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CHICAGO — The Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, a protege of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and two-time presidential candidate who led the Civil Rights Movement for decades after the revered leader’s assassination, died Tuesday. He was 84.

As a young organizer in Chicago, Jackson was called to meet with King at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, shortly before King was killed, and he publicly positioned himself thereafter as King’s successor.

Santita Jackson confirmed that her father, who had a rare neurological disorder, died at home in Chicago, surrounded by family.

Jackson led a lifetime of crusades in the United States and abroad, advocating for the poor and underrepresented on issues, including voting rights, job opportunities, education and health care. He scored diplomatic victories with world leaders, and through his Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, he channeled cries for Black pride and self-determination into corporate boardrooms, pressuring executives to make America a more open and equitable society.

And when he declared, “I am Somebody,” in a poem he often repeated, he sought to reach people of all colors. “I may be poor, but I am Somebody; I may be young; but I am Somebody; I may be on welfare, but I am Somebody,” Jackson intoned.

It was a message he took literally and personally, having risen from obscurity in the segregated South to become America’s best-known civil rights activist since King.

“Our father was a servant leader — not only to our family, but to the oppressed, the voiceless, and the overlooked around the world,” the Jackson family said in a statement posted online. “We shared him with the world, and in return, the world became part of our extended family.”

Fellow civil rights activist the Rev. Al Sharpton said his mentor “was not simply a civil rights leader; he was a movement unto himself.”

“He taught me that protest must have purpose, that faith must have feet, and that justice is not seasonal, it is daily work,” Sharpton wrote in a statement, adding that Jackson taught “trying is as important as triumph. That you do not wait for the dream to come true; you work to make it real.”

Despite profound health challenges in his final years, including the disorder that affected his ability to move and speak, Jackson continued protesting against racial injustice into the era of Black Lives Matter. In 2024, he appeared at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago and at a City Council meeting to show support for a resolution backing a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war.

“Even if we win,” he told marchers in Minneapolis before the officer whose knee kept George Floyd from breathing was convicted of murder, “it’s relief, not victory. They’re still killing our people. Stop the violence, save the children. Keep hope alive.”

Calls to action, delivered in a memorable voice

Jackson’s voice, infused with the stirring cadences and powerful insistence of the Black church, demanded attention. On the campaign trail and elsewhere, he used rhyming and slogans such as “Hope not dope” and “If my mind can conceive it and my heart can believe it, then I can achieve it,” to deliver his messages.

Jackson had his share of critics, both within and outside of the Black community. Some considered him a grandstander, too eager to seek the spotlight. Looking back on his life and legacy, Jackson told The Associated Press in 2011 that he felt blessed to be able to continue the service of other leaders before him and to lay a foundation for those to come.

“A part of our life’s work was to tear down walls and build bridges, and in a half century of work, we’ve basically torn down walls,” Jackson said. “Sometimes when you tear down walls, you’re scarred by falling debris, but your mission is to open up holes so others behind you can run through.”

In his final months, as he received 24-hour care, he lost his ability to speak, communicating with family and visitors by holding their hands and squeezing.

“I get very emotional knowing that these speeches belong to the ages now,” his son, Jesse Jackson Jr., told the AP in October.

A student athlete drawn to the Civil Rights Movement

Jesse Louis Jackson was born Oct. 8, 1941, in Greenville, South Carolina, the son of high school student Helen Burns and Noah Louis Robinson, a married man who lived next door. Jackson was later adopted by Charles Henry Jackson, who married his mother.

Jackson was a star quarterback on the football team at Sterling High School in Greenville, and he accepted a football scholarship from the University of Illinois. But after reportedly being told that Black people couldn’t play quarterback, he transferred to North Carolina A&T in Greensboro, where he became the first-string quarterback, an honor student in sociology and economics, and student body president.

Arriving on the historically Black campus in 1960 just months after students there launched sit-ins at a whites-only lunch counter, Jackson immersed himself in the blossoming Civil Rights Movement.

By 1965, he joined the voting rights march King led from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. King dispatched him to Chicago to launch Operation Breadbasket, a Southern Christian Leadership Conference effort to pressure companies to hire Black workers.

Jackson called his time with King “a phenomenal four years of work.”

Jackson was with King on April 4, 1968, when the civil rights leader was slain. Jackson’s account of the assassination was that King died in his arms.

Sharpton said he “always wondered how much trauma that must have been” for Jackson to witness King’s death. “He never would talk about it too much, but it drove him,” Sharpton said Tuesday. “He said, ‘We’ve got to keep Dr. King’s legacy alive.’”

With his flair for the dramatic, Jackson wore a turtleneck he said was soaked with King’s blood for two days, including at a King memorial service held by the Chicago City Council, where he said: “I come here with a heavy heart because on my chest is the stain of blood from Dr. King’s head.”

However, several King aides, including speechwriter Alfred Duckett, questioned whether Jackson could have gotten King’s blood on his clothing. There are no images of Jackson in pictures taken shortly after the assassination.

In 1971, Jackson broke with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to form Operation PUSH, originally named People United to Save Humanity. The organization based on Chicago’s South Side declared a sweeping mission, from diversifying workforces to registering voters in communities of color nationwide. Using lawsuits and threats of boycotts, Jackson pressured top corporations to spend millions and publicly commit to hiring more diverse employees.

