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Reluctance to expand parole may have led Mississippi legislators to unwittingly sabotage an effort to save state money by shifting some incarcerated people’s health care costs to Medicaid. 

The state’s prisons are overcrowded, and hundreds of prisoners are sick and elderly– the consequence of harsh mandatory sentencing laws that have led to large numbers of people growing old in prison for the first time in American history. 

Though many of them are eligible for Medicaid coverage because of age or disability, the program won’t pay for health care provided inside institutions like jails and prisons, leaving Mississippi on the hook for expensive health care.

The state spent about $77 million on health care for people in prison custody in 2020, including $24 million on offsite care at hospitals. Just over 500 prisoners are older than 65, and research shows the cost of incarcerating an elderly person is about three times higher than a younger person because they have much more expensive health care needs. 

House Bill 936 was approved by both chambers this week and is on its way to the governor for his signature. It aims to address prison health care costs by creating “special care facilities” that could serve as a home for some of the 600 Mississippians who have been paroled but have nowhere to go and so remain in Department of Corrections custody. The bill would also expand medical parole for “medically frail” incarcerated people to the private facilities, where supporters say Medicaid would help pay for care. 

The legislation could put Mississippi at the vanguard of states experimenting with placing elderly, sick incarcerated people in nursing homes.

But there’s a wrinkle: Federal guidance issued in 2016 says Medicaid won’t pay for nursing care if residents’ freedom of movement is restricted or if the criminal justice system retains a role in their health care. Some provisions of HB 936 appear to run afoul of those rules, raising the possibility that Medicaid would refuse to pay for at least some parolees’ care at the facilities, forcing the state to keep paying.

The bill defines “medically frail” as people who are so ill that they can’t perform daily living activities and are not expected to recover. Those parolees must agree to have their medical records sent to a county prosecutor every quarter if the prosecutor requests them. 

And in a provision that was added after the bill passed the House and included in the final conference report, the State Parole Board will revoke parole if the person recovers, “and the department shall ensure that the inmate returns to incarceration.” 

Gov. Tate Reeves’ office did not respond to a request for comment on the legislation.

Dan Mistak, acting president and director of Health Care Initiatives for Justice-Involved Populations at the non-profit Community Oriented Correctional Health Services, said sending someone back to prison if their health improves seems to cross the line Medicaid has drawn. 

“A revocation like that, it signifies that you’re still under control of the state,” Mistak said. 

The provision requiring parolees to agree to share their medical records with prosecutors could also compromise “personal privacy and confidentiality” of clinical records, which is a right that facilities must respect if Medicaid is to pay for care. 

“They’re trying to figure out a way to still keep people under their control while at the same time trying to cost-shift to the federal government,” Mistak added. 

Rep. Otis Anthony, D-Indianola, is a member of the Corrections Committee and worked  on the bill. 

“In order to get it passed, sometimes the other house will put in some language that will appease, you know, voters who don’t want to see people paroled for anything,” he said. “So that’s probably one of those provisions that the Senate stuck in there to ensure that they will serve their time… But for the most part I don’t think that provision will ever be used. Very few terminally ill people who will need either long-term care or hospice care will ever recover.” 

Bill author Rep. Kevin Horan, R-Grenada, said that if the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) doesn’t approve reimbursement for parolees’ care at the facilities, legislators can revise the law accordingly.

“I’m not saying it is a work in progress moving forward, but we gotta get something on the books, see what CMS is gonna do,” he said. “We have to do something.”

The state’s existing conditional medical release policy is used rarely. Only three people were granted the release in 2021, following seven in 2020 and 10 in 2019, according to the Department of Corrections. 

Horan emphasized that the revocation provision doesn’t apply to the Mississippians who have already been paroled but remain in MDOC custody. Their parole would not be contingent on their health status, Horan said. 

Sen. Daniel Sparks, R-Belmont, focused on those people while presenting the conference report on the Senate floor Tuesday afternoon. 

“They have nowhere to go,” Sparks said. “Their family may have died. But they’re in MDOC. Which is a problem for us as a state. We are paying for their medical, we are paying for their housing.” 

Even if Medicaid doesn’t pick up the tab at the special care facilities, the bill will save Mississippi money because paying for nursing care is cheaper than repeatedly sending a person to the hospital and paying for separate services, Sparks said on the Senate floor.

