In a Natchez hotel with a view of the Mississippi River, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Brandon Presley informed a dozen Black and White supporters that Mississippi Republican Governor Tate Reeves is trying to keep money and power in Mississippi by sowing racial divide.

Presley, who was holding a tumbler full of whiskey, said: “They are sitting in the governor’s mansion, I bet your money, tinkling little glasses and smoking cigars.” “And they are talking about, ‘Well nobody is going to vote.’ And especially Black Mississippians. They don’t believe you will commit.”

The crowd murmured. One man shouted: “We are going to be there.”

Presley, 46, the second cousin of rock and roll legend Elvis Presley will need an unprecedented bipartisan, multicultural coalition to vote to unseat Reeves. The state’s conservative reputation has not wavered in the modern age, and it was denied a second governorship to its last Democratic candidate 20 years ago.

Presley, a former mayor of Nettleton in northern Mississippi, is finishing his fourth term serving as a state regulator. Presley has been campaigning in all 82 counties, from the vote-rich metro Jackson areas to the rural Issaquena County where less than 1,300 people are living among cotton and soya fields on a landmass as large as Los Angeles.

Bennie Thompson, the most powerful Black politician in Mississippi, has endorsed Presley. Morgan Freeman, the Oscar-winning actor and one of Mississippi’s most prominent Black residents, joined Presley at a recent campaign event.

Presley raised more money for his campaign than Reeves in this year. He also draws a larger and more diverse audience than any Democrat who has run for Mississippi Governor in the last generation.

Theresa Hall is a church administrator assistant who attended Presley’s Natchez campaign meeting. She said that she will make calls on his behalf.

Many people believe that their votes do not count. Hall, a Black woman, said that they did. “It’s important. “If we don’t vote, we’ll end up like we did four years ago. That was a disheartening sight to see.”

Reeves is running for a second term in office as governor. He has served two terms as lieutenant-governor and two terms as state treasurer. Reeves, 49, spoke to a group of 40 all-white people in Columbus near the Alabama border, during a multiday trip to festivals, fish fries and businesses.

Chuck Younger, Republican state senator from Arizona, introduced the governor to the audience and warned voters against voting for Democrats.

Younger stated, “It has been a pleasure working with Tate.” If we went any other direction, it would be like Bruce Springsteen’s old song: one step forward and then two steps back. It wouldn’t just be two steps. “It would be five steps back.”

Reeves stated that Mississippi is on the move, thanks to a low rate of unemployment and improvements in education.

Reeves stated that “liberal policies do not work.” “Conservative policies do work.”

Presley wants a strong turnout of Black voters in the state, as they make up nearly 40% of its population and form the basis of the Democratic Party. He needs crossover votes, too, from those who normally support Republicans but feel disenchanted by the conditions in one the poorest states of the U.S.

Other efforts are being made to increase participation. The Rev. William Barber, the national director of the Poor People’s Campaign spoke recently at churches in coastal Gulfport, and Biloxi. He encouraged people of all races, to support candidates that talk about improving life for low-wealth individuals.

Barber stated that “this election or any election should be about the policies needed to lift people from the bottom.”

Presley has spoken in speeches and television ads about his third-grade years when he was killed by his father. He then grew up with a single mother who worked at a garment mill and struggled to make ends meet.

Presley claims that rural hospitals suffer because Reeves refuses to extend Medicaid to those who work jobs without health insurance, such as roofing houses or serving at Waffle House. Reeves refers to Medicaid as “welfare”, and says that he doesn’t want people getting government-funded insurance.

Presley’s appeal to white voters of the working class is evident.

“Some people that I know are Trump supporters – they have Trump banners flying and Brandon Presley signs in their yard,” state rep. Nick Bain said, after losing a Republican Primary this year in Northeastern Mississippi.

Black voting rights in Mississippi were won through a long and violent struggle. Leaders such as Medgar Evers, Vernon Dahmer, and others were murdered in the 1960s while trying to gain access to ballots, which was denied to Blacks for many decades. In 1964, an integrated delegation of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party including Fannie Lou Hamer challenged the seating a state delegation made up entirely of white people at the Democratic National Convention held in Atlantic City. This brought attention to the issue and helped pass the Voting Rights act in 1965.

Black candidates have won significant local and legislative positions as Black voter registration has increased. In Mississippi, no Black candidate has ever won a statewide race. It’s also becoming harder for white Democrats in Mississippi to win.

Reeves, a four term state attorney general and Democrat Jim Hood won the 2019 four-person race for governor with 52% of votes. Reeves has linked Presley to Democratic President Joe Biden who is unpopular in Mississippi.

Mike Espy, a Democrat running in a special election to fill the U.S. Senate seat held on November 8, 2018, tried to create the same coalition that Presley is putting together. Espy was a former U.S. Agriculture Secretary and a former Congressman. He won 46% of votes to Republican Senator Cindy Hyde Smith’s 54%. Hyde-Smith was appointed to temporarily fill this seat several months before, when long-time Republican Senator Thad Cochran retired. Hyde-Smith won the 2020 rematch by a similar margin.

Presley’s camp has reason to be optimistic about the changes in Mississippi’s governor election process. Up until this year, a candidate for governor had to overcome a legal challenge written into the Mississippi constitution during the Jim Crow period and repealed in 2020 by Mississippi voters.

In the old system, to be elected governor, a candidate needed to win the majority of votes cast in the state and a majority within the 122 districts of the state House. The Mississippi House would decide the race without both.

This process was written by white politicians in the South who were trying to eliminate Black political power that had been gained during Reconstruction. Separate House votes allowed the ruling class of whites to decide who held office and fueled cynicism.