The constant campaigns often left his wife, Jacqueline Lavinia Brown, the college sweetheart he married in 1963, taking the lead in raising their five children: Santita Jackson, Yusef DuBois Jackson, Jacqueline Lavinia Jackson Jr., and two future members of Congress, U.S. Rep. Jonathan Luther Jackson and Jesse L. Jackson Jr., who resigned in 2012 but is seeking reelection in the 2026 midterms.

The elder Jackson, who was ordained as a Baptist minister in 1968 and earned his master’s of divinity degree in 2000, also acknowledged fathering a child, Ashley Jackson, with one of his employees at Rainbow/PUSH, Karen L. Stanford. He said he understood what it means to be born out of wedlock and supported her emotionally and financially.

Presidential aspirations fall short but help ‘keep hope alive’

Despite once telling a Black audience he would not run for president “because white people are incapable of appreciating me,” Jackson ran twice and did better than any Black politician had before President Barack Obama, winning 13 primaries and caucuses for the Democratic nomination in 1988, four years after his first failed attempt.

His successes left supporters chanting another Jackson slogan, “Keep hope alive.”

“I was able to run for the presidency twice and redefine what was possible; it raised the lid for women and other people of color,” he told the AP. “Part of my job was to sow seeds of the possibilities.”

U.S. Rep. John Lewis said during a 1988 C-SPAN interview that Jackson’s two runs for the Democratic nomination “opened some doors that some minority person will be able to walk through and become president.”

Jackson also pushed for cultural change, joining calls by NAACP members and other movement leaders in the late 1980s to identify Black people in the United States as African Americans.

“To be called African Americans has cultural integrity — it puts us in our proper historical context,” Jackson said at the time. “Every ethnic group in this country has a reference to some base, some historical cultural base. African Americans have hit that level of cultural maturity.”

Jackson’s words sometimes got him in trouble.

In 1984, he apologized for what he thought were private comments to a reporter in which he called New York City “Hymietown,” a derogatory reference to its large Jewish population. And in 2008, he made headlines when he complained that Obama was “talking down to Black people” in comments captured by a microphone he didn’t know was on during a break in a television taping.

Still, when Jackson joined the jubilant crowd in Chicago’s Grant Park to greet Obama that election night, he had tears streaming down his face.

“I wish for a moment that Dr. King or (slain civil rights leader) Medgar Evers … could’ve just been there for 30 seconds to see the fruits of their labor,” he told the AP years later. “I became overwhelmed. It was the joy and the journey.”

Exerting influence on events at home and abroad

Jackson also had influence abroad, meeting world leaders and scoring diplomatic victories, including the release of Navy Lt. Robert Goodman from Syria in 1984, as well as the 1990 release of more than 700 foreign women and children held after Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait. In 1999, he won the freedom of three Americans imprisoned by Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic.

In 2000, President Bill Clinton awarded Jackson the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the country’s highest civilian honor.

“Citizens have the right to do something or do nothing,” Jackson said, before heading to Syria. “We choose to do something.”

In 2021, Jackson joined the parents of Ahmaud Arbery inside the Georgia courtroom where three white men were convicted of killing the young Black jogger. In 2022, he hand-delivered a letter to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Chicago, calling for federal charges against former Chicago Police Officer Jason Van Dyke in the 2014 killing of Black teenager Laquan McDonald.

Jackson, who stepped down as president of Rainbow/PUSH in July 2023, disclosed in 2017 that he had sought treatment for Parkinson’s, but he continued to make public appearances even as the disease made it more difficult for listeners to understand him. Last year, doctors confirmed a diagnosis of progressive supranuclear palsy, a life-threatening neurological disorder. He was admitted to a hospital in November for nearly two weeks.

During the coronavirus pandemic, he and his wife survived being hospitalized with COVID-19. Jackson was vaccinated early, urging Black people in particular to get protected, given their higher risks for bad outcomes.

“It’s America’s unfinished business — we’re free, but not equal,” Jackson told the AP. “There’s a reality check that has been brought by the coronavirus, that exposes the weakness and the opportunity.”

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Associated Press writers Amy Forliti in Minneapolis and Aaron Morrison in New York contributed to this report, as well as former AP writer Karen Hawkins, who left AP in 2012.

More Mississippi children could face prison time under proposed legislation that state law enforcement officials, including Attorney General Lynn Fitch, say is aimed at quashing statewide gang violence.

Senate Bill 2710 and House Bill 1165 would lead to harsher punishment for an unknown number of children in the state by creating new avenues for prosecutors to charge minors as adults.

Under current state law, most minors accused of crimes in Mississippi are placed into the youth court system where the primary goal is rehabilitation, not punishment. 

Only when children commit felonies that carry a life sentence or execution, or felonies involving the use of a deadly weapon, do they end up in circuit court, where they face the same punishment as adults.

The proposed legislation would create a new carveout so that a child who possesses a gun while committing or attempting to commit a violent felony would also be charged as an adult – even if the child did not brandish the weapon during the crime.

The Senate bill would go further, punishing children as adults for committing any felony – even nonviolent offenses – while possessing a firearm that is stolen. It would also add bringing a gun to school among the crimes for which children could be imprisoned.

These provisions are particularly worrisome to criminal justice advocates, who note that children in Mississippi grow up in a state with one of the highest rates of gun ownership in the country. 

“You’re going to catch a lot more kids in the net,” said Andre de Gruy, the state public defender. “These aren’t high-risk kids with serious problems and they would be better served in youth court.” 

