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Judge pauses deadline for federal workers to accept Trump's resignation offer; CA state lawmakers take action to enact safeguards against federal immigration enforcement; Study shows air quality disparities from industrial ag in NC.

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MS advocates fight on after Supreme Court upholds voting ban

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Wednesday, February 5, 2025   

Mississippi voting rights advocates said their fight is not over, even after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear a case challenging the state's lifetime voting ban for people with certain felony convictions.

The decision in Hopkins v. Mississippi leaves in place a provision of the state's 1890 Constitution, originally designed to disenfranchise Black voters.

Paloma Wu, deputy director of impact litigation at the Mississippi Center for Justice, called the ruling a setback, but said it reaffirms the long-term commitment to restoring voting rights.

"With the poll tax and the understanding clause, the literacy test, this was all part of the same 1890 Constitution and it is still achieving its goal," Wu argued. "Black people in Mississippi under our current felony disenfranchisement scheme are still disenfranchised at twice the rate as white Mississippians."

Wu pointed out Mississippi is one of only three states to permanently bar people with certain felony convictions from voting unless the governor grants them clemency, or a bill to do so is passed individually by two-thirds of the state legislature. Wu stressed it would take a constitutional amendment or omnibus suffrage bill for lasting change.

With legal options exhausted, advocates are shifting their focus to legislative action. House Concurrent Resolution 3 has been introduced to ease barriers to restoring voting rights. However, Wu cautioned statutory changes alone cannot fully undo the damage of Mississippi's constitutional voting restrictions.

"We need automatic re-enfranchisement," Wu contended. "You know you end up in this kind of really messy horse-trading where people say, 'Well, I want to add a couple disenfranchising crimes, and then I'll take away a couple disenfranchising crimes.' Well, it might look OK on its face, but when you really start crunching the numbers, you might be really not talking about getting that many people's right to vote back."

Despite the Supreme Court's refusal to hear the case, Wu insisted the conversation about voting rights in Mississippi is not over. Thousands of Mississippians are still barred from voting, for reasons their advocates say unjustly punish people long after they have served their sentences.


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