Some of the two parties\u2019 biggest names, including President Trump and his opponent in 2024, Kamala Harris, have dropped in for rallies. Money is flowing in the millions of dollars. The airwaves are saturated with cutting political ads.<\/p>\n
All for a Senate race in Mississippi, one of the most Republican states in the country.<\/p>\n
The race between Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith, an incumbent Republican, and Scott Colom, a district attorney with deep roots in the state, has raised a tantalizing question in the final days of the midterm season: Could Mississippi, a state flickering on the outskirts of the Democratic Party\u2019s wildest ambitions, actually be in play?<\/p>\n
Mr. Trump\u2019s rally on Monday night with Ms. Hyde-Smith in Corinth, a short drive from the Tennessee border, seemed to indicate that it might be.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m here because Cindy is doing great,\u201d the president told the packed arena. \u201cBut I\u2019ve just got to make sure.\u201d<\/p>\n
He went on to Mr. Colom. \u201cHow the hell do you say that guy\u2019s name?\u201d he asked, adding, \u201cI don\u2019t have to go into him \u2014 he\u2019s a disaster.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr. Colom seemed happy to take the slight. His campaign posted photos showing him at Mr. Trump\u2019s rally talking to voters in line.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope people will realize that Mississippi was always a state that had potential,\u201d Mr. Colom said this month at a cafe in Jackson, the capital. \u201cBut it does need resources and attention.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope people will realize that Mississippi was always a state that had potential,\u201d Scott Colom said this month at a cafe in Jackson, the capital. \u201cBut it does need resources and attention.\u201dCredit…Sarah Warnock\/Associated Press<\/p>\n
In a bastion of conservatism, a healthy dose of skepticism is warranted. Democrats here have let their hopes climb in recent years \u2014 with Mike Espy, a former agriculture secretary running for Senate, in 2018<\/a>, and Brandon Presley, a candidate for governor in 2023 \u2014 only to see them dashed.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve seen this movie before,\u201d Mike Hurst, the chairman of the Mississippi Republican Party, said in an interview. \u201cI don\u2019t see the doomsday coming on Nov. 3.\u201d<\/p>\n But the flurry of high-profile surrogates and millions of national dollars from the parties\u2019 official political arms, and their leaderships\u2019 super PACs, signal a tightening race if not a tossup.<\/p>\n \u201cHe will never outwork me,\u201d Ms. Hyde-Smith said of Mr. Colom during the rally. \u201cI have a proven record to run on that I am very, very proud of.\u201d<\/p>\n Beyond the rallies and star stand-ins, the money is speaking volumes. Some Black Democrats had clamored<\/a> for the party establishment to invest in Mississippi and the man who would be the state\u2019s first Black senator since Reconstruction. Mr. Colom, a relentless messenger, has capitalized on boiling voter anger over high prices, cuts to health care and food assistance and the war in Iran.<\/p>\n With the Senate races in Georgia and North Carolina seeming to shift toward the Democrats, Mississippi appears to be the new front in an expanding battlefield in the South.<\/p>\n That prompted a hefty round of spending from the Senate Majority PAC, which is affiliated with the Senate Democratic leadership. The Senate Leadership Fund, connected to Senate Republicans, has now pumped more than $1 million of advertising into Mississippi, according to AdImpact, which monitors campaign advertising,<\/p>\n \u201cWhether he wins or not, he ran a good race,\u201d Mary Wallace Hodge, 79, a retired store manager in Columbus, Miss., said of Mr. Colom. \u201cRepublicans are scared.\u201d<\/p>\n Mr. Colom is the son of a barrier-breaking regional judge<\/a> and a lawyer who worked on Ronald Reagan\u2019s transition team<\/a>.<\/p>\n Ms. Hyde-Smith, the first woman to represent Mississippi in the Senate<\/a>, has not been as dominant as some of her other Republican counterparts. The state\u2019s former agriculture commissioner, Ms. Hyde-Smith was first appointed to the Senate seat after the 2018 retirement of Senator Thad Cochran, who was adept at bringing federal funds to the state.