Once a child has been convicted in circuit court as an adult, they can never be tried in youth court again. For children 15 years or older, de Gruy added that there will be no way for circuit court judges to move their cases back to youth court if the bill is passed, due to existing state law. He said the difference in courts is not a legal quirk – it is a matter of facing a few months in a juvenile detention center versus years in Parchman. 

Proponents of the legislation – including the Mississippi Prosecutor’s Association and the Mississippi Sheriff’s Association – say that gang members target youth to commit crimes on their behalf, knowing children will receive more lenient punishment than adults. 

But so far, they have not offered data to support that assessment. The attorney general’s office did not respond to questions from Mississippi Today by publication time.

“There are more than 200 gangs in Mississippi, and they recruit minors to do a lot of their dirty work, knowing that punishment is often disproportionate to the severity of the crime,” Fitch said in the press release. “We are taking on this problem by making the penalty fit the crime, both making juvenile recruitment less attractive to gangs and getting criminals off the streets.” 

The bills would also make it a crime to shoot into a group of people, conduct that current state criminal code does not directly address, and create harsher sentences for adults who give firearms to children. Each bill passed out of their respective chambers last week with no floor debate. 

The Republican representatives who authored the House legislation, Jansen Owen from Poplarville and Dana McLean from Columbus, did not respond to requests for comment by the time of publication. 

Sen. Joey Fillingane, a Republican from Sumrall who authored the Senate legislation, told Mississippi Today that mayors across the state want to see the Legislature take action after shootings during football games claimed the lives of at least nine Mississippians last year. 

“If the current situation isn’t working, if we’re having a proliferation of youth crimes using deadly weapons, then we’ve got to try something different and see if we can get a different result,” he said. 

But de Gruy and other advocates argue this bill represents more of the same: More incarcerated people in a state with one of the highest incarceration rates in the world. 

“To the claim that youth crime is on the rise and it’s being driven by gangs, there is no evidence of that,” he said. “I don’t care how many times they say it, that doesn’t make it true.”

Nationally, police are arresting youth for violent crime far less than they did three decades ago, according to FBI data. But in Mississippi, creating a statewide assessment of the same trend is difficult, as many police departments do not report crime numbers to the FBI. 

In the state youth courts, weapons offenses consistently account for a fraction of delinquency cases. Annual reports from the Mississippi Department of Human Services, which oversees services and programs for delinquent juveniles, show that youth weapons offenses recently rose, from 479 in 2019 to a high of 846 in 2023. Weapons offenses fell in 2024 to 780.

De Gruy noted this increase occurred during an overall spike in crime corresponding with the coronavirus pandemic.

As for the shootings at football games cited by Fillingane, de Gruy noted that most of the 19 people arrested during a particularly deadly October weekend were adults. Law enforcement agencies have not released the names and ages of all suspects, but a review of news reports show that of the 13 people whose ages were confirmed, only one was a minor. 

In Heidelberg, the minor was arrested along with six others who were 18 or 19 years old and whose cases would not be tried in youth court. It is not known if they had a history in youth court.

“Youth court judges for right or for wrong look at the youth as somebody who could be saved,” Sen. Brice Wiggins, R-Pascagoula, a former youth court prosecutor, said during a Senate committee hearing last month. “When you get into the adult system, the bottom line is you’re pretty much done and you’re not saved.” 

Wiggins has introduced legislation to bring more transparency to youth courts, which are secret in Mississippi — another fact that prosecutors bemoaned at the hearing. 

“These youth that are committing these violent crimes have no visibility,” said Gregory Austin, the deputy director of the attorney general’s policy division. “They’re getting before the circuit court for the first time with nobody knowing their records because the youth court records are sealed.”

Prosecutors’ surprise can quickly turn into frustration upon learning they had unsuccessfully tried to persuade a youth court judge to transfer a juvenile’s case to circuit court. 

“They’re causing all this bedlam and mayhem and all this other stuff,” said Bryan Buckley, the president of the Mississippi Prosecutors Association, but youth court judges are “like, ‘No, we’re going to try to work with them some more,’ and it happens a few months later.”

If children face harsher punishment, Fillingane told Mississippi Today he envisions them turning on gang leaders or deciding not to follow orders. 

“I think that’s the thought and the hope,” he said. 

But researchers are mixed at best about whether more prison time can deter violent crime, with widely accepted studies finding that lengthy sentences are especially ineffective if the targeted population doesn’t understand the potential punishment of a particular crime. That is especially likely to be the case with youth, whose decision-making faculties are still developing. 

Fillingane said he was aware of this research. 

“I think there are also probably studies out there that argue the other way,” he said. “I think the bottom line is the public is tired of youth offenders committing particularly violent crimes especially with firearms.” 

After speaking with Mississippi Today, Fillingane asked the attorney general’s office and the prosecutors’ association to provide data on youth crime. 

“The perception around the state at least seems to be that these folks are not getting the punishment that they ought to get, and we’re just slapping wrists and saying, ‘oh well, because they’re only 15 or 16, that that’s all we can do, we really can’t do anything else with these folks’ and hope for the best,” the senator said. “That mentality seems to be out there and the citizenry is just not happy about it all.”

Secretary of State Michael Watson discusses his push for lawmakers to enact campaign finance reform, including transparency and searchability of reports for the public. Watson says he knows such legislation is a tough sell with lawmakers.

Evan Turnage, an attorney with ties to top congressional Democrats who is aiming to oust Rep. Bennie Thompson in Mississippi’s 2nd District, rolled out a new ad on Tuesday.

