Mississippi candidates gives stump speeches amid sawdust and sweat at the Neshoba County Fair

PHILADELPHIA, Miss. (AP) — Mississippi candidates are speaking at the Neshoba County Fair, an annual gathering that draws large crowds to the red clay hills in the eastern part of the state.

Hundreds of colorful cabins fill the fairgrounds and some extended groups of friends and families stay for several days in the hottest part of the year for an event that’s been made considerably easier by air-conditioning in recent decades.

Politicians speak under a tin-roofed pavilion as spectators sit on long wooden benches, shuffling their feet in sawdust and fanning themselves in the summer heat.

Party primaries are Aug. 8, with runoffs Aug. 29 and the general election Nov. 7. Here’s what some candidates for attorney general and agriculture commissioner said Wednesday:

ATTORNEY GENERAL

Republican incumbent Lynn Fitch said her office is working to help human trafficking victims “without any shame or blame.” The work includes her office having recently held a training session to help law enforcement identify such cases. She also touted her office’s 2021 lawsuit against pharmaceutical companies over insulin prices, an effort to protect people who have diabetes. Fitch said she will propose a Parents’ Bill of Rights to ensure people have a voice in their children’s schools and a Women’s Bill of Rights to ensure single-sex bathrooms and locker rooms. She did not mention the word “transgender,” but she said the current federal administration is trying to redefine women. Fitch also said Mississippi needs to improve adoptions, foster care, child care and the child-support collection system.

Democratic challenger Greta Kemp Martin is the litigation director for Disability Rights Mississippi. She said she would create a labor division in the attorney general’s office to stand up for workers’ rights. She also said she would prosecute people who abuse elderly and vulnerable residents. Kemp Martin pledged stronger oversight of state agencies, saying Fitch has failed to bring criminal charges against anyone involved in misspending tens of millions of welfare dollars. Federal and county prosecutors have brought charges, but the state has not. Kemp Martin also said Fitch settled insurance claims over Hurricane Katrina damage for “pennies on the dollar,” has not enforced leases for public tidelands and has not enforced campaign finance laws.

AGRICULTURE COMMISSIONER

Andy Gipson, the Republican incumbent, said the state has increased agricultural exports since he has been commissioner. He also touted a state program that allows people to track and kill “sorry, good-for-nothing” wild hogs that can destroy crops. Gipson called on legislators to invest in agriculture by producing three food hubs in the state — north, central and south. He said he wants to expand farmers’ markets and upgrade livestock facilities. He said ports and harbors need new cold-storage facilities for crops.

Robert “Brad” Bradford, a Democrat, is the emergency manager director in Adams County. He’s a military veteran and a fourth-generation farmer from the Mississippi Delta. He has a degree in plant and soil science. Bradford said that as an emergency manager, he has seen farms damaged by tornadoes and hurricanes. He said the state Department of Agriculture needs to do a better job of marketing Mississippi products, relying on talent from “the whole community” in the state. Bradford also said the department needs to be diverse: “It has to look like Mississippi.”

Bethany Hill, a Democrat, noted her established activism to legalize medical marijuana in Mississippi. She said the state has a “desperate need” for industrial hemp, and the state Department of Agriculture has done too little to help growers of that product. The department does not issue licenses to hemp growers, according to its website; licenses must instead come from the federal government. Hill said she is passionate about food security. She grew up on a farm in north Mississippi and said: “My whole family came together to not only sow the seeds but to harvest the crops, and then we all preserved them together.” Hill said her upbringing showed her the importance of community-based economics.

Terry Rogers, a Democrat, is the youngest candidate in the race, at 19, and he said the state is not relying enough on the talent of young people. Rogers said it’s not right that Mississippi has a 7% tax on groceries. “I plan on the people of Mississippi getting fed because for too long we’ve been starving and too long we were starving for a message and for too long we’ve been starving, literally, with poverty.” He said farmers face a labor shortage, but having a chapter of Future Farmers of America in every high school could alleviate that problem by sparking young people’s interest in agriculture.

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Emily Wagster Pettus reported from Jackson, Mississippi.