<\/p>\n The state\u2019s senior senator, Roger Wicker, a Republican, has followed in Mr. Cochran\u2019s footsteps in the ability to bring federal funds to the state, in his case as chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.<\/p>\n Ms. Hyde-Smith has a seat on the panel that controls spending and has taken care in recent days to highlight the money that she has driven home. For some Republicans, that is enough to reliably support Mr. Trump\u2019s agenda.<\/p>\n \u201cHe can\u2019t do it by himself,\u201d said Sharon Pannell, 57, a retired teacher who came to the rally in Corinth on Monday. \u201cI think a lot of people don\u2019t know how important the midterm election is.\u201d<\/p>\n But Ms. Hyde-Smith has otherwise kept a low profile, declining questions from the reporters who prowl the Senate basement and refusing to debate Mr. Colom. In Starkville, Miss., one farmer told Mr. Colom that he wouldn\u2019t know what Ms. Hyde-Smith looked like, if not for the fairly recent barrage of TV advertisements.<\/p>\n Cindy Hyde-Smith, the first woman to represent Mississippi in the Senate, has not been as dominant as some of her other Republican counterparts.Credit…Eric Lee\/Reuters<\/p>\n One of her decisions in the Senate was fateful: She refused to sign off on Mr. Colom\u2019s nomination to the federal judiciary during the Biden administration, effectively blocking his path to the lifetime appointment and leaving him free to challenge her this year.<\/p>\n \u201cI wouldn\u2019t have left the bench to run for the United States Senate, that is fair,\u201d Mr. Colom said. But, he said, his motivation was not personal.<\/p>\n \u201cMississippi did not matter enough to her,\u201d he said. \u201cUltimately, that\u2019s the betrayal.\u201d<\/p>\n He has pilloried Ms. Hyde-Smith as \u201cCindy High Prices\u201d and says she has not done enough for the state. He has worked to build a coalition behind the promise that \u201cMississippi Matters,\u201d playing off a frustration that the state has struggled to climb national rankings.<\/p>\n Then there\u2019s the protein ad.<\/p>\n In February, after a local TV anchor<\/a> referenced the high price of beef while asking about the rising costs of food, Ms. Hyde-Smith observed: \u201cYou have so many proteins to choose from.\u201d<\/p>\n Eight months later, Mr. Colom dropped a punchy, 30-second ad<\/a> off the clip. A trio of dumbfounded voters riff on the same response: Pick another protein? I\u2019d rather pick another senator.<\/p>\n It has become the catchphrase on his campaign\u2019s food truck (pick another protein \u2014 beef or chicken \u2014 for your taco), on campaign posters and even among some voters.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019d rather pick another senator,\u201d Kierra Robinson, 33, told Mr. Colom as he knocked on doors in her Jackson neighborhood, quoting the ad back at him in recognition. \u201cI like you.\u201d<\/p>\n An energized Black electorate, which makes up about 40 percent of the state\u2019s population, could lift Mr. Colom but only so far. Former President Barack Obama, whose 2008 campaign prompted a record surge of Black voting, reached about 43 percent<\/a> that year.<\/p>\n The ongoing effort to redraw districts across the South after the weakening of the Voting Rights Act this year has also helped galvanize many Black voters.<\/p>\n \u201cMississippi\u2019s not a red state \u2014 it\u2019s a state that doesn\u2019t vote,\u201d said Carol Hall, 66, a Southaven, Miss., retiree who had been out canvassing prospective voters for the first time in her life.<\/p>\n But to win, Mr. Colom needs support from more than just Black voters.<\/p>\n Some of those voters seem willing to at least consider him. A young Catholic woman, passionate about her opposition to abortion, said she was looking for a candidate opposed to the data center development near her neighborhood in Horn Lake, Miss., a short drive from Memphis. A gaggle of 18-year-old men spoke about high gas prices and their worries about a protracted conflict in Iran as they debated their first vote.<\/p>\n Roger Keesling said he voted for Mr. Trump in 2024 but came to Mr. Colom\u2019s rally with Ms. Harris earlier this month to learn more about the guy in the ads that popped up during an episode of \u201cThe Voice.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve been doing my homework on Cindy Hyde-Smith, and I\u2019m not that impressed,\u201d Mr. Keesling said, speaking before the rally. Mr. Colom, he said, seemed like \u201che works for the people.\u201d<\/p>\n