this story.

Editor’s note: This story was updated after publishing with a statement from Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann.

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MAY 31, 1921

The Tulsa race massacre began after a white mob gathered at a jail where a Black teen had been arrested on false charges of “attacking” a white girl in an elevator. 

In reality, he may have tripped or bumped into her. Although authorities exonerated him, that didn’t stop the mob. 

“As the whites moved north, they set fire to practically every building in the African American community, including a dozen churches, five hotels, 31 restaurants, four drug stores, eight doctor’s offices, more than two dozen grocery stores, and the Black public library,” according to a 2001 report on the massacre. 

That rampage left as many as 300 dead and 10,000 homeless. “They tried to kill all the Black folks they could see,” recalled George Monroe, who was 5 at the time. The Black community known as Greenwood bore the name of the Mississippi Delta town. Greenwood, known as the “Black Wall Street” for its bustling businesses, became a pile of ashes. 

No one was ever prosecuted for these crimes. Viola Fletcher, a 107-year-old who survived, said, “I have lived through the massacre every day. Our country may forget this history, but I cannot. I will not. And other survivors do not. And our descendants do not.” 

The community that once sprawled beyond 35 blocks is now just one block. A 7,000-square-foot museum, Greenwood Rising, now honors that community.

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Over the last year, students, alumni, faculty and staff at Mississippi’s eight public universities have come to know this routine well: The Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees fires or lets go of a president, often providing little information as to why. Then the board asks the community to participate in hours-long listening sessions to provide feedback on desirable qualities in the next president. 

But are the trustees actually listening? If they are, what do they think? That part is often unclear.  

At last month’s listening sessions on Jackson State University’s campus, five trustees and the commissioner, Al Rankins, quietly took notes as stakeholders shared their thoughts on the kind of president they’d like to succeed Thomas Hudson, whose two-and-a-half-year tenure ended earlier this year in a mysterious resignation. 

Steven Cunningham, the board’s only Jackson State alumnus and the trustee leading the search, occasionally shared his thoughts with the crowd. But the rest of the trustees and the commissioner kept their perspective confined to legal pads or notebooks, which Mississippi Today obtained through a public records request. 

The handwritten notes — from all the trustees who attended except Tom Duff, the former IHL board president — provide a glimpse into how trustees are thinking about the key hire at Jackson State, which is not just the largest historically Black university in Mississippi but the largest university in the state’s capital city. 

Trustees typically keep thoughts like these hidden behind the closed doors of executive sessions, but Mississippi Today has reprinted the notes, when legible, exactly as they appear in the records. 

There were some common themes. Though none of the notes mentioned Hudson outright, nearly all trustees wrote that community members asked for the board to conduct a more thorough background check on Jackson State’s next president — or more generally to follow an unbiased, by-the-book selection process. 

“Vetting,” Cunningham wrote. “What are we going to do DIFFERENT?” 

It’s still not clear why Hudson left Jackson State, but many in the community believe the university would not be looking for a new president had IHL not cut the search short to hire him. Community members have a similar critique of IHL’s hiring of Hudson’s predecessor, William Bynum Jr., whose tenure ended after he was arrested in a prostitution sting in 2020. 

“don’t hire friends,” noted Teresa Hubbard, a trustee and Delta State University alumnus who had just wrapped up the search for the next president there, which resulted in an out-of-state hire. 

Hubbard also noted that the community wants a president who will advocate for JSU, writing “don’t run off a strong willed person.” 

Many students said they wanted to be more involved in the selection process, Hubbard also noted. IHL has yet to announce a presidential search committee, a panel of stakeholders that confidentially advise the board, for Jackson State. 

Other stakeholders want to be more involved in the search too, Cunningham noted. 

“Listen to the Alums,” he wrote. “$,$,$.” 

“Allow us to sit before you and listen,” wrote Gee Ogletree, a trustee and University of Southern Mississippi alumnus who, like Hubbard, recently finished a presidential search. “Don’t want to be shamed.” 

A few trustees took note of the one person who wanted to see Elayne Hayes-Anthony, the temporary acting president, take the top spot permanently. Chip Morgan, a trustee and retired executive vice president of the Delta Council, wrote that trustees would start looking at applications after the job description was posted. It’s not live yet. 

