Democrat Scott Colom has won Mississippi’s US Senate race, defeating Republican incumbent Cindy Hyde-Smith and becoming the state’s first Black senator since the Reconstruction era that followed the Civil War. The Scott Colom Mississippi win is one of the most striking results of the 2026 midterm elections.
The Associated Press called the race for Colom after local election officials spent days processing absentee ballots and affidavit ballots, as provisional ballots are known in Mississippi. Reuters said the latest tallies showed Colom ahead by more than 4,500 votes, or about half a percentage point, in a contest so tight that at times he led by only a few dozen votes. The Mississippi race was one of the final races to be called after the November 3 midterm elections. Hyde-Smith, 67, conceded, according to local reports.
First Black Senator Since 1874
Colom, a 43-year-old district attorney, became the first Democrat to win a Mississippi Senate seat since John Stennis in 1982. The last Black candidate elected to the Senate in Mississippi was Blanche Bruce, a formerly enslaved man elected in 1874, more than 150 years ago. The last time the state sent a new Democrat to the Senate was 1947, when it elected a staunch segregationist, the AP said. Hyde-Smith was appointed to the Senate in 2018 and won a special election later that year.
The result was a stunning upset in the heavily Republican state and expanded on the national drubbing the Democrats delivered to President Donald Trump’s Republicans in the November 3 midterm elections. Colom’s victory gives the Democrats a 55-44 advantage in the 100-member Senate, with the winner in one Senate race from last week’s election, in Alaska, yet to be determined.
What Comes Next
Colom will take his seat when the new Congress is sworn in on January 3, 2027. His win closes a gap of more than 150 years since Mississippi last sent a Black senator to Washington, and it reshapes the Senate map heading into the next session. Democrats will hold a comfortable majority, although the Alaska race still to be decided will determine the final margin.
The Mississippi contest drew national attention as one of the last uncalled races of the midterms, with the outcome hanging on a slow count of absentee and affidavit ballots. For more on the outstanding races, see our report on Alaska and Mississippi Senate races still uncalled after counts and the House count nearing its final tally as Democrats hold 256 seats so far.
