MISSISSIPPI SENATE SEAT FLIPS BLUE BY SMALLEST OF MARGINS

In 2023, Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith used her home-state veto to block Scott Colom from a federal judgeship Joe Biden had handed him, citing his support for transgender rights among other things. Eight days after the midterms, the AP called the Mississippi Senate race for that exact same guy. He gets her desk instead. The count was ugly for her all week. Election night ended with the two separated by 65 votes, and Colom finished at 49.2 percent to her 48.7 with 99 percent of precincts in. Mississippi has no automatic recount law, so overturning it would take a court order. Hyde-Smith called Colom, then posted a video saying she respects the decision of Mississippi voters. The closing stretch was a slow-motion car crash. She hasn't debated anybody since 2018, which Colom called chicken. She went on WLOX in Biloxi, got asked about the price of beef, and said Mississippians have "so many other proteins to choose from." Trump flew in to prop her up. Colom still out-raised her down the home stretch. Colom, a 43-year-old district attorney, becomes Mississippi's first Black senator since Reconstruction and the first Democrat the state has sent to the Senate since 1982. It is the eighth Senate seat Democrats flipped this cycle, putting them at 55.

Why you should give a shit: She torched a safe seat to keep one man off a judge's bench, and now he gets a vote on every federal judge in the country.