Multiple trustees wrote that community members said the university urgently needs more money to fix its ailing infrastructure — and to get its own water system. Hudson’s administration had been lobbying for $17 million in funding for infrastructure repairs, including a new water system, during the legislative session.

“PWI’s have water systems,” Hubbard wrote. Cunningham noted that this was a “priority!!!” 

The trustees did not shy away from taking note of the extensive criticism that some community members had for them. Ogletree summarized nearly every point made by Ivory Phillips, a dean emeritus at Jackson State and a former faculty senate president. 

Phillips, Ogletree noted, is a “Critic of College Board,” that trustees have “Not Given JSU Best Attention” and many community members believe the “Listening Sessions are a Sham.” 

Ogletree also noted another community member who put the blame for the failures of Hudson, Bynum and his predecessor Carolyn Meyers squarely on the board: “3 Presidents Chosen by You Guys.” 

Several trustees seemed alarmed by one faculty member who said that she and other professors had experienced bullying from students. “SAFETY e.g. student threats!!!,” Cunningham wrote; “students cheat + admin does nothing,” Hubbard noted. 

Cunningham editorialized his notes with emphatic capitalization, underlinings and exclamation points in blue ink. It appears he took great interest in comments made by Dawn McLin, a professor and the current faculty senate president, underlining her name multiple times and writing “CORE VALUES” beside it, a list that included integrity, “accountability” and “stick to policies/ procedures.” 

After one instructor teared up talking about how she did not plan to send her kids to Jackson State due to security concerns, Cunningham wrote down the word “Safety.” He drew a square around it. “(Crying),” he noted. “SAFETY,” he wrote again, this time circling it multiple times. 

In another note, Cunningham wrote that a community member wanted Jackson State to have an “open door policy” and for the university to “focus on RETENTION as well enrollment.” 

“IHL’s roll(sic)?” he wrote underneath it. 

Al Rankins, the IHL commissioner whose role it is to manage the eight university presidents, took notes in two columns titled “(Institutional Executive Officer) characteristics” and “issues.” 

Under issues, Rankins wrote, among other things: “low morale,” “high presidential turnover,” “administration ignoring complaints,” “need more extensive background checks” and “need to place fence around campus.” 

Under characteristics, he wrote, “integrity,” “strong moral compass,” “forward-thinking,” “understand traditions,” “participate in code of ethics training,” “progressive thinker,” “strong advocate for JSU,” “visible,” “transparent,” “visionary,” “structured and have backbone,” “welcoming,” “is home-grown talent,” “servant leader, faith in God” and “loves JSU and its students.” 

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Is there anything better than post-season baseball? The Clevelands have plenty to discuss with Southern Miss a No. 2 seed in the Auburn Regional, William Carey University threatening to win an NAIA national championship and the Mississippi High School State championship series taking place at Trustmark Park. There are so many story lines in Pearl, at Auburn and in Idaho where Carey coach Bobby Halford got his 1,300th victory Monday night.

Stream all episodes here.

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The Tate Reeves campaign says the governor still intends to give away political contributions he has received from those involved in the state’s welfare scandal, though at this point those funds remain in his campaign coffers.

“The political donations from anyone who is connected to the TANF scandal will be donated to a worthy cause at the ultimate conclusion of the legal proceedings. Those cases are ongoing,” said Elliott Husbands, Reeves’ campaign manager, referring to the continuing investigation of the misspending of $77 million in Temporary Assistance for Needy Families welfare funds.

In a February 2020 press conference, Reeves acknowledged receiving campaign contributions from people associated with the scandal and ongoing investigation, such as Nancy New and her son Zach, both of whom have pleaded guilty to state and federal charges related to the misspending of funds that were designed to provide assistance to the state’s poorest citizens.

“I can tell you right now, anything they gave to the campaign is going to be moved to a separate bank account,” Reeves said in 2020. “… Anything they gave the campaign will be there waiting to be returned to the taxpayers and help the people it was intended for. If that doesn’t happen, the money will go to a deserving charity.”

There is no indication that the funds have been transferred to a separate bank account based on a review of Reeves’ multiple campaign finance accounts. The Reeves campaign gave no indication that a separate bank account had been established.

