Mississippi Votes Again, Same Senate Machine Rolls On

Scott Colom beat Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith 49.2% to 48.7% in Mississippi's Senate race, a margin of fewer than 5,000 votes, and it took more than a week of counting absentee and affidavit ballots to say so. The Associated Press called it Wednesday. The state hasn't elected a Democrat to the Senate since John Stennis in 1982. The last time Mississippi chose a new Democratic senator was 79 years ago, in 1947, and that winner was a staunch segregationist.

Who Has the Power

The Senate itself doesn't change. Fifty-five Democrats to 44 Republicans, with Alaska still a toss-up, means the same chamber, the same rules, the same tradition that lets one member spike a president's judicial picks in their home state. Hyde-Smith used exactly that tradition against Colom in 2022, when then-President Biden nominated him to be a U.S. District Court judge in the Northern District of Mississippi. Sen. Roger Wicker and former Gov. Haley Barbour backed him. Hyde-Smith blocked it anyway. One person's veto, no vote required. Colom says his Senate bid was never about getting even with her.

Hyde-Smith, 67, got her seat in 2018 when then-Gov. Phil Bryant appointed her after Sen. Thad Cochran resigned. A governor's pick, not a ballot, put her in the chamber that has now been decided by a few thousand ballots.

Who Pays

Colom's closing ad ran at the Jackson home of Medgar Evers, the civil rights leader gunned down in his driveway in 1963, 63 years ago. "In Mississippi, no one is above the law, and no one should be outside its protection," Colom said. "He was killed for helping Mississippians vote. On Tuesday, use your vote and honor everyone who died for that right."

The voters Colom was courting had concrete grievances. He campaigned on cost of living and healthcare. His 30-second ad followed Hyde-Smith's apparent brush-off of high beef prices by saying consumers could choose other proteins, then showed incredulous voters saying they'd "pick another senator instead." He criticized tariffs he said were hard on Mississippi farmers, and he criticized what the base reporting calls an unpopular war in Iran.

No comparable drama for the senator. At the late-October rally in Corinth, Hyde-Smith spoke nine words in six seconds: "Is this not the best president in our lifetime?" Trump replied, "I love that," during his 80-plus minutes at the microphone. "Sometimes they get up and they talk for 10 minutes."

What They're Calling Democracy

The money came from the usual places. National Democrats announced last month they were investing in ad spending in the race for the first time. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer helped him raise money, and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker was among the outside financial supporters. Former President Bill Clinton and former Vice President Kamala Harris campaigned in the closing weeks. The Cook Political Report moved its rating from solidly Republican to leaning Republican only after the national apparatus decided the seat was worth buying.

Colom himself framed the pitch in party terms. "It's got to be about having a party that represents rural America again, suburban America, urban America," he said, "a party that makes sure we actually deliver for voters in ways that make their lives better, and we don't come up with excuses as to why we can't do it."

Hyde-Smith conceded in a video posted on X. "While this is not the outcome we worked for or hoped for, I respect the decision of Mississippi voters," she said. "I want to congratulate Scott Colom and wish him well as he takes on the tremendous responsibility of representing our great state."

The Count Itself

At one point the day after the election, just a few dozen votes separated the candidates. Mississippi has the largest share of Black voters of any state, and results showed strong turnout in the Delta's majority Black counties. Colom becomes the first Black senator from the state since Bruce Blance, a former slave elected in 1874, 152 years ago. He acknowledged that weight: "My job is to do well enough as the next United States senator that the next time some young black boy or girl has the work ethic, the vision, and the values, and they want to be United States senator, that nobody says because of anything I've done that they shouldn't get a chance."

Mississippians waited more than a week to learn who would hold the seat. Whether the seat delivers on the beef prices, the farm tariffs and the healthcare costs that drove the vote is a question the chamber's calendar will answer, not the voters.