Sen. Angela Burks Hill, R-Picayune, questioned Sparks about how much the legislation would cost the state. Sparks said it would save money, but he couldn’t say how much. 

Hill said she wanted to see such an estimate “before we commit to this Medicaid expansion.”

“Because that’s what it is,” she said. “It’s Medicaid expansion for prisoners and parolees.” 

Hill and 15 other senators voted against the conference bill. 

Many Republicans who don’t support expanding Medicaid for working-poor Mississippians voted in favor of HB 936. Sen. Brice Wiggins, R-Pascagoula, sponsored a separate bill, SB 2448, that would have also created the “special care facilities” for medically frail inmates. In an interview with Mississippi Today, he declined to explain why he doesn’t support Medicaid expansion in general. 

His bill passed the Senate with broad support before dying in the House Medicaid Committee. Wiggins also participated in the conference on HB 936. 

The legislation makes Mississisppi part of a growing wave of states trying to figure out ways to use Medicaid to help reduce the costs of providing health care for incarcerated people. 

Mistak said Mississippi is unusual because most states that have pursued that goal expanded Medicaid eligibility based on income. That creates greater potential savings, because it makes almost every incarcerated person eligible. Then the program will pay for care that requires a hospital stay of at least 24 hours. 

There’s still not much precedent in other states to show how exactly Mississippi’s program would play out if enacted. In Connecticut, a nursing home called 60 West houses people paroled from prison following a 2013 law. But Medicaid initially refused to reimburse Connecticut for parolees’ care there, citing the presence of security measures that had no medical justification. After the facility made changes, Medicaid agreed to pay. Today, 60 West looks like any other nursing home.

David Skoczulek, vice president of business development at iCare Health Network, which operates 60 West, told Mississippi Today that a handful of 60 West residents have returned to prison after violating a term of their parole. But no one living at 60 West can be returned to prison simply because their health improved. 

“It would seem to be extraordinarily difficult to protect resident rights in a way that conforms with CMS rules and requirements if they still require the types of custody precautions of a current prisoner,” he said. 

The facility does not share medical records with anyone in the corrections or justice system, he added. 

HB 936 would also create regulations for the special care facilities, and stipulates that there can be no more than three in each Supreme Court district. MDOC would be responsible for contracting with the facilities and would regulate them along with the Department of Health.

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Brittany Brown of Madison was on the way to a photo shoot for her newborn son when she got a phone call from the state health department. There was something abnormal in her baby’s newborn screening.

Since that day a year and a half ago, Brown and her husband have lived in uncertainty. Their son was diagnosed with Pompe disease, a rare genetic condition that causes muscle weakness and progressively gets worse. 

The first uncertainty came after the call: What is Pompe disease?

“I’ve never had a feeling like that,” she said. “… there’s no comparison to getting a call and Googling something like that and thinking that’s what your situation is when you thought you just birthed a healthy child.” 

The Google search produced even more uncertainty. There were two types of Pompe Disease, one more severe than the other, she learned. Which did he have? 

“We lived in this limbo for a few weeks waiting to find out what kind he had,” Brown recalled. 

Her days now are devoted to making sure her son doesn’t fall behind in his specialist appointments and twice-monthly, $20,000 infusions that ensure he is able to walk, swallow and perform other basic tasks. His weekly visits to a physical therapist and an occupational therapist are critical, and his doctors keep a close eye on his health – any regression that goes unaddressed could quickly become permanent.

And in recent weeks, she’s been dealing with yet another unknown.

The University of Mississippi Medical Center, where her now 18-month-old sees a slew of specialists and therapists and receives his life-saving medicine, is battling with her family’s insurance company, Blue Cross Blue Shield. If the two don’t reach an agreement by Friday, UMMC will go out of network with the company – meaning Brown and her husband could face massive bills or be forced to go out of state for their son’s care.  

Brown, and many other patients who either can’t or won’t go elsewhere, have not been able to get an estimate from the hospital of what their out of pocket costs would be if they continued with their UMMC providers. Brown said her son’s UMMC therapists are so wonderful, and so hard to get in with, that she is considering paying out of pocket to keep her son’s spot. 

But she said she’s been told they can’t give her any idea of what the costs would be until after UMMC is officially deemed out of network with the insurance company. 

