Cyrus Ben is on his way to a second term as tribal chief of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians. Voters across six communities cast their ballots on Tuesday, with 215 absentee ballots set to be counted on Wednesday afternoon. At this time, Ben is stands atop the results with approximately 62 percent of the votes. The incumbent has served as tribal chief for the past four years after winning the election in 2019. Phyliss J. Anderson, who was elected the first female elected Chief of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians in 2011, currently has 34 percent of the counted ballots. T ..read more

Recently disqualified candidate for Mississippi’s public service commission Mandy Gunasekara has filed an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court in hopes of getting back on this year’s ballot. Gunasekara, who served as an official with the Environmental Protection Agency under former President Donald Trump, is seeking an emergency stay in the Mississippi Supreme Court’s May 11 decision deeming her ineligible to run for office. The state’s highest court disqualified Gunasekara from pursuing the northern district’s seat on the commission over a residency requirement that the former candidate ..read more

More and more hospitals are leaving the Mississippi Hospital Association (MHA) with the latest departure coming from North Mississippi Medical Center in Tupelo. According to reporting from the Magnolia Tribune, the decision from North Mississippi Medical Center sparked two other health systems – Ochsner and Merit – to also terminate their memberships with the MHA. Ochsner Health System, amid recent layoffs, still operates seven hospitals across the state including locations in Meridian, Union, Quitman, Morton, DeKalb, and Harrison County. Merit, on the other hand, has nine hospitals with locat ..read more

Following last week’s expiration of Title 42, Gov. Tate Reeves has announced that Mississippi is deploying National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexico border. In a tweet sent out by the Republican governor Wednesday afternoon, Reeves said the decision to mobilize came as levels of migration at the southern border have reached historic highs under President Joe Biden. “Drugs and illegal aliens are invading our country thanks to the Biden Administration’s unwillingness to put public safety over politics,” Reeves wrote. “Every state has become a border state, and every day we’re seeing the terrible ..read more