The ad, which a spokesperson for Turnage’s campaign told Mississippi Today was part of a “six-figure” purchase across broadcast and digital platforms, hits the airwaves with less than a month to go before the state’s March 10 primaries for congressional offices.

Turnage, 33, said the 2nd Congressional District — which stretches from the Delta through much of Jackson and along the Mississippi River — has remained “the poorest district in the poorest state in the country” for the entirety of Thompson’s tenure.

“That was true when I was one, when our congressman was first elected, it’s true today,” Turnage said. “If our congressman’s 33 years in office had helped build up this district, built wealth and health in this district, there’d be no need for change. But if life has gotten harder and less fair for you and your neighbors like it has for so many Mississippians, then I ask for your support to bring new ideas and new leadership back to the halls of power.”

A spokesperson for Thompson did not respond to a request for comment about the ad or a question about his closing message to voters. In recent media appearances, Thompson has lambasted the Trump administration for its immigration crackdown, and his campaign has touted endorsements from leading politicians in his district, such as Jackson Mayor John Horhn.

Turnage is a former aide to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York and Senate Conference Vice Chair Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. His close ties to two of the U.S. Senate’s leading Democrats made his decision to challenge Thompson notable, as the longtime incumbent Thompson has typically sailed to re-election since entering office in 1993 without facing a pedigreed Democratic challenger in a primary.

Turnage lived briefly in Cleveland as a child before returning to Jackson, attending Murrah High School in the Jackson Public Schools system. His parents, Ellis and Ellie Turnage, are both attorneys. He attended Yale Law School and went on to work for Warren, helping her draft legislation aimed at curbing corporate power. He also worked for Schumer as a top lawyer handling Democratic leadership priorities. He currently leads the Southern Justice Project at the Open Markets Institute

Thompson has represented the 2nd Congressional District covering Jackson and the Delta since 1993. Thompson, a civil rights leader and former chair of the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6th Capitol attack, is a towering figure in state and national politics. He previously told Mississippi Today he believes his record would “speak for itself.”

Turnage officially entered the race on Dec. 17. He unveiled a policy platform that includes a “Come Home” agenda to reverse brain drain through student debt relief, housing support and remote federal work. He has also touted support for a Working Families Tax Credit, a policy he said would counter the realities underlying the state’s welfare scandal. He supports more funding for maternal health care, where outcomes in the Delta lag behind most of the country and programs to increase broadband access.

Turnage has also attempted to draw a contrast between himself and Thompson on the issue of campaign finance, saying Thompson has received money from private prison companies.

The latest round of campaign finance reports from the Federal Election Commission, which run up to Dec. 31, 2025, shows Thompson with $1.6 million in cash on hand. Thompson received a $5,000 donation in 2025 from GEO Group, a company that invests in private prisons, the FEC reports show.

Turnage’s fundraising records show he raised $65,464 between when he launched his campaign on Dec. 17 and Dec. 31, 2025, the latest date for which FEC reports are available.

On the Republican side, Adams County Supervisor Kevin Wilson is challenging Ron Eller, who is running again for the GOP nomination after losing to Thompson by nearly 25 points in 2024. Wilson raised about $55,000, besting Eller’s roughly $11,000 haul in the latest FEC numbers. An independent, Bennie Foster, is also running for the seat.

Jackson’s mayor and a majority of the City Council gave their support Monday to a proposal advancing at the Capitol that would put long-term control of the city’s water and sewer systems under a separate utility authority. Residents, though, offered concerns during a crowded town hall meeting that included tense confrontation between officials.

House Bill 1677 would create a “Metro Jackson Water Authority” led by a nine-member board who would appoint a president to run daily operations. The bill passed the House last week and awaits action in the Senate. The Jackson City Council called a meeting Monday to hear residents’ thoughts on the idea.

Several Jacksonians also backed the bill, arguing this was as good a deal the city would get. In previous legislative sessions, lawmakers have only introduced bills that would give a majority of the board appointments to state officials.

“From my perspective, we’re caught between a rock and a hard place,” said John Byrd, vice president of the Association of South Jackson Neighborhoods. “It’s problematic we’re in this situation, but we’ve got to get out of this situation. This is a way to ease out of the burden and hopefully get back onto sound ground.”

Jeffrey Taylor, a resident who used to work for the Jackson Fire Department, called the proposed authority “the lesser of other evils.”

HB 1677 would give the city input on a majority of the nine seats. Those positions would include: Jackson’s mayor; two at-large appointees selected by the mayor; one recommendation each from Byram’s and Ridgeland’s respective mayors, who would then need approval from Jackson’s city council; and the president of the Greater Jackson Chamber of Commerce. The governor would have two at-large appointees and the lieutenant governor would have one.

The new authority would kick in once a federal judge releases third-party utility JXN Water from control of the water and sewer systems. JXN Water manager Ted Henifin has projected that to happen by 2027, although U.S. District Court Judge Henry Wingate has the final say.

While five of the nine seats would go through elected Jackson officials, residents on Monday said they were worried that having unelected people run the water and sewer systems would dilute the democratic process.

“ When authority to manage a public utility is moved from elected officials and entrusted to an appointed board, the public loses its direct avenue for accountability at the ballot box,” said Nsombi Lambright-Haynes, representing the Jackson NAACP.

Lambright-Haynes and others also said the bill should include a process for the water and sewer systems to come back under the city’s direct control once they’ve been stabilized.

