A brief, early look at the Hinds County Circuit and Chancery judicial races

2014 is the year of judicial elections in Mississippi, and the Secretary of State's website has the list of qualifying judicial candidates across the state.  The list is admittedly incomplete, as the qualifying deadline isn't until May 9th.  But let's take a look at where we are in the Hinds County races so far.

The Hinds County Circuit and Chancery Courts are unique in that they serve as the initial battleground for many actions involving state agencies.  Just last year, for example, there was the injunction signed by Hinds County Circuit Judge Winston Kidd concerning the open-carry law, and the fight over public records from the Public Service Commission held before Hinds County Chancery Court Judge Dewayne Thomas.

There are four chancery court judges in Hinds County, and four circuit court judges.  There will be no retirements in 2014, as all eight of the judges have qualified for re-election.

Only one Hinds judge has drawn a challenger to date, and that's first-term Circuit Court Judge Jeff Weill.  Ali ShamsidDeen, a Jackson Municipal Court Judge, has filed to run against Weill, setting up a partial rematch of the 2010 race to replace the then-retiring Judge Swan Yerger.  In that race, Weill received 8,557 votes, as opposed to ShamsidDeen's 3,541 and Bruce Burton's 1,955.

There is still plenty of time between now and May 9, 2014, so we may see some new entrants in these races.  I'll write more after the qualifying deadline.

Campaign tricks on display in Hinds supervisor race

Darrell McQuirter (D) and Alphonso Hunter (I) are squaring off in the District 2 Hinds Supervisor race today, and reports are swirling through Belhaven that robocalls purporting to be from the McQuirter campaign are reminding people to vote tomorrow.

Of course, the election is today, Tuesday, November 5th from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

The robocalls aren't the only tricks on display aimed at the McQuirter campaign.  Over the weekend, flyers linking him to Republicans, Tea Party members and racists made their way through the district. Hunter's campaign denied any involvement.

Delbert Hosemann: I want to run the Hinds County elections

There is a ginned-up issue out there, folks, that threatens to end local control of elections in majority-black counties.  It is part and parcel of nationwide Republican plans to suppress minority votes.  This is important, so please pay attention:

According to the Hinds County Circuit Clerk, Barbara Dunn (D), there are 57 Hinds County residents who are eligible to cast military absentee ballots, 12 of which are in the country. The 45 overseas military absentee voters were contacted and informed that they could vote online. The 12 in the U.S. wanted paper ballots, and they will get those once they are printed.

The remaining absentee ballots haven't been printed yet because the Election Commissioner race involving Bobbie Graves is the subject of a lawsuit currently pending before the Mississippi Supreme Court. Contrary to what some people are saying, the law allows for situations such as this. Note the last part of Section 23-15-9(a) of the Mississippi Code:

(a) Not more than forty-five (45) days nor later than 12:00 noon on the Saturday immediately preceding elections held on Tuesday, the Thursday immediately preceding elections held on Saturday, or the second day immediately preceding the date of elections held on other days, he shall appear in person before the registrar of the county in which he resides, or for municipal elections he shall appear in person before the city clerk of the municipality in which he resides and, when the elector so appears, he shall execute and file an application as provided in Section 23-15-627 and vote by absentee ballot, except that if the ballot has not been printed by forty-five (45) days preceding the election, the elector may appear and file an application anytime before the election. Then the absentee ballot shall be mailed by the circuit clerk to the elector as soon as the ballot has been printed.

All of this is apparently giving Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann (R) the vapors, because he is claiming he has already drafted a lawsuit to take over the Hinds County elections.  This lawsuit, if filed, could create the legal precedent Hosemann would need to take over a county's elections any time he sees a problem.  And guess where he's going to see problems?  That's right, the same places he thinks he sees the rampant voter fraud he's not prosecuting.  Which happen to be the same places the MSGOP sends poll watchers.  And all of which just happen to be the majority-black areas of our state.

Rep. Bill Denny (R - Jackson) keeps saying that Hinds County lost 22,000 people in the last decade. That's not what the Census Bureau says.

Apparently in an effort to justify his efforts to take a seat away from Hinds County, Rep. Bill Denny (R - Jackson) keeps saying that Hind County lost 22,000 residents over the last decade.  That's not true, according to the census.   According the US Census Bureau, the 2000 population of Hinds County was 250,800.  The 2010 population is 245,285.  This is a decline of 5,542, or 2%.

Denny could have kept all of Hinds County's districts if he wanted to.

Rep. Earle Banks (D - Jackson) questions Rep. Bill Denny (R - Jackson) about the Denny map

Rep. Banks says that Rep. Denny told him that the districts could not be changed after Banks saw them last.  Denny denies saying that.

Rep. Banks disagrees with Denny's frequent statement that Hinds County lost 22,000 residents since 2000.  Banks says Hinds has lost only 2% of its population.  Some research reveals that Banks is correct: According the US Census Bureau, the 2000 population of Hinds County was 250,800.  The 2010 population is 245,285.  This is a decline of 2%.

So a loss of 5,000 people means a loss of a seat for Hinds County?  That's BS and Denny knows it.

About those Hinds County election issues back on August 2nd...

Now that the Sheriff's race in Hinds County is over, I can briefly comment on what went down with the Hinds County Democrat Primary on August 2nd.

In short, it was a confluence of unfortunate events. Tight races, machine failures, the race card, ballot security issues, and polls simply not being open on time combined to create one of the most chaotic elections in memory. The vast majority of the actual problems with the vote count are present in every election. There will always be folks who have trouble filling out an absentee ballot properly, and there will always be problems updating voter rolls when people register close to the deadline.

But there will not, God willing, always be instances where machine totals are wildly different from the numbers of voters. Nor will there be precincts with incomplete ballots that are used throughout the morning rush. At least, we hope.

Hinds County resembled Florida 2000 in the aftermath of the Democrat primary, and that simply cannot happen again. Everyone was quick to blame Claude McInnis, the chairman of the Hinds County Democratic Executive Committee. The vast majority of the problems were not his fault. However, he was too quick to let criticisms of the process affect him, and as a result, he made the perception worse when he excluded media from routine events such as the vote certification.

The real blame here lies with the voting machines themselves. The wild underreporting of votes from some precincts and the multiplication of votes from others greatly undermined the faith of the public in the vote totals. The Hinds County Election Commission needs to ask some tough questions of the individuals responsible for servicing these machines, and it might not be a bad idea for Secretary of State Hosemann to take a look at this as well. Not because anyone did anything wrong, but because our computerized Elections Management System may be in need of repair.

Hinds County redistricting goes south, elections to be held under old lines

As mentioned here yesterday, the Department of Justice has refused to clear the Hinds County redistricting plan in time to allow for elections under the new lines. Here's WJTV's coverage of the matter and its effect on local attorney Micah Dutro, who is running for Justice Court Judge.

***BREAKING*** - Hinds County redistricting not cleared by US DoJ?

Apparently there's been some sort of goof up with respect to Hinds County redistricting being cleared by the Department of Justice, and that means the candidates will be (barring court intervention) running under the old lines. No word yet on why the DoJ did not approve the new lines by June 1.

This news is breaking this afternoon, and details are very sparse. WJTV may be the one to break this story tonight, so keep your eye on them.