Legislative roundup
Week of March 3-7, 2025
From staff reports
Redistricting
The Legislature has passed the House and Senate redistricting maps that they were instructed to redraw following a lawsuit that contested the fairness of the maps drawn in 2022. Should a federal panel approve these maps, we’ll be looking at 15 legislative races with general elections to occur this November.
It will come as no surprise that there are a handful of unhappy legislators who are accustomed to the use of gerrymandering to make their elections less of a contest. Republicans are very high on a merit-based society these days, so good luck as many of them face opponents in fairly-drawn districts.
Education
Speaker Jason White and his House Education Committee just won’t let school choice die a dignified death this session, and early this week inserted last-minute language into an unrelated education bill to keep district transfers alive. HB 1435, the House’s open enrollment bill, died earlier this session. That bill would’ve allowed students the ability to transfer out of their home school district to a nearby district without being granted permission by their home district to leave. The student’s per-pupil state funding would have followed them to their new school district. The language from that bill found its way into SB 2618 but it was still a no-go from the Senate, which has consistently been far more resistant to school choice than their counterparts in the House since Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann’s 2019 election.
As evidenced by this tweet from Speaker White, everyone is handling this very maturely and coping very well!
Celebrating the life and legacy of Robert G. Clark, Jr.
Former speaker pro tempore and longtime legislator Robert Clark passed away Tuesday. Rep. Clark was the first Black person elected to the legislature in the post-Reconstruction era. To say that Robert Clark was a trailblazer is an understatement. Elected in 1967, Clark served in the House for 36 years and eventually held the second most powerful position there. Upon his retirement in 2004, he was succeeded by his son, Rep. Bryant Clark, who still holds that office.
Public visitation will take place on Sunday, March 9, 2025, at the Mississippi State Capitol, on the second floor rotunda, where Clark will lie in state from noon until 4pm.