Trump backed another winner! Cindy Hyde-Smith managed to defeat Democrat Mike Espy today in the much anticipated Senate runoff election out of Mississippi. She will officially become the first woman from Mississippi elected to Congress, with The Associated Press calling the race in her favor not even 30 minutes ago.
“Congratulations to Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith on your big WIN in the Great State of Mississippi,” he tweeted late Tuesday. “We are all very proud of you!”
via USA Today:
Hyde-Smith was appointed by Republican Gov. Phil Bryant to fill the seat of longtime GOP Sen. Thad Cochran, who retired in April because of failing health. Hyde-Smith, a former state agriculture commissioner and state senator, will complete the two years remaining of Cochran’s term.
The contest was the last Senate race of 2018 and will give Republicans a 53-47 advantage next session.
Hyde-Smith, 59, will be among a record number of women, mostly Democrats, elected to Congress this year and part of the record number of women – 24 – to serve in the Senate in the upcoming 116th session. Of those, 17 are Democrats and seven are Republican.
The new number tops the record of 23 women now serving in the Senate.
“Mississippi was one of the last two states to have never elected a woman to Congress,” said Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University. “While Cindy Hyde-Smith got Mississippi out of that undistinguished club when she was appointed, there still had never been a woman elected, so this is another milestone for the state of Mississippi.”
Vermont is now the only state to have never elected a woman to Congress.
Despite the historic moment, much of the national attention on the Mississippi race in recent weeks has focused on Hyde-Smith’s controversial “public hanging” remark that sparked an uproar in a state with a troubled history of discrimination and lynching.