Just before the start of the legislative session on Jan. 5, Mississippi Free Press State Reporter Heather Harrison informed me that for the first time since she’d been covering the Capitol, the Mississippi House speaker had left her out of a media event.
It turned out, she wasn’t alone. House Speaker Jason White had chosen to hold a question-and-answer session in his office with a small, select group of news outlets he picked and invited—and that group didn’t include the Mississippi Free Press or Mississippi Today.
Heather, being the cheerily feisty reporter that she is, wanted to know why. When she approached Speaker White on the House floor, he told her that the goal had been “a closed-door media invite to get out my side of the story” on “issues important to me as they relate specifically to school choice.”
The speaker’s communications director, Taylor Spillman, told Heather this week that she would add her to the list for any future Q&A events in White’s office.
We hope White’s office will honor that and ensure that all Mississippi news outlets are allowed to attend future press conferences or Q&As—whether it’s the Mississippi Free Press, Mississippi Today, Magnolia Tribune, WJTV or the Neshoba Democrat.
But even if politicians leave us out of press events, that won’t stop us from carrying out our mission. Free Press journalists have always been about people-first, not access to power.
You need only look at the ledes in Heather’s past reporting on policymaking in Mississippi to see that our focus is on how politics affects real people, not on power games between politicians.
In a December 2025 story about advocates at the Capitol urging changes to make it easier for patients to access medical-marijuana laws, Heather’s first sentences were thus: “Devereaux Galloway downed about 150 prescribed opioid pills monthly after his spinal surgery in 2019. The Gulf War veteran, paralyzed and bedridden after serving his country, also suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder.”
In an October 2025 story about Mississippi pausing new WIC applications amid the government shutdown: “In 2004, Cassandra Welchlin was a new mother battling postpartum depression who had to stop breastfeeding soon after her daughter was born.”
In a March 2025 story about the Legislature passing a tax-cut bill, her first sentence was this: “Mississippians will soon pay less in income and grocery taxes while paying more in gas taxes under a bill that both chambers of the Legislature have now approved and that Gov. Tate Reeves has indicated he plans to sign into law.”
Even in a breaking news story on a teacher-pay bill on Jan. 6, 2026, Heather began thus: “Mississippi educators could soon get an annual pay raise of at least $2,000 after the Mississippi Senate Education Committee advanced legislation on Tuesday to increase teacher salaries.”
Notice how none of those story ledes ever begin with, “The (Senate/House) passed a bill to (policy jargon).” Each one, instead, begins with a real person’s story or by directly stating how a policy will affect everyday people. People over power. That’s the MFP way.
We do hope our elected officials will strive for transparency and make themselves available to MFP and other news outlets. It is important for those who don the title of “public servant” to be accountable to the people who elected them. But whether or not we always have access to powerful people, we will remain undeterred as we continue reporting for the people of Mississippi.
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This MFP Voices opinion essay reflects the personal opinion of its author(s). The column does not necessarily represent the views of the Mississippi Free Press, its staff or board members. To submit an opinion for the MFP Voices section, send up to 1,200 words and sources for fact-checking the included information to voices@mississippifreepress.org. We welcome a wide variety of viewpoints.