Brandon Presley, a Democrat in his fourth time period as a Mississippi utilities regulator, introduced Thursday that he’s operating for governor this yr, saying he believes state authorities and the present Republican governor are disconnected from the wants of working folks.
“Once you’re extra involved about how a lot marketing campaign cash you’ll be able to increase than you’re with how one can increase the standard of life for the people who find themselves the homeowners of state authorities, there’s one thing unhealthy screwed up,” Presley, a 45-year-old distant cousin of Elvis Presley, instructed The Related Press in an interview.
Gov. Tate Reeves, 48, final week filed papers to hunt a second time period. He’s the one Republican within the race thus far. Invoice Waller Jr., a former Mississippi Supreme Court docket chief justice who misplaced to Reeves within the 2019 Republican main for governor, has stated he’s contemplating one other run.
Presley will face no less than one candidate within the Democratic main. Gregory Wash ran a low-budget race for governor in 2019 and has filed to run once more.
Mississippi, Louisiana and Kentucky are the one states electing governors this yr.
In a telephone interview Thursday as he was driving in north Mississippi, Presley stated a welfare misspending scandal and the monetary struggles of a number of hospitals present that state authorities is failing. He stated Mississippi has had “wink-and-nod cronyism” for too lengthy, and he needs to tighten ethics guidelines and marketing campaign finance legal guidelines.
“I ain’t by no means owned a tennis racket, I ain’t by no means had a sweater wrapped round my waist and I ain’t by no means been a member of a rustic membership,” Presley stated. “I’m in Chickasaw County proper now. I perceive this fella entering into there proper now to get him a sausage and biscuit to go to work. When my title goes on that poll, the working households of Mississippi’s names go on the poll.”
When Reeves introduced final week, he stated voters ought to reelect him as a result of Mississippi has restricted abortion rights, expanded workforce growth, elevated trainer salaries and decreased the earnings tax whereas he’s been in workplace. Reeves served two phrases as state treasurer and two phrases as lieutenant governor earlier than successful the governor’s race 4 years in the past.
Presley was elected mayor of his hometown of Nettleton in 2001, weeks earlier than his twenty fourth birthday, a spot so small that he describes it as “a no-stoplight city.”
In 2007, he was elected to the Mississippi Public Service Fee, representing the northern third of the state. He opposed growth of a $7.5 billion coal-fueled energy plant in japanese Kemper County.
Quickly after Presley filed qualifying papers Thursday, he was endorsed by U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson — one of the crucial highly effective Democrats in Mississippi. Thompson is the state’s solely Black congressman and Presley, who’s white, might want to enchantment to a various base of voters in a state the place 38% of residents are Black.
Thompson stated in an announcement that Presley “has devoted his profession to preventing to enhance the lives of all Mississippians.”
“Proper now, our state is in determined want of a frontrunner who will put the folks first and stamp out corruption, not embrace it,” Thompson stated.
Mississippi Republican Occasion Chairman Frank Bordeaux stated Thursday that Presley is sort of a junior varsity model of the 2019 Democratic nominee for governor, then-Legal professional Basic Jim Hood, however that Presley is “extra liberal.”
“Governor Tate Reeves has performed an distinctive job main the state by unprecedented occasions,” Bordeaux wrote on Twitter.
Republicans have held the Mississippi governorship for a lot of the previous three many years, since contractor Kirk Fordice unseated Democratic Gov. Ray Mabus in 1991. The one Democrat to function governor since then was legal professional Ronnie Musgrove, who served one time period earlier than he was unseated by Washington lobbyist and former Republican Nationwide Committee chair Haley Barbour in 2003.
Presley not too long ago turned engaged to a Katelyn Mabus, a cousin of the previous governor. Presley was born weeks earlier than the demise of his well-known relative. Brandon Presley stated his grandfather and Elvis Presley’s grandfather have been brothers.
Feb. 1 is the deadline for candidates in Mississippi to qualify for statewide, regional, legislative and county workplaces. Occasion primaries are Aug. 8, with runoffs Aug. 29. The final election is Nov. 7, and runoffs are Nov. 28.
© 2023 The Canadian Press
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