Even though the days of segregation and racial discrimination are long gone, it seems that some things never change in the state of Mississippi, where a key U.S. Senate race remains undecided a week after the midterm elections.
Democrat Scott Colom is locked in a close race with incumbent Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith. Colom holds a 2,500 vote lead with 97% of the ballots counted.
Now, however, the powers-that-be in the Mississippi elections bureau may try to put their thumb on the scale and invalidate thousands of provisional ballots that could potentially give Colom a resounding win.
CNN reports that the matter of those provisional ballots has put the state in the national spotlight.
“Whether those ballots are ultimately counted could determine the outcome of a contest where Democrat Scott Colom is narrowly leading Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith. But the fight over provisional ballots – known as affidavit ballots in Mississippi – is indicative of how Republicans at the federal and state level have zeroed in on voter rolls, in some cases disqualifying voters with scant notice.”
More troubling is how the state of Mississippi determined who would and would not have their votes counted, a move that could disenfranchise thousands of voters.
“Election officials in Mississippi made waves last year when they began using commercially available credit data to identify voters who may have moved as part of voter list maintenance.”
“Critics of the use of the credit data, which they argue may not be reliable in a state where many residents don’t have bank accounts, say they believe it contributed to a surge in voters deemed inactive and then excluded from poll books. Those voters then were required to vote via provisional ballots if they showed up on Election Day.”
Voters like Andrew Couch say they cannot believe that a state with the checkered past of Mississippi would dare to say their vote won’t be counted.
“I’m very upset,” Couch said. “I’ve been participating in his process for many years as an adult. I’ve been teaching my kids to participate as well. So, if people lose faith in the process that we’re going through, I think it’s going to hurt voter turnout in general in the future.”
Of course, that could well be what some in Mississippi were planning when they implemented the new rules, though Mississippi Secretary of State Michael Watson denies there is anything nefarious with what his office did.
“It may take voters a little longer for final results to come in, but more accurate voter lists will speed up the process and decrease opportunities for voter fraud in Mississippi. And in the end, accuracy and integrity will be maintained,” Watson said.
But voting rights activists warn Watson is being disingenuous and question his actual motives.
Mississippi State Director for the Southern Poverty Law Center Waikinya Clanton remarked, “Once you have done the act of registering to vote, which is your constitutional right, then there shouldn’t be a purging at any occurrence, you shouldn’t be rendered inactive. Voting is about choice and it’s about responsibility and so people can choose to engage in a process or not.”
As of Monday evening,15,547 affidavit ballots had been processed with roughly 76% of them accepted. Another 2,578 absentee ballots were still outstanding.
It remains to be seen if Colom will eventually be declared the winner. Based on the dark past of the state he hopes to represent in the Senate, his victory would be a matter of overcoming yet another obstacle that has been placed in the path of voters.