The city council voted 4-2 for a resolution backing the House proposal, while also advocating for the water authority to have a fair billing dispute process. Ward 5 Council Member Vernon Hartley and Ward 2 Council Member Tina Clay voted against the bill. Ward 3 Council Member Kenneth Stokes was absent.

Hartley panned lawmakers for not having public forums to discuss the bill earlier in the process.

“I do have a message for our politicians out there: How dare you bring something to us without going to the public?” he said. “They’re the ones paying the bills.”

Hartley also said it felt like lawmakers were pressuring the city to rush into a decision when there could be other options.

Rep. Justis Gibbs, a Democrat from Jackson, was in attendance. While agreeing with residents’ concerns with the bill, Gibbs said the Democratic-led city would likely not get a better offer from the majority-Republican Mississippi Legislature.

“ We really have to manage our wishes and our expectations with the amount of votes that we can influence in the state Legislature,” he said.

Ward 7 Council Member Kevin Parkinson pushed back on suggestions that the city would have less control under the proposed authority.

“We now have 0% control of the system,” Parkinson said.

Tensions ran high earlier in the meeting, when Parkinson repeated to Henifin a common sentiment locals have expressed about JXN Water: While the utility has made major infrastructure improvements, it hasn’t done as well with its billing and customer service. Henifin took exception to the remark.

“I take offense,” Henifin said. “Everyone likes to say, ‘Oh you’ve done a great job with the infrastructure.’ We’re doing a great job with the billing system. It’s just painful. People don’t want to pay their bill. There’s been a culture here of folks …”

Groans from the crowd immediately drowned out his voice, to which Henifin responded, “Whatever, I’ll take the heat.”

Mayor John Horhn, a former state senator, said forming a water authority would help the city manage its $197 million in debt associated with its water and sewer systems. If the bill passed, the debt would transfer from the city to the authority. Horhn said the move would make lenders more willing to restructure the debt payments. A water authority would also be able to borrow more money, which JXN Water currently can’t do.

While the city would be involved with a majority of the board appointees, some potential actions under HB 1677 would require more than just a majority vote. Rate increases or expenditures over $5 million would require agreement from three-fourths of the board, which is more than the five seats the city would have direct control over.

During the town hall, Byram Alderwoman Roschelle Gibson said the bill wouldn’t give her city fair representation on the board because the Jackson City Council could reject their nominees. JXN Water serves about 4,200 customers in Byram.

Weeks after the death of his school choice bill in the Senate, House Speaker Jason White told a crowd in downtown Jackson on Monday that a special session to push the issue forward is “certainly not off the table.”

Republican Gov. Tate Reeves has the sole authority to call a special session, and has vocally supported the House school choice proposal. But Reeves has not indicated he plans to call such a session, and White has stopped short of directly calling on him to do so. White’s bill barely passed the House even with the speaker pushing for it, and a substantial number of his Republican caucus voted against it.

School choice, policies aimed at giving parents more say over their children’s schooling that often divert state funds toward private schools, has been White’s signature issue this legislative session. The Senate Education Committee killed House Bill 2, the House’s omnibus education bill that included its school choice proposals, earlier this month.

A special session “would finally maybe drive this conversation a little bit more,” White told attendees on Monday at the Stennis Capitol Press Forum. “So certainly that would be an option. We’re not afraid of that option.”

A special session, which would suspend legislative deadlines and put more pressure on lawmakers, might be the simplest path forward for White with his school choice proposal. His bill received a lukewarm welcome in his own chamber and an even colder reception in the Senate, where it was killed after less than 90 seconds of deliberation.

White now only has a few options. He could try to insert his school choice proposal — education savings accounts, or ESAs, which give parents state dollars to spend on their child’s education however they wish — in a similar bill. 

READ MORE: The House’s education bill is dead, but school choice isn’t. What happens now?

But he admitted on Monday that not many viable options remain. 

“We’re currently evaluating vehicles that are available in the House that have come from the Senate that might be amendable, if you will, and not violate any of our rules and keep this conversation alive,” he said. “A quick look doesn’t show that many are available on that issue.” 

White spent the bulk of his time at the podium, nearly an hour, talking about his school choice agenda and disappointment in the media’s coverage and Senate’s stance on the issue. He said that he was surprised that the two chambers, elected by the same Mississippians, were so far apart on school choice and chalked it up to “leadership.”

Senate leaders, including Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, have made clear that they’re not interested in a program like education savings accounts that would allow public dollars to go toward private school tuition.

“We are disappointed that the Senate did not engage in real meaningful discussion and debate on the issues in House Bill 2 and instead opted for what can only be described as a theatrical committee performance to kill the bill a full month before the committee deadline,” White said. “There’s no reason for that … You have to read into some meaning there.”

He said the Senate Education Committee’s lack of discussion at the meeting about House Bill 2 was a “disservice to taxpayers, to parents, to students and future generations of Mississippi.” 

“We never said House Bill 2 was perfect,” he said. “We begged for the back-and-forth conversation and dialogue on the issue. But it does take two to dance or tango or whatever you want to say. The Senate had every opportunity to make that bill better.”

Many of the other initiatives in House Bill 2 have been proposed by the Senate in individual bills, such as a bill that would loosen regulations for students to transfer from one public school district to another. Referred to as portability or open enrollment, it’s a form of school choice. 

But White said Monday those Senate bills, including portability, were largely due to pressure from the House and a “reaction” to its education proposals. 