Brown’s son is one of tens of thousands of Mississippians who will be impacted if UMMC and Blue Cross Blue Shield don’t settle on the terms of their contract. The dispute between the two stems from disagreement over reimbursement rates and Blue Cross’ quality care plan, which measures hospital performance and whether services provided to patients are adequate. 

The public battle is a classic he-said, she-said: UMMC officials say they are only asking for the insurance company to reimburse at “under market rate” prices compared to other academic medical centers. Blue Cross leaders see it a different way. 

“Blue Cross & Blue Shield establishes payment rates on the market rate for Mississippi, not what out-of-state providers are paid,” said Cayla Mangrum, manager of corporate communications for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Mississippi. “UMMC is asking for an overall 30% increase for all of its hospitals and all of its providers. Think about it this way: UMMC is asking that a nurse practitioner in a UMMC Clinic in every city in the state be paid more than every non-UMMC nurse practitioner. UMMC is asking that a physician at UMMC – Grenada be paid more than the physician at any Baptist hospital …” 

But those at UMMC maintain their physicians should be treated differently than other hospitals. UMMC treats the sickest of the sick and is home to the only children’s hospital, the only Level 1 trauma center, and the only organ, tissue and bone marrow transplant program in the state.  

“Blue Cross wants to compare us to other Mississippi hospitals, but there are no hospitals in the state like us,” said Dr. LouAnn Woodward, vice chancellor for health affairs and dean of the School of Medicine. “Every day we treat patients across Mississippi, many with nowhere else to turn, because they need the specialty physicians found only here at UMMC.” 

But for the Mississippians who rely on those specialized services, disagreements between hospital and insurance executives don’t mean much to them. Their concern is how and whether they and their children will receive life-saving care without going bankrupt – and leaders at both UMMC and Blue Cross are aware of that. 

“Unfortunately the patients are caught in the middle of this dispute,” said Dr. Alan Jones, associate vice chancellor for clinical affairs at UMMC. 

Lanier Craft of Brandon also has a son with Pompe disease. For eight years, beginning with his diagnosis at three months old, mother and son have trekked to UMMC for appointments with specialists in Ear, Nose and Throat, complex care, cardiology, pulmonology, orthotics, ophthalmology, neurology and surgery.

Her son Townes receives the same infusions of medicine as Brown’s son – except he gets them weekly. Townes is also wheelchair bound, has a tracheostomy tube and is on a ventilator – making the prospect of regular trips three hours away to New Orleans, Birmingham or Memphis even more daunting. 

“The truth is we can’t go anywhere else,” said Craft, crying. “This is all there is for us. Batson has been there since I walked in the door in February eight years ago with my child. They have done everything for us, and to just completely lose that within a day because of an agreement over money is unimaginable.”

Craft, a teacher, said the past week has been a frenzy. Her son has always been on her husband’s commercial plan, and if she tried to switch him to her state plan, he would either not be accepted because of a pre-existing condition or be extremely expensive.

She took half a day off work Tuesday to make phone calls: to doctors; Blue Cross Blue Shield of both Mississippi and Tennessee, the state her family has insurance through; the insurance commissioner; and any connections she has with offices and agencies who might help.

The calls got her nowhere, she said – a similar outcome reported by others who spoke to Mississippi Today. Several reported they would call UMMC’s help line only to be told to call Blue Cross. Blue Cross would then tell them they would have to call UMMC. 

Around 2 a.m. Wednesday morning, Craft was awake with her son, who was struggling to maintain healthy oxygen levels. Waking in the middle of the night to tend to a health issue with the eight-year-old is common for her.

“My first thought was ‘I can’t take him to the hospital, I don’t know if he’s going to be covered,’” she said. “The first thought as a parent (in that situation) should not be ‘How am I going to afford this?’”

The fallout between the insurance company and the state’s only safety net hospital does not just impact Mississippians with rare, complex conditions.  

One mom of four who spoke to Mississippi Today but did not wish to use her name in the story  has spent the last three months fighting to figure out why her daughter is so sick. 

After an eight-day hospital stay and a diagnosis of Kawasaki Disease last year, her daughter began developing unexplained sores. Despite multiple treatments recommended by specialists at Children’s of Mississippi, they didn’t improve. Her hair began falling out and she lost weight. 

Her daughter’s pediatrician and UMMC dermatologists ran tests for various infections, but all came back negative. The doctors last week directed her to Children’s of Mississippi for a biopsy.

