Bennie Thompson's fight to keep his congressional seat just became a lot harder. Mississippi's only Black representative and sole Democrat in Congress is now openly being hunted by his own state's Republican leadership, who are using a weakened Voting Rights Act to pursue what Thompson calls a brazen power grab.
The Supreme Court's recent decision in Louisiana v. Callais gutted key protections of the Voting Rights Act, and Southern Republicans have wasted no time capitalizing on it. Within days of the ruling, governors and lawmakers across Florida, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi and beyond started calling special sessions to redraw predominantly Black districts. Tennessee Republicans already eliminated their state's only Black congressional seat. Governor Ron DeSantis signed a new map in Florida. Alabama has maps ready to go.
In Mississippi, Republican officials are making no secret of their target. State Agriculture Commissioner Andy Gipson, running for governor as a Republican, posted publicly calling for redrawing Thompson's district. State Auditor Shad White, likely to become another GOP gubernatorial candidate, has spent weeks on social media demanding the same thing. Governor Tate Reeves, while postponing a special session on Wednesday, made clear this was merely a delay. "It is not a question of if, it's a question of when," he said, referring to Thompson's tenure as a "reign of terror."
Thompson understands exactly what's happening. "This was red meat to the Republican legislators of the south," he said of the Supreme Court decision. Without federal oversight, states can now "create an opportunity for people to not be represented or vote for the candidate of their choice."
The history behind this moment runs deep. Mississippi once had more than 100 Black elected officials across state and local offices, but that was in the 1800s during Reconstruction. White legislators then enacted the "Mississippi Plan," introducing poll taxes, felony disenfranchisement and literacy tests to suppress Black voters. Violent intimidation completed the job. By 1964, only 6.7 percent of eligible Black Mississippians could vote.
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 changed everything. Robert G. Clark Jr. became Mississippi's first Black state representative since Reconstruction in 1967. Over the next six decades, Mississippi became home to more Black elected officials than any other state, proportionally speaking. Today, the state is about 38 percent Black, the largest such share in the nation.
Much of that Black population lives in Thompson's district. He was first elected in 1993 and has represented it ever since. But the map itself tells a story of Republican hostility. When it was last redrawn, GOP lawmakers added four rural counties that had never been part of the district before. The result: a district stretching nearly 300 miles with no public transportation, forcing Thompson to fly north into Memphis or west into Baton Rouge just to cover his constituents.
"Whatever the perceived gerrymandering that Republican elected officials are saying, they have to take credit for it," Thompson said. "They have been drawing this district since I was elected."
Thompson, 78, was born before the Voting Rights Act passed. His father died in 1964 without ever being allowed to vote because the local clerk refused to register Black people. The Act gave his father the chance he never lived to use, and it gave Thompson his first ballot in his hometown, where he would later become mayor despite receiving an inferior education under segregation.
Republican anger at Thompson centers partly on his chairmanship of the January 6 committee investigating the Capitol attack and his liberal voting record. "Because I believe in diversity, equity and inclusion, I'm perceived as not Mississippian enough," he said. But he's voted for every measure to lift Mississippi from the bottom of every economic indicator. "The good thing about running for public office is it gives people a choice," he said. "When you give people a choice and don't take that right away from them, they'll vote in their best interest."
The speed with which Southern states are redrawing maps reveals the true agenda, Thompson believes. "By and large, every state that's rushing in the south to redraw districts, the majority of their legislative delegations are Republican," he said. "They have publicly stated that this is their moment to change it. I think given those statements, you can assume that Black representation going forward will be on the decline."
Legal challenges to these redrawn maps are already underway, and voting rights coalitions are mobilizing across the South. Thompson sees the moment as dire but also as an opportunity. "This dastardly decision by the US supreme court can serve as a catalyst for change," he said. "We plan to resist with every fiber in our body to demonstrate our opposition."
Author James Rodriguez: "Thompson's situation is a preview of what's coming for Black Democrats nationwide if these gutted protections stick, and Republicans aren't even pretending to hide their playbook anymore."
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