Welcome to The Homestretch, a daily blog featuring the most comprehensive coverage of the 2023 Mississippi governor’s race. This page, curated by the Mississippi Today politics team, will feature the biggest storylines of the 2023 governor’s race at 7 a.m. every day between now and the Nov. 7 election.
Four summers ago, Bill Waller Jr. had Tate Reeves on the ropes.
Waller, the former Mississippi Supreme Court chief justice who challenged Reeves in the 2019 GOP primary, had forced the powerful lieutenant governor into a runoff after Reeves’ allies had spent months downplaying his primary challenger.
What began as a modest campaign for Waller swiftly picked up steam. He was earning notable support from suburban Republicans. Respected GOP party leaders spoke highly of him and several even endorsed him. In the run-up to the primary, it was clear that Waller was a force for Reeves to reckon with.
READ MORE: ‘I think he’s more electable than Tate’: Four past GOP chairmen endorsed Waller over Reeves
The reason for that was simple: a fresh, new-to-the-modern-GOP platform. Waller ran on three major issues that year that few previous Republicans had: raising the state’s lowest-in-the-nation teacher pay, improving the state’s crumbling roads and bridges, and expanding Medicaid to save sick Mississippians and struggling hospitals. And on those three issues, Reeves got absolutely blasted.
Teachers groups torched Reeves for his years of inaction on teacher pay. Roadbuilders admonished...
Rebel Wilson appeared in a Sydney court on Monday, April 20, at the start of a defamation case brought by Charlotte MacInnes, the lead actor in Wilson's directorial debut "The Deb." The legal battl...