She scrambled to get her daughter in for the procedure before Friday, April 1, when UMMC will be considered out of network. It is scheduled for Thursday – just one day before the deadline for a contract agreement.

But regardless of the biopsy results, her daughter will still need care at UMMC – and the insurance dispute has added another layer of stress to an already stressful situation, she said. 

“We will do whatever we need to do, but we only have so much savings,” she said, noticeably emotional. “One of her bills was $79,000 from when we were in the hospital… and Blue Cross paid $78,000 of that. So what else are we supposed to do?” 

Because Blue Cross and UMMC have had similar public disputes in the past, some patients remain unphased, believing they will work it out as they have done before. 

But while Blue Cross and UMMC disagree on a lot, they both agree on one thing: the chances of this getting worked out before April 1 are slim. 

“We at UMMC don’t believe it’s going to get worked out,” Jones told Mississippi Today on Tuesday. “We’ve seen no good faith effort by Blue Cross to try to negotiate with us.” 

Leaders at the insurance company said they are “not optimistic” an agreement will be reached before the deadline, but maintain they have been working to reach an agreement with the hospital. 

“The fact we have not agreed to their reimbursement or quality demands does not mean we have not acted in good faith,” said Mangrum. “Since early 2021, we have had a dedicated team meeting with UMMC personnel and evaluating the financial impacts of reimbursement demands as well as quality improvement programs under which UMMC could have received additional payments if they met certain criteria.” 

The post Mississippi’s largest hospital and insurer ‘not optimistic’ about reaching an agreement, leaving families in impossible positions appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Extended Medicaid coverage for new moms is still alive in the state legislature, but barely. 

Sen. Kevin Blackwell, R-Southaven, on Tuesday invoked a legislative maneuver that could revive his bill to extend Medicaid coverage from 60 days to a year postpartum. 

Speaker Philip Gunn, R-Clinton, had effectively killed the bill earlier this month, despite pleas from physicians and medical experts who say the extended coverage would reduce maternal mortality and improve outcomes for babies and families in a state with the country’s highest infant mortality rate.

Blackwell’s resolution to suspend the rules Tuesday evening passed the Senate with little opposition. Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, who presides over the Senate, had pledged to “appeal to (Gunn’s) Christian values” to try to persuade him to support the postpartum Medicaid extension. 

Now, the resolution goes to the House. If the House passes the resolution, the Senate could again take up Blackwell’s bill and eventually send it back to the House. 

Gunn cited his opposition to Medicaid expansion when asked why he did not support the bill. But Blackwell’s legislation would not expand Medicaid eligibility; it would extend coverage for people who already qualify. 

Blackwell told Mississippi Today on Tuesday night that he’s not optimistic about the legislation’s prospects in the House.

“I hope they take it up, but I believe they’ll just let it die,” he said. “The speaker calls it expansion when it is not.”

Emily Simmons, Gunn’s communications director, said Tuesday night that she could not comment because her office had not had the chance to review Blackwell’s resolution. 

“I think there were different views on whether this expands Medicaid,” Gunn told Mississippi Today when the bill died on March 9. “I have been very clear that I oppose Medicaid expansion, and that I believe we should be working to get people off Medicaid as opposed to adding more people to it.”

Several other states that have not expanded Medicaid eligibility under the Affordable Care Act have extended postpartum coverage to at least six months, including Georgia, Tennessee and Florida.

The apparent death of the postpartum Medicaid extension earlier in the session sparked an outcry from doctors and advocates for women’s and infants’ health in Mississippi. 

“I feel as if they are playing politics with women’s lives,” Cassandra Welchlin, co-convener and state lead of Mississippi Black Women’s Roundtable, told Mississippi Today. 

A 2019 health department report on maternal mortality in the state reviewed every pregnancy-related death in Mississippi from 2013 to 2016. The report found that nearly 40% of all such deaths occurred more than six weeks postpartum. 

Heart conditions and hypertensive disorders were the two most common causes of death, and Black women in Mississippi are three times likelier than white women to die of pregnancy-related complications. 

During the public health emergency due to COVID-19, the federal government has prevented states from kicking people off Medicaid during the pandemic. That has allowed Mississippi moms up to this point to retain coverage after they give birth. But when the emergency declaration expires, likely sometime this year, they will once again lose coverage at 60 days postpartum.  

