Wednesday, November 28, 2018

Mississippi Special Election: Republican Hyde-Smith

By Douglas V. Gibbs
Author, Speaker, Instructor, Radio Host

Finally, most of the November 6 Mid-Term Election is behind us.  In Southern California, we are still counting ballots, and the more we count, the more the Democrat leads increase.  California lost most of any of the GOP influence there might have been, losing Orange County completely.  Riverside County, where I live, is the most conservative county, now, voting Republican across the board, but our demographics are changing, and in Orange County a Democrat pointed and said, "Riverside County is next."

The coordinated effort to drive out all opposition in California is almost complete.

Fortunately, the rest of the country is not politically anything like California (except maybe Illinois, New York, and Massachusetts).  In places like Oregon, aside from maybe Portland and its neighboring regions, a spark of conservatism still shines.  Washington State is pretty conservative except for the Seattle area.  Nevada nearly voted in a few Republicans.  Fly-over country is as red as a beating heart.

In Mississippi a special election for a U.S. Senate seat was in play, and the appointed Republican, Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith, gets to hold the seat for two more years until its regular election comes up in 2020.

Hyde-Smith had 54 percent of the vote to Espy’s 46 percent with 95 percent of precincts reporting.  This makes the Senate a decently comfortable GOP majority of 53-47.  Hyde-Smith is the first woman elected to represent Mississippi in the Senate.

Now, it's time to start getting all of these judges confirmed.

A former Democrat, some are calling Hyde-Smith a moderate, but her support of Trump (and appreciation of Trump for his support during the campaign, he appeared at two rallies in the State) was unwavering.  She sounds and votes pretty conservative, but we'll have to keep an eye on her voting record, just in case.

“This win tonight, this victory, it's about our conservative values,” Hyde-Smith said. “It's about the things that mean the most to all of us Mississippians: our faith, our family."

Hyde-Smith told reporters after her speech that she spoke to Trump shortly after the race was called, and said he told her she had “been through a storm and you’ve survived it.” She said she had apologized for her controversial comments [public hanging comment that the Democrats jumped all over, claiming it hearkened back to the South's history of lynching] and planned to move on and look forward.

Asked if anything she had endured during the campaign would prevent her from running for a full term in 2020, she said, "absolutely not."

"This is not for the faint of heart and I'm certainly not the faint of heart," Hyde-Smith said.

Mississippi Democrats believe the race was closer than many expected, and it shows a potential for building more Democrat runs for office in the future.  A Democratic Strategist on television last night pointed out that Mississippi is about 60% white, and 40% black, and the party lines follow the racial lines.  Mississippi has been voting only Republican Senators into office since 1982.

-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary

No comments: