Members of the Mississippi Legislature’s joint redistricting committee will hold hearings across the state over the next two months to hear from voters about how lawmakers should draw the state’s legislative, congressional and Supreme Court district maps.
Each of the eight hearings will be held at 6 p.m. on their respective days and are scheduled through August and into September. The Mississippi Legislature’s YouTube channel will broadcast all the hearings live. Legislators will visit Itawamba Community College in Tupelo on Aug. 18; Northwest Mississippi Community College in Senatobia on Aug. 27; Delta State University in Cleveland on Sept. 1; Alcorn State University in Natchez on Sept. 8; an undetermined location in Meridian on Sept. 10; the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg on Sept. 17; Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College in Gulfport on Sept. 22; and the Mississippi Capitol Building in Jackson on Sept. 24.
| Location | City | Date |
| Itawamba Community College | Tupelo, MS | Aug. 18 |
| Northwest Mississippi Community College | Senatobia, MS | Aug. 27 |
| Delta State University | Cleveland, MS | Sept. 1 |
| Alcorn State University | Natchez, MS | Sept. 8 |
| TBA | Meridian, MS | Sept. 10 |
| University of Southern Mississippi | Hattiesburg, MS | Sept. 17 |
| Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College | Gulfport, MS | Sept. 22 |
| Mississippi Capitol Building | Jackson, MS | Sept. 24 |
The Mississippi House and Senate will each have members participate in the Mississippi Standing Joint Legislative Committee on Reapportionment and Redistricting. On July 28, Hosemann named Republican Sens. Jeremy England of Vancleave and Lane Taylor of Philadelphia, who serve as the chairman and vice chairman, respectively, of the Senate Elections Committee, to oversee the redistricting process.
The lieutenant governor appointed Sens. Daniel Sparks, R-Belmont, and Angela Turner-Ford, D-West Point, to work on redrawing Mississippi’s 1st Congressional District; Sens. Briggs Hopson, R-Vicksburg and Albert Butler, D-Port Gibson, to Mississippi’s 2nd Congressional District; Sens. Josh Harkins, R-Flowood, and Dean Kirby, R-Pearl, to Mississippi’s 3rd Congressional District; and Sens. Brice Wiggins, R-Pascagoula and Mike Thompson, R-Long Beach, to Mississippi’s 4th Congressional District.
“I have full confidence these members will respectfully and thoroughly study redistricting, understanding the magnitude of this responsibility,” Hosemann said in a July 28 press release. “Just as the committee brought forward thoughtful proposals in 2022, I expect this committee to do the same.”
Mississippi House Speaker Jason White, R-West, appointed representatives to the committee on June 24.
At the joint committee’s first meeting on Aug. 2, members elected Kirby to serve as chairman, Rep. Noah Sanford, R-Collins to be vice chair and Rodney Hall, R-Southaven, to work as the secretary. Kirby named the Butler Snow law firm and Ted Booth as the committee’s staff counsel; and Ben Collins and Neil Smith to work on the technical aspects of drawing district maps.
“I look forward to working with you guys the next couple of months or a year,” Kirby said with a chuckle as he motioned to adjourn the meeting.
The renewed push for redistricting comes after the U.S. Supreme Court’s Republican majority curtailed Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act—a key provision which has long prevented states from enacting racially gerrymandered maps for the purpose of diluting the voting power of racial minorities. In recent years, federal courts have ordered Mississippi to create more majority-Black legislative and state Supreme Court districts to comply with the Voting Rights Act, but the Callais decision has already reversed those rulings.
In 2025, U.S. District Court Judge for the Northern District of Mississippi Sharion Aycock ordered Mississippi to redraw its state Supreme Court map, first adopted in 1987, to give more voting power to Black Mississippians, in compliance with the Voting Rights Act. More than a third of Mississippians are Black, but all three districts—which each elect two Mississippi Supreme Court justices—are majority-white.
Voting rights advocates filed a federal lawsuit in 2022 alleging that those three districts violated the Voting Rights Act and the U.S. Constitution by denying Black voters the ability to elect a justice of their choice. But after the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana vs. Callais, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals approved a motion vacating Aycock’s order. Subsequently, Gov. Tate Reeves canceled a special legislative session in May to redistrict the state’s Supreme Court map.
In 2025, the Mississippi Legislature redrew its state House and Senate district maps to add more Black-majority districts after another court similarly ruled in 2024 that the state’s previous map violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act by having too few districts where Black voters could elect candidates of their choice. The new districts led to the election of Sen. Johnny DuPree, D-Hattiesberg, the first time that city has ever had a Black senator represent them in Jackson, despite the city’s population being 51% Black.
Now, with the Voting Rights Act’s potency severely diminished by the U.S. Supreme Court Republican-appointed majority’s Callais ruling, those gains Black voters made could be rolled back with a new round of redistricting.
Reeves floated the possibility of a special session for legislative redistricting this year when talking to reporters last month at the Neshoba County Fair. During a special session, the Legislature may only consider topics explicitly called for by the governor.
Legislative redistricting may require lawmakers to convene in Jackson before this January because the qualifying deadline for candidates is on Feb. 1, 2027, although Reeves would not confirm with reporters at the Neshoba County Fair on Thursday whether he would call a special session or when it would occur.
“That’s going to take a little bit of time to get all of that together,” he told reporters on June 25, referring to redrawing legislative, congressional and state Supreme Court district maps. “But I would not be surprised if there is a special session to deal with redistricting sometime between now and when the next legislative session begins, but we will definitely have our redistricting done before the 2027 election.”
It is unknown how far redistricting will go if a special session does come together, though Republican leaders have generally praised the Callais decision. Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann said the ruling put “an end to years of federal overreach” in Mississippi’s redistricting matters, but Reeves and other white Republicans have made clear their hopes to redraw Mississippi’s 2nd Congressional District, Mississippi’s only majority-Black congressional district and home to Mississippi’s only Black congressman, Bennie Thompson.
Follow the Mississippi Free Press’ coverage of voting rights and read past stories here.
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