On the Senate floor Tuesday night, Sen. Angela Burks Hill, R-Picayune, asked Blackwell whether he was aware that, since the passage of Obamacare, women could obtain Medicaid coverage without “a doctor’s visit or any test” to demonstrate that they are pregnant. 

According to the Mississippi Division of Medicaid, “self-attestation” of pregnancy is sufficient for someone to qualify for coverage if they also meet income requirements. But Medicaid can require verification if information like claims data conflicts with that self-attestation.

“What we could be doing is letting a lot of people get on Medicaid who aren’t pregnant,” Hill said. 

“Are you aware this is postpartum? And that occurs after birth?” Blackwell responded. 

“Everybody’s about pro-life, and if you’re pro-life, you’d be for this bill,” he continued.

Hill said that she is pro-life and that her church has a relationship with a crisis pregnancy center, which counsel pregnant women not to get abortions. 

“Don’t tell me I’m not pro-life because I don’t support this bill,” she said.

Hill and at least five other senators voted against the rules suspension. 

The post Senate gives Gunn another chance to extend health care for new moms appeared first on Mississippi Today.

I bet the new signs are paid for with stimulus funds, too.

The post Marshall Ramsey: New Signs appeared first on Mississippi Today.

In 2019, Alabama became the 49th state to pass equal pay legislation, making Mississippi the only state without pay equity or sex-based employment discrimination laws. The Mississippi Legislature has two opportunities to change that with House Bill 770 and Senate Bill 2451. However, groups like the Black Women’s Roundtable have criticized both bills for a lack of inclusive language for women of color and the requirement of pleading with particularity, among other problems. In this episode of MT Speaks, Will Stribling talks about the bills with executive director of Black Women’s Roundtable Cassandra Welchlin.

The post VIDEO: Black Women’s Roundtable discusses equal pay bills appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Efforts to increase the number of majority-Black legislative districts were thwarted Tuesday by the Republican majorities of the House and Senate.

The redistricting plans developed by the Legislature’s Republican majorities were approved Tuesday. The House approved its leadership’s redistricting plan 81-37 with most of the chamber’s Democrats voting against the proposal.

The Senate vote — 37-5 to approve — was more nuanced, and all Democrats voted for its final passage. But Black senators said the plan diluted Black voter strength and attempted unsuccessfully to amend it.

The main opposition to the Senate plan — and hours of debate on Tuesday — came from a few Republicans angered that the plan, because of population loss in southwest Mississippi, put Sen. Melanie Sojourner, R-Natchez, into a majority Black district.

Sen. Chris McDaniel, R-Ellisville, a close political ally of Sojourner, unsuccessfully attempted to amend the Senate map to help Sojourner and had heated debate with some fellow Republican senators after he accused them of “racial gerrymandering.” The five votes against the Senate plan were Republicans allied with McDaniel and Sojourner.

Sen. Kathy Chism, R-New Albany, said she prayed on the issue and God told her, “Child, I sent you to Jackson … as a Republican.”

“As a Republican I am concerned about the district’s increase in (Black voting age population) now being more than 60%,” Chism said. “That makes a Republican, pro-life district vulnerable to becoming a pro-choice Democrat district. It’s time we stand as Republicans for Republican principles.”

But other Republicans said the maps were redrawn fairly, based on population changes and law, and noted Sojourner’s district was essentially shifted to what will be a heavily Republican district in Rankin and Smith counties because of population growth there.

The two chambers are expected to rubberstamp the other chamber’s plan in the coming days and complete the redistricting process that must be conducted every 10 years to adhere to population shifts found by the decennial U.S. Census.

Black legislators in both chambers unsuccessfully offered amendments to increase the number of African American majority districts.

“All we are saying is let a redistricting plan reflect the population and people of Mississippi,” said Robert Johnson, D-Natchez, who is the House minority leader. “We ought to be in this body in a balanced manner that takes care everybody in the state.”

The plan developed by the House and Senate Republican leadership maintained “the status quo” in terms of African American majority districts – 15 of the 52 seats in the Senate and 42 of 122 in the House.

“A map that maintains the status quo simply dilutes Black voting-strength in Mississippi,” said Sen. Derrick Simmons, D-Greenville, the Senate minority leader. Simmons offered an amendment that was voted down to add an additional four Black majority districts in the Senate.

