The initial reaction to Tate Reeves’ reelection as Mississippi’s governor is that the Democratic chances of ever winning statewide office again are doomed, and so is Medicaid expansion in this state, at least for the next four years.
Maybe so, maybe not.
Four years ago, Reeves defeated Jim Hood, a Democrat with statewide name recognition but short on cash, by 5 percentage points.
This year, Reeves defeated Brandon Presley, a Democrat with plenty of cash but short on statewide name recognition, by 5 percentage points.
What’s still to be tried by the Democrats in this era of GOP dominance is fielding a candidate with both name recognition and cash.
Presley, it should be remembered, started off this campaign in a big hole. His time as a small-town mayor and then public service commissioner did not make him a household name in at least two-thirds of the state.
He was running against an incumbent who, though not the most lovable politician in the world, still had proven himself adept over a 20-year span at both raising money and pushing the right buttons to keep this socially conservative state in his corner.
Presley also was running at a time when people in Mississippi are generally satisfied with their personal financial conditions, now that inflation is moderating. Had the recession materialized that economists were predicting a year ago, it might have produced a different outcome on Nov. 7.
Not that winning a statewide race is ever going to come easy for a Democrat as long as Mississippi remains a heavily rural and racially polarized state.
As many have observed, Democrats in this state start off with a 40% floor, based largely on the monolithically Democratic vote of Mississippi’s Black population. But to reach 50% takes both a lot of money and a particularly skilled politician who can energize the Black vote while not alienating the white crossover support the candidate must also get.
Presley actually outraised Reeves this year, in large part because out-of-state Democratic groups believed Reeves was vulnerable. That $11 million only got the challenger an extra 7 percentage points, though. Enough to make the race interesting, but not enough to unseat an incumbent, which Mississippi has a history of rarely doing.
Four years from now, should Presley choose to run again, he’d start off with the name recognition he lacked this go-round. He would not have to face an incumbent governor. And the economy might be in a down cycle (that’s bound to happen at some point), plus by then the full impact of the GOP’s slashing of income taxes will be more evident. The state released a report this past week, overshadowed by the election, that showed tax collections for the first four months of the fiscal year are down more than $52 million, or 2%, all because of the drop in income-tax revenues.
Presley’s biggest challenge would be to convince the Democratic Governors Association and other out-of-state donors that they’re not wasting their money in Mississippi.
As for Medicaid expansion, no doubt its odds of enactment haven’t been improved with Reeves’ victory, since the campaign was partially a referendum on that issue.
But the Jackson Clarion Ledger’s headline writers were more preoccupied with rhyming than they were with accuracy by calling the governor’s victory a “Mandate for Tate.”
A mandate would be 60% of the vote, which is what the other seven Republican statewide officials received in the general election. If anything, Reeves underperformed, given all of the advantages he had entering his reelection contest — a sizable war chest, incumbency, Donald Trump’s endorsement and economic stability. There certainly wasn’t any great enthusiasm behind Reeves’ campaign, as he received 10% fewer votes than he did in 2019, which was roughly the same drop-off from Hood to Presley.
Even if Reeves continues to dig in his heels on Medicaid expansion, the Legislature could have different ideas. Both the likely next speaker of the House, Rep. Jason White, and Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, who heads the Senate, have previously indicated they are open to studying the possibility.
They may want to wait to see whether Reeves’ Medicaid plan, offered in the late stages of the election campaign, delivers as much relief to the state’s struggling hospitals as the $700 million a year the governor claims it will.
If the governor’s plan doesn’t pan out as promised, Medicaid expansion will almost certainly resurface as a major topic of discussion. His 5-point victory was not large enough to stop that.
- Contact Tim Kalich at 662-581-7243 or tkalich@gwcommonwealth.com.
