Mississippi Speaks Mississippi Supreme Court Ballot Initiative Ruling: What Does It Mean for the State?

• Sponsors: One Voice (Executive Director Nsombi Lambright-Haynes) and MS State Conference NAACP (Executive Director Corey Wiggins | State President Reverend Robert James) 
• Host: Brandon Jones – Policy Director |Southern Poverty Law Center & SPLC Action Fund (Mississippi)
• Guests:  Zakiya Summers- State House of Representatives |District 68 : Corrine Rivera Fowler- Director of Policy and Legal Advocacy | Ballot Initiative Strategy Center & BISC Foundation

On May 14th, the Mississippi Supreme Court voided the state’s ballot initiative process essentially overturning previous ballot initiatives such as medical marijuana and ending future ballot initiatives such as Medicaid expansion and early voting. The petition to challenge and void the state’s ballot initiative process was filed by Madison Mayor Mary Hawkins Butler. Her argument stemmed from the constitutionality of the state’s ballot initiative process. The current ballot initiative language requires petitions to collect signatures in the state’s five congressional districts with no district exceeding 20% of the total. The state, however, only has four congressional districts. The state lost one congressional district after the 2000 Census. Therefore, the Supreme Court ruled that the state’s ballot initiative process was “unworkable” and “inoperable.