In the House, Johnson offered a plan that would have added five additional majority-Black districts in the House and 10 additional districts that provided African Americans more influence by increasing their numbers significantly. The House leadership plan has few districts with a Black population between 30% and 40%. Johnson’s plan would have significantly increased that number.

African American members said the plan offered by the leadership “packed” the Black population into fewer districts to dilute their strength.

“What we are trying to do is say you don’t have to pack all of the African Americans in one district,” Johnson said.

Rep. Jim Beckett, R-Bruce, who headed up the redistricting process in the House, countered, “I can tell you I think we did everything we could possibly do to draw districts fair to the members of the chamber, to the state and to the regions of the state.”

Under the leadership’s plans, 29% of the Senate districts are majority African American while 34% of the House districts are. Based on the 2020 Census, the state’s African American population is 38% while the white population is 59%. The remaining percentage fits in “other” categories including multiple racial groups, under the categories developed by the U.S. Census.

READ MORE:

• Republicans make few changes to legislative maps during redistricting

• Mississippi NAACP questions constitutionality of redistricting plan

• Ethics Commission rules that open meetings law was not violated in redistricting effort

• Podcast: Inside the ‘daunting’ task that is legislative redistricting

The post Redistricting plans pass, despite Black lawmakers’ protests appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Vroom vroom.

The post Marshall Ramsey: Tax Cutters appeared first on Mississippi Today.

House and Senate leaders late Monday said they were close to deals on budget, federal stimulus spending and other measures, but said they would have to extend deadlines for final negotiations as the 2022 Mississippi legislative session draws toward a close.

Lawmakers are expected to vote Tuesday to extend the session “on paper” because they couldn’t meet Monday’s midnight deadline to pass budget bills. Still, they hope to finish work and end this year’s session by Friday.

Still being finalized is a nearly $7 billion state budget for the fiscal year that starts in July, and a plan to spend most of $1.8 billion in federal American Rescue Plan Act pandemic stimulus money from Congress.

“Chairman Hopson and Chairman Read are busy right now working on (appropriations bills) but obviously they will not finish” tonight, Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, who presides over the Senate, said referring to House Appropriations Chair John Read and his Senate counterpart, Briggs Hopson.

Legislative leaders do not believe they will have any trouble garnering the two-thirds vote of both chambers needed to push back the Monday night deadline.

“I do believe we will reach a budget (agreement) tonight or sometime tomorrow,” House Speaker Philip Gunn said Monday. “… But the physical process of printing the bills — having analysts read them, proof them, then the actual printing, can take 48 hours. Friday — that’s my guess (on ending the session).”

The budget agreement is expected to include about $40 million for a state employee pay raise under the state Personnel Board’s “SEC Squared” program to bring state government salaries closer to the regional averages. Lawmakers already have passed on to the governor the largest teacher pay raise in state history.

Over the weekend, lawmakers also sent to the governor the largest tax cut in state history, one that will eliminate more than $500 million in personal income taxes for Mississippians by 2026.

Legislative leaders said they’ve also agreed on most details of spending $1.3 billion to $1.4 billion of the state’s ARPA money and holding back $300 million to $400 million.

The bulk of the state’s ARPA money — about $750 million — would go to local governments and rural water associations for infrastructure projects, House Speaker Pro Tem Jason White said. Millions would also go to health, mental health and children’s services to help the state meet long-running federal court mandates to remedy substandard services and conditions. Other spending will likely include a new nursing center at the University of Mississippi Medical Center and about $50 million for workforce development.

White said lawmakers are currently considering a $25 million match for $25 million the city of Jackson has earmarked for work on its troubled water and sewer system. City leaders have said fixes to the system will cost much more, and White said this would be a first step in addressing the problems.

Numerous general law bills are still being debated in the final days of the session, Gunn said, including an equal pay bill — with Mississippi the last state in the nation not to provide recourse for employees paid less based on sex — and reinstating the voter ballot initiative process shot down by the courts.

The post Lawmakers ‘close’ on budget, stimulus spending deals, ending session appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Happy official sixth anniversary to Mississippi Today! I’ve had the joy of leading this organization through ups and downs over five of our six years. It hasn’t always been easy, but the heart behind our mission is what fuels us. I want to thank each of you, our readers, who have supported us by sharing our stories, following us on social media and donating to our newsroom. It is only by your support that the last six years have been possible.

