Mississippi Democrat Mike Espy is running again for U.S. Senate against Republican incumbent Cindy Hyde-Smith. MPB's Kobee Vance reports.
Democrat Mike Espy says he wants a rematch against Cindy Hyde-Smith for the U.S. Senate seat. Espy lost last year's special election for the two remaining years of retired Senator Thad Cochran's six-year term. Espy says the recent gubernatorial election is a sign that the democratic vote is still growing from his 2018 campaign.
"What I did to build momentum was built upon by Jim Hood just here two weeks ago. And now we're coming back again, and we're gonna improve upon that because if we have the resources we need now, we're going to be able to grassroots, get out of the voter organization, like Mississippi has never seen."
Espy says he will work to reduce poverty, improve schools, and end the Trump trade war that's pressuring farmers.
Austin Barbour is a national Republican strategist and founder of the Clearwater group. He says Espy will have to overcome voters who remember him for his loss in the last election.
He did a great job of boosting African American turnout, of Democrat turnout, but he still lost by eight points. And with Donald Trump on the ballot in 2020 turning out a large number of Republican voters, you know you'll have a million, two million, three voters that will come out in 2020. It makes it even more of a difficult situation for Mike Espy next year."
The 2018 campaign was rocked by a video of Hyde-Smith saying she would attend a "public hanging" if invited. She later apologized for the comment
