{"id":230000,"date":"2026-11-07T02:22:11","date_gmt":"2026-11-07T02:22:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/lawyers-descend-on-mississippi-as-vote-counting-continues-in-razor-thin-senate-race-the-guardian\/"},"modified":"2026-11-07T02:22:11","modified_gmt":"2026-11-07T02:22:11","slug":"lawyers-descend-on-mississippi-as-vote-counting-continues-in-razor-thin-senate-race-the-guardian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/lawyers-descend-on-mississippi-as-vote-counting-continues-in-razor-thin-senate-race-the-guardian\/","title":{"rendered":"Lawyers descend on Mississippi as vote counting continues in razor-thin Senate race – The Guardian"},"content":{"rendered":"

Democratic and Republican lawyers and groups trade sharp legal letters about procedures for counting ballots in tight race
Where Trump and Republicans lost the midterms \u2013 a visual analysis of the key states<\/a>
Democrat Scott Colom<\/a> is on the verge of winning a Senate<\/a> seat in Mississippi<\/a> in a stunning upset, but ballots are still being counted in a close race where Colom holds a lead of just under 2,000 votes over Republican incumbent Cindy Hyde-Smith. Losing ruby-red Mississippi would be the final straw for Republicans after a midterm sweep by Democrats that turned Texas blue and saw a Democrat elected to the seat once held by the late South Carolina Republican senator Lindsey Graham.
A possible legal fight is also brewing, as both sides trade sharp legal letters about the procedures for counting remaining ballots. National voting groups and attorneys have descended upon the magnolia state, joining the local groups that worked to mobilize voters. Democratic and Republican groups, including Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) and Democratic election attorneys from the Elias Law Group, have deployed hundreds of volunteers and lawyers to all the state\u2019s 82 counties to oversee the final rounds of counting.
In Mississippi<\/a>, voters who cast affidavit ballots on election day because they don\u2019t have photo IDs have five business days to visit their local circuit clerk\u2019s office to present an acceptable photo ID, or sign a religious objection affidavit. They have until 10 November to do so, which is also the last day for mail-in ballots to arrive and be counted.
Mississippi has no automatic recount law. A recount can only happen if ordered by a court in response to a lawsuit against a county or county election commission from a political party or campaign. Mississippi law does not establish a system for challenging ballots on a statewide scale, so the process would have to be county-by-county basis.
\u201cMississippians did their part. Now election officials must do theirs,\u201d Nsombi Lambright-Haynes, executive director of One Voice, a local civic organization said in a statement. \u201cVoters who followed the rules and were still turned away, moved to an affidavit ballot, or left off the rolls through no fault of their own deserve answers and action. We will not let administrative failures erase the voices of the people.\u201d
On Thursday, the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC), which represents Hyde-Smith, sent a letter to county election commissioners and circuit clerks in the state, demanding that they separate and preserve all affidavit ballots cast in the 3 November general election.
\u201cAs the democratic process continues to play out, we are committed to ensuring that every single lawful ballot is accurately counted and the voices of all Mississippians are heard,\u201d NRSC\u2019s ergional press secretary, Samantha Cantrell, said in a statement.
Colom\u2019s campaign manager, Gerard Henderson, called the NRSC\u2019s letter a \u201cdesperate stunt\u201d in a statement.
\u201cWe\u2019re confident that when every lawful ballot is counted, Scott Colom will be Mississippi\u2019s next US senator,\u201d he said.
Colom\u2019s legal counsel sent a letter to the 82 counties, their election commissioners and their circuit clerks on Thursday, too. That letter said that the demands \u201chave no basis in Mississippi law, and if you depart from ordinary election procedures as you have been asked to do, you will violate Mississippi voters\u2019 rights and Mississippi election law\u201d.
\u201cNotwithstanding Hyde-Smith\u2019s letter, you should therefore do as you are legally obligated to do: continue conducting this election using ordinary, lawful procedures,\u201d the letter reads. \u201cDo not segregate accepted affidavit ballots from other paper ballots. And certainly do not do anything that would allow a particular ballot to be traced to a particular voter, in violation of the \u201cfundamental principle of the right to cast a secret ballot.\u201d
On Friday, the NAACP sent its own letter to county election commissions in the state, calling on election officials to \u201cstrictly adhere to state law during the post-election ballot counting and certification process\u201d.
\u201cEvery voter in Mississippi deserves to have their vote counted strictly according to the law,\u201d Derrick Johnson, the NAACP\u2019s president and CEO, said in a statement. \u201cThe NAACP is on the ground monitoring every stage of this post-election process in every corner of the State. We will be watching closely to ensure election commissioners are permitted to follow every legal procedure and every ballot is accounted for free from intimidation and threats.\u201d
Mike Hurst, the chair of the Mississippi Republican party and general counsel of the Republican National Committee, addressed reporters in a press conference outside the Hinds county courthouse in Jackson on Thursday afternoon. He said that there could be approximately 20,000 outstanding ballots left to be counted.
While many have suggested that those ballots would likely only further boost Colom\u2019s lead over Hyde-Smith, Hurst said: \u201cA significant number of these, we believe, are in and remain in Republican leaning districts, precincts and counties.
\u201cWe are firm in our conviction that if the law is and was followed, that Mississippians will have spoken clearly and unequivocally and that Senator Hyde-Smith will be re-elected to another term to represent the great state of Mississippi,\u201d Hurst said.<\/p>\n

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Democratic and Republican lawyers and groups trade sharp legal letters about procedures for counting ballots in tight raceWhere Trump and Republicans lost the midterms \u2013 a visual analysis of the key statesDemocrat Scott Colom is on the verge of winning a Senate seat in Mississippi in a stunning upset, but ballots are still being counted […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":230001,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-230000","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-us","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=230000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230000\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/230001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=230000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=230000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=230000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}