Mississippi lawmakers launch redistricting process after Supreme Court ruling

Lawmakers on Monday took the first steps toward potentially redrawing Mississippi’s legislative, congressional and judicial districts in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark Louisiana v. Callais decision that weakened minority voting protections.

The Joint Redistricting and Reapportionment Committee, comprised of House members and senators, met at the state Capitol for the first time since the Supreme Court ruling. The state legislative committee will solicit input from voters in eight different areas of the state over the next two months on how the districts should be redrawn in light of the Callais decision.

The committee also voted to hire attorneys from Butler Snow to serve as general counsel. Republican Sen. Dean Kirby from Pearl was elected chairman of the committee, and Republican Rep. Noah Sanford of Collins was named vice chair.

Republican Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann declined to say which districts he thinks the committee should prioritize or even if it was certain the committee will redraw judicial, legislative and congressional districts.

“I don’t want to pre-suppose anything,” Hosemann said. “The committee needs to do its work. They’re going to be going all over Mississippi hearing from people.”

Though the committee has scheduled eight hearings, some voting rights activists worry the hearings are merely a facade, and lawmakers have already made up their mind to dismantle majority Black districts.

Amir Badat is the Southern states director and senior adviser for Fair Fight Action, a voting rights advocacy organization. He told Mississippi Today in a statement that the committee’s redistricting process is “putting lipstick on a pig.”

“At its core, this process is an effort to diminish Black political power,” Badat said. “No number of meetings or public hearings will change that fact. If the joint committee truly cared about what the public wants, it would end this sham process before it begins.”

The joint hearing came after Scott Colom, Mississippi’s Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate, organized a voting-rights town hall on Saturday evening with Democratic U.S. Sen. Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland, Democratic U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi and Mississippi NAACP Director Charles Taylor.

The panel encouraged the roughly 100 attendees at Farish Street Baptist Church in Jackson to make sure they’re registered to vote, help register other people to vote and turn out to vote in record numbers.

Alsobrooks told Mississippi Today that she would encourage Mississippians to “stay the course and keep fighting” against efforts to weaken majority Black districts.

“It was not all that long ago, we’re reminded, that John Lewis walked across the Edmund Pettus Bridge and was beaten within an inch of his life with a pole that was wrapped in barbed wire” as he marched for voting rights for Black people, Alsobrooks said. “It was a sacrosanct right that we’re never going to give up.”

If the committee decides to tackle congressional redistricting, Thompson, Mississippi’s lone Black and Democratic official in Washington, will almost certainly be targeted by the majority-Republican state Legislature.

Some Republicans, such as state Auditor Shad White, have called on the Legislature to effectively dismantle Thompson’s district, which comprises portions of the Jackson metro area and the majority-Black Delta.

Thompson told Mississippi Today on Saturday that his campaign team will be monitoring the hearings and hopes state lawmakers will truly be receptive to the comments they gather from the public hearings.

“I hope their work will be done in public and not behind closed doors,” Thompson said.

Here is the schedule of hearings that will take place at 6 p.m.:

1. Aug. 18 at Itawamba Community College in Tupelo

2. Aug. 27 at Northwest Mississippi Community College in Senatobia

3. Sept. 1 at Delta State University in Cleveland

4. Sept. 8 at Alcorn State University in Natchez

5. Sept.10 at a venue to be determined in Meridian

6. Sept. 17 at the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg

7. Sept. 22 at Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College in Gulfport

8. Sept. 24 at the state Capitol building in Jackson

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This story was originally published by Mississippi Today and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.