“Whatever gets them there, we’ll see where that gets us … but that doesn’t fix it,” he said. “The lieutenant governor, he’s made no bones about where he is on school choice. Again, that’s his business. He’ll face his voters, I guess, now he’s running for governor on that issue.”

Reeves’ office did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the likelihood of the governor calling a special session over school choice. Hosemann has indicated he is considering a run for governor, but has not announced such a decision.

National school choice advocates descended on Jackson last week, encouraging the governor to call a special session, but Reeves has only called lawmakers into special session to deal with economic development projects and to pass a budget.

At surface glance, people seem more connected than ever in the information age, from social media networks to the myriad pathways for instant communication. But, those threads look barer than ever deeper down on a human-to-human level, where it really counts. Where it could really help.

New Stage Theatre’s newest production, “Primary Trust,” opening Tuesday for a two-week run through March 1, taps the core of the country’s epidemic of loneliness in a simple, elegantly touching way.

Playwright Eboni Booth was awarded the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for “Primary Trust,” the intimate story of a man whose isolated, small-town life, cemented in routine for nearly two decades, is suddenly disrupted by change. The courage that Kenneth, 38, musters to reach out, and the big impact that even small steps and kind gestures make in his world, resonate in a moving work that vividly illustrates the power in human connection.

“‘Primary Trust’ is the second-most produced play in the country right now, so this is the play for such a time as this,” Director Sharon Miles said. “This play specifically addresses the idea of building a life that is secluded and isolated and being comfortable in that. And then, there’s a shift that happens in his world, and it’s shaken up. What do you do? How do you pivot? How do you respond?

“But it also is a play that reminds us that we need connection, we need community, because we all want to be seen,” Miles added. “We all need human connection. That’s really what the heart of the play is.”

Kenneth is a bit odd, but functions well enough in his quiet and simple, highly circumscribed life. He works at a bookstore and frequents his favorite restaurant, Wally’s Tiki Bar, for mai tais with his best friend. “Primary Trust” is his own story of a job loss and brave steps that open up his world to friendship and new possibilities. The story is handled gently, with heartbreaking revelations but also humor and glimmers of hope for the richer life within his grasp. 

A small, tight cast of five (two, playing multiple characters) bring the story to life onstage. Chicago actor Kevin Aoussou, who plays Kenneth, recalled his tears when he read the script for a Chicago audition last year, and in the theater when he went to see it.

“Then when we do it here, those same exact moments, I’m crying again and again,” Aoussou said, shaking his head with a chuckle. Kenneth’s words about his mother, about how she is his everything, echo deeply with him. “That is the thing that pulls on my heart every single time I do this play. … That’s the thing that draws me to him.”

Herman J.R. Johnson of Terry, portraying Kenneth’s best friend, Bert, finds compelling resonance in the careful life Kenneth builds. “For someone who is struggling in life and still manages to grasp onto people that are patient with him and mean well, and let him be himself – I think that means a lot.”

The “Primary Trust” cast also includes: Alicia Thomas of New York, playfully dubbed “shape shifter” by Miles for her versatility as Corinna and 28 others, including multiple members of Wally’s waitstaff; New Stage veteran John Howell in several roles, including Kenneth’s bookstore boss, Sam; and Jackson musician Andrew Dillon as the Musician.

Howell finds the play a good fit for this theater, and others now. People need comfort and connection as various crises and other forces threaten to pull us apart, he said. “This is a good play to get us grounded.”  

Dillon dons a Hawaiian shirt as the piano player at Wally’s Tiki Bar, and he also supplies original music throughout to set the tone and express Kenneth’s experience. “I’m kind of like his emotional support musician,” Dillon said.

They inhabit a set resembling a tiny neighborhood, where characters loom larger than the buildings in their midst. “Mister Rogers Neighborhood” sprang to mind when Miles read the play.

“‘Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood’ makes it all of our neighborhood,” she said. “It makes it all of our hometown. All of the things he goes through, and how he deals with them, with loss and love and friendship, it just makes it more universal.”

New Stage Theatre partners with NAMI Mississippi (National Alliance on Mental Illness) during the show’s run, with resources in the lobby for more information on the grassroots organization and on mental health. NAMI Mississippi Program Director Savanah Hicks saw parallels in their “Hearts and Minds” presentation, which touches on social interaction. 

“Humans are wired for that connection. We need it,” Hicks said. “And then, once we get that connection, it also gives us something else essential, which is a different perspective. … We need that different perspective, for us to be able to see things clearly.”

New Stage will also host Tiki Bar Bingo during the run of “Primary Trust.” The activity starts a half-hour prior to each performance, sparking interactions with fun questions and a prize of 2026-27 season tickets at stake.

“The whole point is, interact with another human, meet a friend, be brave,” Miles said. “That’s Kenneth’s story. That’s our story. I feel like that’s what this play is asking. Also what this moment is asking. Meet someone. See someone. Build your community.

“It just feels like the moment to do this play is now.”

“Primary Trust“ performance times are 7 p.m. Feb. 17-21, 24 and 26-28, and 2 p.m. Feb. 22 and March 1. For tickets, $35 adults and $30 seniors/students/military, visit newstagetheatre.com or call 601-948-3533 ext. 223.

At the midpoint of the three-month legislative session, two leading lawmakers say they are working to ensure tens of millions of state opioid settlement dollars are spent to address addiction.

