Mississippi's Republican governor signed a bill on Friday to expand the territory of a state-run police department inside the majority-Black capital city of Jackson, and the new law is expected to face a court challenge from the NAACP.
The legislation was passed by a majority-white and Republican-controlled state House and Senate. Jackson is governed by Democrats and about 83% of residents are Black, the largest percentage of any major U.S. city.
Gov. Tate Reeves said this week that the Jackson Police Department is severely understaffed and he believes the state-run Capitol Police can provide stability. The city has nearly 150,000 residents and has had more than 100 homicides in each of the past three years. Debate in the past four months over a larger state role in Jackson has angered residents who don’t want their voices diminished in local government. It’s the latest example of the long-running tensions between the state government and the capital city.
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