FOCUS: 2022 Elections • Housing & Evictions • #MSWelfare Scandal • Jackson Water • Abortion • Race & Racism • Policing • Incarceration
Batesville mayoral candidate Eddie Nabors traveled to Washington, D.C., as Donald Trump sought to overturn the 2020 presidential election on Jan. 6. Social-media posts also show that, in November, he marched in a group that included The Proud Boys, a far-right extremist organization.
A group of voters is asking the Mississippi Supreme Court to allow them to intervene for a rehearing in Watson v. Butler and to reconsider its decision to strike down Initiative 65, the voter-approved medical marijuana law, and to revive the state’s ballot initiative law, which a 6-3 majority of justices nullified as part of its ruling.
Management demanded workers return to their positions, but often part-time and during shifts with virtually no customers coming in. The industry-wide transition to curbside services left many employees working for the tipped minimum of $2.13 an hour with few tips, if any.
Pritchett is one of 370 Mississippi inmates serving virtual life sentences, meaning they are on the inside for 50 years or more. Of those “virtual lifers,” 22 were juveniles like him when they committed the crimes that led to their incarceration, as a recently released national report “No End in Sight: America’s Enduring Reliance on Life in Prison” by The Sentencing Project revealed. In addition, Mississippi has 2,041 incarcerated people serving life sentences, with 1,600 of them serving life with parole, Mississippi Department of Corrections data show.
The Mississippi Free Press met with Public Works Director Dr. Charles Williams on May 3 to discuss the EPA’s 2020 emergency order, the ongoing effort to improve the city’s water treatment plants, the documentation of the city’s water treatment violations, and transparency over water quality and safety.
On the penultimate day of the Confederate Heritage Month, Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves made a bold declaration: “There is not systemic racism in America.” The announcement, if it were true, could come as a relief to the 38% of Mississippians who are Black. But around 16% of those residents will not have the opportunity to express their gratitude to the governor in the next election because they are systematically disenfranchised due to an 1890 Jim Crow felony voting law.
Two weeks after a temporary, nationwide halt on the use of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine, the Mississippi State Department of Health is encouraging health-care providers to continue delivering the single-shot vaccine, with an advisory for women under 50 to consider using Pfizer or Moderna’s formulation.
The reaction to integration, which included white Jackson families immediately pulling 5,000 of their children out of local schools, was but one piece of the water-infrastructure puzzle. Another came in 1972, an unintended consequence of necessary environmental reform. That year, the Water Pollution Control Act steamrolled through a veto from President Richard Nixon. Few took notice.
Patients admitted to Mississippi State Hospital and East Mississippi State Hospital for short-term care of diagnoses such as suicidal ideation, worsening of psychiatric symptoms, or who were in need of medication adjustments are not vaccinated by the hospitals they reside in during their stay.
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The Mississippi Free Press is a project of the Mississippi Journalism and Education Group, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit journalism organization (EIN 85-1403937).