As a final look back, I wanted to share some of our top coverage from last year. In 2021, we continued our coverage of the MDHS welfare scandal. Investigative reporter Anna Wolfe reported on the money that Brett Farve and others involved in the case still owed the state. We continue to follow this story and have an entire page dedicated to tracking those involved and if they are being held accountable.

We also had extensive coverage of the Jackson water crisis that left many in the Metro area without adequate access to water. Our reporter Alex Rozier followed the city’s water deficiencies, while our political reporters followed the lawsuit drawn against the city and our education reporter followed how the water crisis affected Jackson’s school system. The coverage is still being followed into this year.

Thank you for taking a journey back in time with us this past week as we celebrate the hard work of our reporters dedicated to making Mississippi a better place. We find encouragement in the fact that so many of you share the same passion for the state and take the initiative to support our mission in any way you can. Here’s to many more years serving the great people of Mississippi and beyond!

To our current members: Thank you, truly, for your generous support. Mississippi Today is for the people and powered by the people. Our work would not be possible without you and our stories would not have meaning without your willingness to share your experiences with our reporters.

To our readers who are not yet members: Thank you for joining us on this journey. If you’d like to help us celebrate and create more meaningful projects going forward, create a recurring donation today. We’re almost to our goal of welcoming 60 new members in celebration of our sixth anniversary.

The post Mississippi Today officially turns six years old appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Note: This analysis first published in Mississippi Today’s weekly legislative newsletter. Subscribe to our free newsletter for exclusive early access to weekly analyses.

Upon learning news of a legislative income tax cut agreement — what will be the largest single tax cut in Mississippi history — Gov. Tate Reeves was left with nothing but the ability to post on social media.

The governor, who took advantage last week of legislative infighting and publicly advocated for a full elimination of the income tax, was effectively sidelined when lawmakers agreed on a deal behind closed doors on Saturday.

Reeves called the tax plan “a good step” but criticized Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann for demanding a more measured approach to cutting the income tax. Speaker of the House Philip Gunn had embraced Reeves’ plan to eliminate the income tax, but Gunn ultimately trashed it during legislative negotiations with Hosemann.

“Strong action that will change our state for the better takes time and passionate partners,” Reeves tweeted. “For transformative change, we need our state’s Lieutenant Governor to work with bold conservatives.”

For Reeves, Gunn and many Republican elected officials, the final tax cut plan that lawmakers agreed to did much less than they wanted.

All eight statewide offices and the three most powerful seats in Mississippi — governor, lieutenant governor and speaker — are held by members of the Republican Party. The Mississippi Republican Party enjoys a supermajority of both the Senate and House, meaning the party in power can pass any bill they want without a single Democratic vote.

Why, then, can’t Republicans agree on and pass full-throated reforms and other major policies? Because there are three distinct factions within the Mississippi Republican Party, each with clear voter support and led by power brokers who can swing votes and muddy the political waters.

On any given policy debate, one faction pushes and the other two pull. They are rarely in agreement on really anything. The boundaries of the factions are constantly moving, and as the national Republican Party continues its steady march to the right, many longtime Mississippi Republican elected officials have either been forced to move right with the party or are now considered moderate because their positions are unchanged. Still, many Republican elected officials often try to fit in two or more groups at once.

The intra-party struggle for power and a clear identity reared its head during the income tax debate this legislative session as seemingly no Grand Old Party leader got exactly what they wanted. Nearly every Republican is leaving Jackson disappointed in some regard, and political observers are left trying to sift through what exactly happened the past three months.

Here are the three Republican Party factions and examples of their influence during the debate on tax cuts this session:

The Establishment

This is the largest faction of the Mississippi Republican Party. It wields the most influence at the Capitol, and it is certainly home to most Republican elected officials in the state.

These Republicans adhere to fiscal conservative principles championed by national party leaders: lower taxes, less government spending, deregulation of the economy. On social issues, they are driven by what they believe to be conservative evangelical principles.

Gov. Reeves and Speaker Gunn reside solidly within the Establishment, though both have tried often to pander to voters to their right. Reeves and Gunn both strongly supported full elimination of the income tax, though they had differing ideas of how to accomplish that.

Many rank-and-file legislative Republicans supported the plan to eliminate the income tax. Every House Republican voted for some form of Gunn’s plan, and many state senators were open to it.