House Public Health and Human Services Chairman Sam Creekmore, a Republican from New Albany, and Sen. Nicole Boyd, a Republican from Oxford, have both sponsored bills that would change the state’s opioid settlement laws. Now that the bills have each passed one chamber, Creekmore said he plans to meet with Boyd to figure out what new provisions would lead to more responsible local spending of the settlement money. 

Since 2022, 147 towns, cities and counties throughout Mississippi have been receiving money from national opioid lawsuits, cases that charged about a dozen companies with contributing to over 10,000 Mississippi overdose deaths. When first arguing these cases, lawyers for Mississippi said money was needed to address the public health epidemic the companies created.

But when those local governments signed on to the lawsuits, Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch told them they could spend their shares on any public purpose without reporting how those dollars were used. Those shares are expected to total over $60 million by 2040, but Fitch’s arrangement wasn’t widely publicized until September, when Mississippi Today published results of its months-long investigation into spending. 

The Mississippi Today investigation found that local government officials had received over $15.5 million in opioid settlements but spent less than $1 million on ways to prevent more overdoses. Cities and counties had spent around $5.4 million on other expenses, mostly to supplement their general budgets.

Jane Clair Tyner, a Pine Belt resident whose son died while struggling with opioid addiction, said it wasn’t until speaking with Mississippi Today last year that she learned cities and counties could spend their money on purchases unrelated to addiction.

“It was a literal punch in my gut when I read that,” Tyner said. “It was a desecration to every grave that every parent in this state has mourned over, of their lost child to this epidemic.” 

When asked why Fitch made this decision, her office has said the opioid epidemic cost the U.S. hundreds of billions of dollars, and the lawsuits allowed for some settlement money to repay governments for past expenses. A spokesperson for her office didn’t respond to an email asking for Fitch’s thoughts on new legislative efforts.

A few weeks after the investigation was published, Creekmore said he wanted to address the problem. On Mississippi Today’s “The Other Side” podcast, he said he would look to pass legislation that would change how local governments could spend their opioid settlement shares. 

On Wednesday, Creekmore restated his commitment to creating requirements for local governments to address addiction. He said he doesn’t want the legislation to be too cumbersome for small cities and counties with few resources. 

New laws, he said, should include examples of organizations doing overdose prevention work that local officials can send settlement money to — such as community mental health centers. He’s also looking for ways to bring in a third party to oversee how cities and counties spend their funds.

“They’re concerned how they spend the money, and they’re looking for guidance,” he said. “Even some of the larger cities.”

Boyd said she and the other senators plan to follow Creekmore and the House’s lead on reforming opioid settlement laws. 

When Mississippi Today told Tyner about Creekmore’s plan to eliminate using local opioid settlement dollars on general expenses, she said she felt hopeful. But she’s seen guidelines intended to ensure this money gets spent on addressing addiction leave room for loopholes in other states, and she hopes future laws will ensure money gets spent on addressing addiction beyond giving unrestricted money to mental health centers.

While Tyner appreciates legislators’ avoiding the creation of cumbersome requirements for small town officials, she said preventing overdoses takes nuanced approaches. 

“It is a complex issue,” she said. “So the manner in which we approach it to fix it cannot be simple.” 

Copiah County Administrator David Engel said he’s hopeful that legislators provide clear pathways to spending this money responsibly. He and the Board of Supervisors used about $74,000 in April to help fund the local drug court, but he said Copiah County has about $76,000 of additional settlement money that officials don’t want to spend until they hear how it could be used to prevent more overdoses. 

Engel said if the state provided more examples of how this funding should be used, he would be willing to do extra work to track and publicize how Copiah County spends the money. 

“I don’t mind jumping through the hoops as long as I get a little clarity,” he said. 

But Engel also knows that the state is in its fourth year of receiving funds. Over 1,700 Mississippians have died of overdoses since the state received its first settlement check, and he believes this money could have saved some of those lives had cities and counties known how to use it effectively.

“I don’t think there’s any question as to that.”

To be clear, many Mississippi lawmakers believe millions of dollars of special-interest, dark money flowing in to influence an election here is terrible, and they won’t stand for it.

That is, it’s terrible if its flowing into an election for something voters put directly on a ballot, sidestepping the Legislature.

But millions of dollars of such money flowing practically unchecked into politicians’ campaigns and, according to federal prosecutors, pockets – well, apparently that’s not so bad.

The Senate last week killed a measure to reinstate voters’ right to put something directly on a ballot. Opponents’ main reason voiced for killing it was that special interests with deep pockets could too easily influence Mississippi voters on such issues.

But both the Senate and House – with a rare show of bipartisanship – also killed measures aimed at regulating and reporting to the public the flow of special-interest and dark money into Mississippi campaigns for political office.

It appears the state is on track to continue to have some of the weakest, least enforced campaign finance laws and disclosure. It’s also on track to not reinstate voters’ right to put issues on a ballot that they had until five years ago when a court invalidated it over technical issues.

Some highlights from a busy week that included a deadline for floor passage of bills:

• A bill to force more Mississippi governments and law enforcement to cooperate with federal immigration authorities drew fierce debate before passing the House on a mostly party-line vote.

• The House passed two major alcohol-related bills. One would allow direct shipment of liquor to Mississippians’ homes, and another that would allow local governments to pass ordinances allowing the sale of alcohol on Sundays.

• With some constituents still without power three weeks after Winter Storm Fern, some lawmakers blasted the state’s response to the disaster during debate over a measure to create a disaster recovery loan program.

