Scott Colom wins Mississippi Senate seat

Long shot becomes frontrunner

Scott Colom, a local district attorney, announced his candidacy late last year in ruby red Mississippi. By October, he was confident his door-to-door campaign would succeed.

“We didn't have hundreds of million dollars to come in to spend, we did it going door to door, festival to festival, earning support.”

Colom defeats Hyde-Smith

Colom narrowly defeated Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith, according to The Associated Press on Wednesday evening. He won by approximately five thousand votes with a small fraction still uncounted.

Flipping red counties

While Colom swept traditionally left-leaning areas like Hinds County, he also won Republican strongholds. Forrest County, which President Trump won in twenty twenty-four with about fifty-eight percent, backed Colom.

DA since twenty sixteen

Colom has been district attorney for the state's sixteenth judicial district since twenty sixteen. That includes his hometown of Columbus, Mississippi, in Lowndes County, a right-leaning voter base.

Campaign focused on affordability

Colom ran on accessible healthcare, saving rural hospitals and affordability. He said working in a Republican-majority area informed his need for bipartisanship in tackling those issues.

“I believed that the majority of the Mississippians love our state more than they hate the Democratic Party or love the Republican Party.”

Hyde-Smith blocked his judgeship

In twenty twenty-three, President Joe Biden nominated Colom for a federal judgeship. Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith blocked him, citing donations from billionaire philanthropist George Soros to an independent PAC.

Hyde-Smith's election night claim

On election night, Hyde-Smith told supporters she had blocked Colom from being a federal judge and from being senator. She later conceded the race, saying she respects Mississippi voters' decision.

“I blocked Scott Colom from being a federal judge, and you blocked him from being U.S. senator.”

Historic milestone for Mississippi

Colom is Mississippi's first Black senator since Reconstruction. The last Democrat elected to the seat was in nineteen eighty-two, and no incumbent had been defeated since nineteen forty-two.

National Democrats joined late

About two weeks before the election, a PAC associated with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer donated one point two million dollars for advertising.

Colom credits state voters

Colom recognised that national Democratic attention came late but said it was voters within Mississippi who made the difference. He travelled the whole state from coast to capital to Tennessee border.

“They understand the power of their vote in ways that we really haven't seen in a long period of time.”

Paving the way forward

Colom said his job is to make it easier for the next African American with work ethic and vision to become senator. He aims to show that character, not skin colour, should define a candidate.

“My job is to be a senator that makes it easier for the next African American that has the work ethic, the vision, the values, and they want to be United States senator, make it easier for them.”