The Establishment benefits from the unabashed support of conservative media outlets — both radio and online — that will target Republicans who aren’t “in line” with Establishment leaders. Several right-leaning interest groups and powerful lobbies also worked on behalf of the Establishment to chastise Republicans who were against the plan.

The Moderates

This wing of the Republican Party is left of the Establishment and is growing by the term at the Capitol.

Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann is the most powerful elected official of the Moderates, who believe that many principles championed by the Establishment can sometimes be too risky or too far. They believe that fiscal policy shouldn’t be reformed quickly, especially in a poorer state like Mississippi that is always especially susceptible to challenging national economic times.

On both fiscal and social issues, they are more inclined to listen to their colleagues across the aisle about who might be affected by certain policies. For example, Senate Republicans had initially pushed as part of their tax cut package lowering Mississippi’s highest-in-the-nation grocery tax — a tax that disproportionately affects economically disadvantaged Mississippians.

Hosemann, with the help of five or six Republican Senate leaders, staved off Gunn’s plan for full elimination of the income tax with their “this does too much, too quickly in uncertain economic times” argument.

“Our constituents expect us to fund core government services in infrastructure, education, healthcare and other areas,” Hosemann said in a statement Saturday after the compromise passed. “Our budget experts have assured us we can continue to do this and significantly ease the tax burden on hardworking Mississippians.”

Hosemann is taking heat for this from both the Establishment — evidenced by Reeves’ tweet — and the Far Right.

The Far Right

This wing of the Mississippi Republican Party is on the far right side of the political spectrum. These elected officials are uber conservatives — “Reagan Republicans” aren’t usually conservative enough in their view. They, like the Moderates, also appear to be gaining in number at the Capitol, and Establishment Republicans tend to fear them in election years.

They believe that there should be little government spending altogether, that no taxpayer should help pay for services that other taxpayers benefit from. The government is the big, bad enemy of working people, and it should be completely stripped of its size and might so that citizens may take full control of their lives.

This wing of the Mississippi Republican Party is led most notably by state Sen. Chris McDaniel, who has unsuccessfully run for U.S. senator and has earned a national following among fellow right-wing conservatives. McDaniel and his supporters have panned Hosemann in recent days for blocking a full elimination of the income tax, using terms to describe Hosemann like “RINO” (Republican In Name Only) and even calling him a Democrat.

“Hosemann has stubbornly refused to consider eliminating the state’s income tax even though Governor Tate Reeves, Speaker Philip Gunn, the House of Representatives, and conservatives across Mississippi have championed the effort,” McDaniel wrote on Facebook last week. “Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised. Delbert Hosemann also refused to endorse Donald Trump during his 2016 presidential campaign.”

Will it matter in 2023?

A tax cut — the largest in the state’s history — isn’t something any Republican regardless of faction is likely to lose on by the time statewide and legislative elections happen in August and November of 2023.

But there is sure to be a lot of politicking between now and then.

The Far Right wants Hosemann’s head on a stake. McDaniel and his loud supporters have wanted the state senator to run for lieutenant governor for years. As the national Republican Party continues moving to the right, Mississippi supporters of this faction appear to be frustrated right now with everyone, including the Establishment. While they can certainly be loud on social media and during rallies at the Capitol, they have never proven to have enough statewide influence at the ballot box in Mississippi to do anything about it.

The Moderates continue picking up legislative seats, particularly in suburban districts with higher educational attainment. It also appears that many incumbent Republicans at the Capitol are getting more comfortable with owning their more moderate tendencies — if not publicly, then privately while trying to shape policy behind closed doors. Hosemann, at least going into his term as lieutenant governor, had the highest approval rating of any statewide elected official in Mississippi, so any serious threat to his 2023 re-election would be a surprise.

The Establishment continues its dominance in the state and hasn’t really shown any signs of slowing down. Reeves will continue trying to placate both the Establishment and the Far Right, although the latter has appeared a losing strategy for him since he was elected governor (especially apparent during the pandemic and the 2020 state flag change). Gunn is still flirting with a 2023 primary challenge of Reeves.

The bottom line and true as ever in Mississippi: Republicans have Election Day support from everyday voters solely because of the word “Republican” behind their names. Will there ever be a broad enough understanding of the intra-party struggles and factional nuances that could spur sea change in GOP primaries?

The post Mississippi’s three Republican parties and how they influenced the income tax debate appeared first on Mississippi Today.