Mississippi’s Senate race remains undecided days after polls closed, with Republicans expressing confidence that roughly 17,000 outstanding affidavit, or provisional, ballots will ultimately break in their favor and hand Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith a sixth term.
As of Thursday evening, about 20,000 ballots still needed to be counted, according to Mike Hurst, chairman of the Republican Party of Mississippi and general counsel for the Republican National Committee. Hyde-Smith, a Republican, trailed Democratic challenger Scott Colom by 1,813 votes, a margin of one-tenth of a percentage point, 49 percent to 48.9 percent. Early Wednesday morning, just hours after polls closed, the candidates were separated by only 43 votes with about 96 percent of ballots counted, the Associated Press reported.
Hurst told The Federalist in an interview that the bulk of the remaining provisional ballots are coming from traditionally Republican-leaning parts of the state, and that validation rates for those ballots have been unusually high.
“Usually affidavits are only proven correct about 25 percent of the time,” Hurst said. “We are seeing up to 75 percent or 80 percent validated. That’s what’s getting us excited. Internally that’s why we’re pretty bullish about this election.”
Hurst said the sheer volume of provisional ballots is unprecedented in state history, and he pointed to reports that a number of Republican voters were removed from the rolls and forced to cast affidavit ballots as a result.
“We are hearing that there are a number of Republicans who, for whatever reason, have been taken off the voter rolls and had to take provisional ballots,” Hurst said. “It’s something we’ve never seen in Mississippi before, something Democrats are not aware of.”
Hurst said he knows of a close friend who has not missed an election in 30 years and was forced to cast an affidavit ballot after being removed from the rolls.
On Thursday afternoon, Hyde-Smith’s official X account posted a confident message about the outcome.
“Cindy Hyde-Smith is going to represent Mississippi in the United States Senate for the next six years. We believe thousands of votes remain to be counted from dozens of Republican counties, and we are confident those votes will reinforce her path to victory.”
The Republican National Committee says it has sent 50 volunteer attorneys and observers to join an existing in-state election integrity team to monitor the count across Mississippi’s 82 counties and ensure state election law is being followed. An RNC Election Integrity team member told The Federalist that Republican volunteers have been deployed to counties “where votes are still being decided.”
“RNC and Mississippi GOP attorneys and observers are in counties across the state where ballot review and counting remain underway, watching how outstanding ballots are handled and how election officials determine which ballots legally qualify to be counted,” the RNC official said.
Hyde-Smith’s campaign and the RNC have said they are prepared to sue if county commissioners and circuit clerks fail to keep provisional ballots quarantined separately from regular absentee ballots.
Colom’s campaign is pushing back hard against the GOP’s demands. His campaign manager called the Republican demand letters to election officials “a desperate stunt” by national Republicans who “know they’re about to lose a race,” according to the Clarion Ledger. Lawyers for Colom, from a firm led by Marc Elias, sent their own letter to local election officials describing the Republicans’ demands as “unlawful and extraordinary measures” with “no basis in Mississippi law.”
Roughly 3,000 mail-in ballots also remain uncounted, Hurst said. Under Mississippi law, which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld this summer in a 5-4 ruling, mail-in ballots postmarked by Election Day are valid if received within five business days afterward.
Mississippi has no automatic recount trigger, and officials have said it could be days before every vote is processed and tallied. Counties must submit final results to the Secretary of State’s office by Friday, Nov. 13.
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