Quote of the Week

“Gentleman, I’m not chasing, I’m not going down that rabbit hole with you and we’re not going to hop around that. You’re dancing, but you ain’t got a dance partner.” – Rep. Joey Hood of Ackerman, responding to Rep. Jeffery Harness of Fayette, who asked Hood, “What kind of coward walks around with a mask on and makes arrests?” Hood was presenting a bill to prevent any Mississippi government or law enforcement agency from interfering with federal ICE agents.

In Brief

Closed primaries amendment thwarted

Sen. Kathy Chism, a Republican from New Albany, has for several years unsuccessfully pushed legislation to have closed party primaries in Mississippi, with her measures typically dying without a committee vote.

Last week, Chism attempted to force a vote on the issue with an amendment to another elections bill. But Sen. Derrick Simmons, a Democrat from Greenville, successfully challenged the amendment as not germane to the bill. Some states have closed primaries, where only people registered with a political party can vote for its nominees. There has been debate over closing Mississippi primaries for years.

“Closed primaries are not only wanted, but needed in Mississippi,” Chism said. “With closed primaries, each party would control its choice of candidate without interference from the other party in the primary election.” – Geoff Pender

Lawmakers: Proposed public records exemptions overly broad

Lawmakers realized a House bill that could allow more information to be withheld from public records requests is “overly broad,” said Rep. Daryl Porter, a Democrat and Vice Chairman of the House Accountability, Efficiency and Transparency committee.

Porter amended House Bill 1468 on the floor to require more scrutiny of the bill before it could be passed into law and said lawmakers plan to change it.

The bill from Republican Rep. Brent Anderson of Bay St. Louis adds broad definitions of “personally identifiable” and “protected” information to the Mississippi Public Records Act. The bill covers any information that could identify an individual alone or when combined with other information and explicitly requires government agencies to conduct a case-by-case assessment on records requests. – Michael Goldberg

Chambers pass apprenticeship bills

The House and Senate passed two nearly identical bills that would give the state direct oversight of workforce apprenticeship programs.

Under the measures, the state would create its own Office of Apprenticeship within the Mississippi Department of Employment Security. The office would take over approval and oversight of registered apprenticeship programs. Currently, the U.S. Department of Labor is responsible.

The framework of the bills is very similar, although there are slight differences, including, the number of people on an advisory board and the deadline for registering the state office with the federal government. Gov. Tate Reeves proposed this transition in his 2027 executive budget recommendations. He wrote that this change would, “reduce federal bureaucracy and improve employer and stakeholder engagement.” – Katherine Lin

Education measures die with deadline

A number of education bills died with a Thursday deadline, including legislation that would have impacted teachers and school board members. 

One House bill authored by Rep. Jansen Owen, a Republican from Poplarville, would have prohibited teachers who have sex with students from resigning, instead requiring their termination. 

Another bill would have removed appointed school board member positions. All school board members, under the bill, would be elected. Owen said the legislation aimed to address parent sentiment that school boards are not held accountable. 

A Senate bill that died would have also kept a closer eye on school board members. Senate Bill 2306 would have tasked a commission with governing the conduct of school board members and created a framework for sanctioning school members found to be in violation. 

Most charter school teachers would have no longer been exempt from the state’s educational qualification requirements under another Senate bill that didn’t make it off the floor. Some senators have been publicly critical of the state’s charter schools, most of which are rated “D” or “F.” – Devna Bose

Bills address unused school buildings

A couple of bills passed by both chambers could make it easier for districts to get rid of unused school buildings. 

It’s a problem particularly pronounced in Democratic Sen. David Blount’s district, which includes Jackson. 

Jackson Public Schools has closed a handful of school buildings in recent years due to declining enrollment. However, state law has made it difficult to sell them, Blount said, because if the building is used for a purpose other than a school, ownership reverts back to the school district. 

Senate Bill 2515 allows for alternative use of the buildings and establishes a timeline for charter schools to make a decision about building purchases.

“I’m not a fan of charter schools, but if you have a closed school building, it makes sense to look at it first as a school,” Blount said. “Current law does not have an end date on when that right may be exercised. This simply puts a termination date on that right of refusal.”

A similar bill, House Bill 1395, has also passed that chamber.  – Devna Bose

Proposal would take casino winnings for child support

Mississippi lawmakers are considering taking casino jackpots from parents who owe child support.

Similar bills from the House and Senate would have casinos withhold winnings from deadbeat parents — Senate Bill 2369 and House Bill 520. The proposals would require casinos to check a state database of people in arears on child support before paying out jackpots. – Mississippi Today

By the Numbers

$50 million

Amount lawmakers said they plan to request to fund a disaster recovery emergency loan program to aid Mississippi counties included in the recent federal disaster declaration from Winter Storm Fern.

More Legislative Coverage

Prison health care reform measures clear the House

The Mississippi House passed several bills this week aimed at improving the quality of medical care in Mississippi prisons and developing stronger oversight of health care delivery. Read the story.

School consolidation bill dies without a vote in Mississippi Senate

Senate Bill 2486 would’ve tasked a committee within the Mississippi Department of Education with recommending school district consolidations and established a framework for future mergers. Read the story.

Pro tem Kirby says ‘We couldn’t find anybody who supported it’ when school choice bill got to Senate

Senate President Pro tem Dean Kirby, a Republican from Pearl, gives an update on school choice, state support for areas devastated by the winter storm, and serving in the position known as “the senators’ senator.” Listen to the podcast.