Tag Archives: Mississippi

NPR reports: Mississippi’s former welfare director, four colleagues and a former pro wrestler have been charged with carrying out a multimillion-dollar embezzlement scheme to siphon public money from needy families for their own personal use — from business investments to a luxury rehab stay in California. Special agents from the Office of the State Auditor arrested John Davis, who is …

From the Facebook page of Mississippi Rep. Jill Ford: Yesterday, January 27, 2020, was a historic day for not only Governor Tate Reeves as he presented his State of the State address to the people of Mississippi – favorite line: “we’ve been singing the Blues long enough, it’s time to sing Gospel now – the Good News”. It was also …

Courthouse News reports: Democrat Mike Espy on Wednesday announced his run for the Mississippi Senate seat he sought in a tight special election last year, setting up a potential 2020 rematch with Republican Cindy Hyde-Smith, who was dogged by controversy for a remark expressing a willingness to attend a public hanging. Espy, 65, rose to national prominence after being elected …

The New York Times reports: Votes have started to come in for the governor’s race in Kentucky, which has been cast as a showdown between an unpopular governor and an unpopular party. The Republican incumbent, Matt Bevin, has focused his campaign on his alignment with President Trump and his opposition to impeachment, with the president holding a rally on Monday …

Yesterday I reported that a Mississippi wedding venue rejected an interracial couple based on their “Christian beliefs.” Today the owner issued an apology after her refusal video went wildly viral with millions of views. The Washington Post reports: In her apology, the event hall’s owner attempted to explain why she believed the Bible supported her views on interracial marriages, describing …

The New York Daily News reports: A video allegedly showing the owner of a Mississippi event space saying they don’t do “gay weddings, or mixed race” because of their “Christian belief” has gone viral, leading to outrage. LaKambria Welch shared a video on Facebook Saturday that allegedly shows a woman who worked at Boone’s Camp Event Hall saying the space …

CBS News reports: Four people have been shot, including a police officer at Walmart in Southaven. WKRG sister station, Local 24 News has confirmed that two employees were shot and killed early Tuesday morning, one outside the store, the other inside. According to Baptist DeSoto, the police officer who was shot, was hit in his bullet proof vest and was …

Larrison Campbell writes for Mississippi Today: Bill Waller, a former state supreme court chief justice, and Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves agreed to ride alongs with Mississippi Today reporter Adam Ganucheau. The other candidate — state Rep. Robert Foster, R-Hernando — declined, however, because I am a woman. In two phone calls this week, Colton Robison, Foster’s campaign director, said a …

Roll Call reports: Thad Cochran of Mississippi, the mannerly former chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee where he was a dependable provider for his home state during more than four decades in Congress, has died at the age of 81. Cochran, who retired from the Senate on April 1, 2018, after dealing with health issues, died Thursday morning in Oxford, …

ABC News reports: A federal court in Mississippi on Friday temporarily blocked the state’s new “fetal heartbeat” law that bans abortion after roughly six weeks of pregnancy. The law was set to take effect July 1. “Here we go again,” U.S. District Judge Carlton W. Reeves wrote in his opinion. “Mississippi has passed another law banning abortions prior to viability.” …

The Associated Press reports: Mississippi’s governor and two other top Republicans say a state lawmaker should resign if he punched his wife. Second-term Republican Rep. Doug McLeod of Lucedale was arrested last weekend and charged with misdemeanor domestic violence. George County sheriff’s deputies say McLeod bloodied his wife’s nose after she didn’t undress quickly enough when McLeod wanted to have …

ABC News reports: Despite calls for refunds, new campaign filings show Mississippi Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith kept $50,000 in donations from major companies like Walmart and Facebook in the wake of her controversial special election victory in November. The latest Federal Election Commission filing — released amid the government shutdown at the end of last week — showed that Republican Hyde-Smith …

CNBC reports: Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith will win Mississippi’s Senate election, holding a GOP seat despite comments that stoked racial tensions in the state and sparked backlash from donors, NBC News projects. The GOP senator will defeat Democratic former Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy in the special election runoff, the final 2018 congressional race. Hyde-Smith will serve the remainder of GOP …

The Hill reports: Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith’s (R-Miss.) campaign on Saturday ripped an article from the Jackson Free Press reporting that she attended and graduated from a Mississippi segregation academy in the 1970s, calling it part of the “gotcha liberal media.” Hyde-Smith spokeswoman Melissa Scallan called the report “a new low” in a statement to The Hill while claiming the report …

CBS News reports: Republican incumbent Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith and Democrat Mike Espy are participating in the only debate before the special election on Nov. 27 on Tuesday evening in the contentious race to be elected the next U.S. senator from Mississippi. Hyde-Smith, who was appointed by Gov. Phil Bryant to fill the remainder of Sen. Thad Cochran’s term after he …

Mississippi’s Starkville Daily News reports: A Starkville priest is at the center of a criminal investigation involving a string of fraudulent charity efforts that federal agents believe was covered up by church leaders in Jackson. According to a 37-page affidavit filed Friday by Department of Homeland Security Special Agent William G. Childers in U.S. District Court in Jackson, an ongoing …

CBS News reports: A newly published video shows Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, a white Republican from Mississippi, praising someone by saying: “If he invited me to a public hanging, I’d be on the front row.” Hyde-Smith, who faces a black Democratic challenger in a Nov. 27 runoff, said Sunday that her Nov. 2 remark was “exaggerated expression of regard” for someone …

ABC News reports: A Mississippi man was fired from his job for wearing a controversial shirt to the polls. A viral photo shows Clayton Hickey on Election Day voting in a t-shirt with an image of the Confederate flag and a noose on the front. The photograph, which was taken at a polling center in Olive Branch, Miss., outraged fellow …

Weather Underground reports: Tropical Storm Gordon is quickly heading toward a landfall tonight along the northern Gulf Coast as a Category 1 hurricane. The National Hurricane Center has issued a hurricane warning from the mouth of the Pearl River, Mississippi, to the border between Alabama and Florida. Tropical storm warnings are posted from west of the mouth of the Pearl …

The Weather Channel reports: Tropical Storm Gordon is pushing into the Gulf of Mexico as it continues to bring heavy rain and gusty winds to Florida. Gordon will head for a northern Gulf Coast landfall late Tuesday as a strong tropical storm or possibly a Category 1 hurricane. The National Hurricane Center has now issued a hurricane watch from the …