Records indicated that the News contributed at least $6,000 to Reeves’ election efforts.

In Reeves’ 2019 gubernatorial campaign, he also filmed public education commercials touting his public school teacher pay plan at the News’ now shuttered private New Summit School in Jackson. Private school students and teachers were used for the commercial. Video from the 2019 New Summit advertisement has been used again this campaign cycle by Reeves in two commercials.

READ MORE: Reeves campaign uses video from shuttered private school linked to welfare scandal

In addition to other charges and guilty pleas related to the welfare funds, federal prosecutors have alleged that Nancy New used at least $76,889 in public funds that were supposed to go to the New Summit School to purchase a house.

The governor also is close to other people who have been caught up in the welfare scandal. Fitness trainer Paul Lacoste, who received $1.3 million in welfare funds that the state is now trying to recoup, cut a campaign commercial on social media endorsing Reeves and touting himself as the governor’s personal coach.

THE BACKCHANNEL: Gov. Tate Reeves inspired welfare payment targeted in civil suit, texts show

And Reeves received a campaign contribution from members of Brett Favre’s family, including his wife Deanna.

Favre was able to secure $5 million in welfare funds to build a volleyball stadium at the University of Southern Mississippi. Favre had pledged to USM that he would raise funds for the volleyball center, and he has said he did not know the money he secured for the center was supposed to go to help poor people.

Referring to the inquiries from Mississippi Today, Husbands called Mississippi Today “a liberal Democrat SuperPAC” and mentioned an unnamed donor who has given money to both the nonprofit newsroom and to Brandon Presley, Reeves’ Democratic challenger for governor later this year.

Mississippi Today shares numerous contributors to both the Reeves and Presley campaigns, and no Mississippi Today donor has been convicted of misspending public funds.

Editor’s note: Donors do not influence Mississippi Today’s editorial decisions. A list of our donors, always posted publicly to our website, can be found here.

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A $5 million federal lawsuit was filed Tuesday against the city of Indianola, the police chief and Officer Greg Capers, just days after police shot an 11-year-old boy.

“There is no way a reasonably trained officer who would have done what Greg Capers did — to shoot an unarmed 11-year-old,” Carlos Moore said Tuesday at a news conference outside his Grenada office. Moore, the managing partner of The Cochran Firm in the Mississippi Delta, is representing the youth, Aderrien Murry, and his mother, Nakala. 

On May 20, she received an unexpected visit from “an irate father of one of her minor children,” according to the lawsuit. “(She) instructed her son to call the police, because she feared for her and the children’s safety.”

Capers responded and drew his gun, but “failed to assess the situation before displaying and-or discharging his firearm,” according to the lawsuit.

As a result, Aderrien, 11, was shot, resulting in a collapsed lung, lacerated liver and fractured ribs.

His mother said her son asked, “Why did he shoot me? “What did I do?” before he began crying.

Doctors intubated him when he arrived at the University of Mississippi Medical Center and put him on oxygen. They released him from the hospital four days later.

These injuries could have been avoided if Capers and other officers had received adequate training in this area. Instead, Capers acted with “deliberate indifference, reckless disregard and gross negligence,” the lawsuit alleges.

The lawsuit also accuses the officer of acting with malice, saying the “ulterior purpose in misusing the legal process was to severely harm Plaintiffs while not executing their lawful duties to actually serve and protect Plaintiffs and other similarly situated individuals.” 

City officials have not responded to the lawsuit, which represents only one side of a legal argument. 

At the news conference Tuesday, Murry’s mother, Nakala, said whenever she closes her eyes, the scene flashes back — holding her son and applying pressure to his wound, only to see blood running from his mouth.

She called for a halt on the shootings of the sons of so many mothers. “We’re a voice for everybody,” she said, “because something needs to be done.”

Capers was named Policeman of the Year in 2021, according to the Enterprise-Tocsin. He is now on administrative leave with pay. 

“If he’s your best, you need a clean house from top to bottom,” Moore said. “If that’s your best, I would hate to see the worst.”

The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation is now conducting a probe into the shooting. 

Murry’s family is calling for the arrest of the officer on aggravated assault charges and for firing both the officer and chief of police, Moore said. “Give this family some justice and some peace.”

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Read the story behind the cartoon.

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