Mississippi Senate OKs bill affecting majority-Black city

Emily Wagster Pettus, Associated Press

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — The majority-white and Republican-led Mississippi Senate voted Tuesday to pass its version of a bill that would allow an expanded role for state police and appointed judges inside the majority-Black capital city of Jackson, which is led by Democrats.

“It is vastly improved from where it started, but it is still a snake,” Democratic Sen. John Horhn of Jackson said of the bill during Tuesday’s debate.

Critics say that in a state where older African Americans still remember the struggle to gain access to the ballot decades ago, the bill is a paternalistic attempt to intrude on local decision-making and voting rights in the capital, which has the highest percentage of Black residents of any major U.S. city.

Learn how The House version entailed “apartheid” like courts

Over policing has negatively impacted black communities in the past

Read more breaking stories here