The Mississippi Senate contest between Scott Colom and Cindy Hyde-Smith has turned into an unexpectedly tight race, with the outcome still undetermined as counting continues. HuffPost headlined it "Mississippi Senate Race Too Close To Call With Most Votes Counted". BBC News headlined it "Democrat leads by dozens of votes in surprisingly tight Mississippi Senate race".
Part of the uncertainty stems from the fact that the state has no law providing for an automatic recount. The New York Times headlined it "Mississippi’s Senate Race Is Close. The State Has No Vote Recount Law.". That gap in state law has left both campaigns preparing for a legal dispute over how remaining ballots will be counted. CNBC headlined it "Mississippi Senate: Colom, Hyde-Smith gird for ballot legal fight in razor-thin race".
Outstanding absentee ballots remain central to the dispute. The Daily Wire reported: "According to the latest update from Mississippi Secretary of State Michael Watson, there are an estimated 3,600 outstanding absentee-by-mail ballots, a number larger than Colom’s lead."1 A lawyer involved in a related federal lawsuit argued that federal law barred counting votes received after Election Day, and pointed to timing patterns in how different parties' voters tend to return mail ballots. "A lawyer for the Republican National Committee, whose lawsuit argued federal law barred counting votes received after Election Day, noted in a brief to the Supreme Court, "2Democratic voters tend to mail their ballots later on average than Republican voters, which results in late-arriving ballots favoring Democratic candidates."", CNBC noted.
Explanations for how the race became so competitive have varied. Some reporting has tied the shift to a broader surge in turnout across the South this cycle. Mother Jones reported: "But my colleague Ari Berman reported on Wednesday that Black voter turnout has skyrocketed across the South this election cycle, due in significant part to mobilized frustration over the April Supreme Court decision that effectively dismantled the Voting Rights Act, Louisiana v. Callais, setting the stage for a string of extreme partisan gerrymanders and other crackdowns on access to voting."3 Other reporting has traced the closeness of the contest to how Colom built his campaign.
Colom himself has also spoken about the limits of outside support for his campaign, criticizing national Democrats for not investing more in the race.
The stakes of the outcome carry historical weight. Should Colom prevail, he would become the first Black senator elected from Mississippi since the Reconstruction era. CNBC reported: "If Colom defeats Hyde-Smith, 67, he would be the first Black senator from Mississippi since the post-Civil War Reconstruction Era."2
Mechanically, officials and both campaigns are now focused on how the final votes will be processed.
