Pete Buttigieg calls for Mississippi to elect Scott Colom to US Senate, send ‘shockwaves’ ...Middle East

BILOXI – Former U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on Tuesday pleaded for Mississippi voters to “send shockwaves” by voting for Democratic nominee Scott Colom and rejecting Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith next week. 

Buttigieg was the latest national political figure to campaign in Mississippi in the homestretch before the Nov. 3 midterm elections. The Senate race has also attracted a last-minute barrage of spending as Democrats see an opening and Republicans worry that reliably conservative Mississippi could become a casualty of President Donald Trump’s sinking popularity nationwide. 

Trump hosted a rally for Hyde-Smith in Corinth on Monday, days after former Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris campaigned for Colom in Columbus last week.

Trump’s approval ratings have plummeted nationally amid opposition to increasing consumer prices and an unpopular war in Iran. Democrats have grown optimistic that Colom could pull off an upset in a state that hasn’t elected a Democrat to the Senate in more than four decades. 

READ MORE: Trump rallies for Cindy Hyde-Smith in Mississippi: ‘You like me’

“When you win in Mississippi, it is going to send shockwaves,” Buttigieg told a galvanized crowd in Biloxi. 

 Speaking to hundreds of people at a community center, the Biden administration transportation secretary said Trump and Hyde-Smith are directly responsible for soaring gasoline and grocery prices because of the president’s tariffs and other policies and the Iran war. 

“It’s happening because of decisions that were made in Washington,” Buttigeig said. “This time it’s not because Vladimir Putin decided to start a war. It’s because Donald Trump decided to start a war.” 

Colom repeated his campaign pledges about the need to raise the federal minimum wage and his desire to advocate for policies that help deliver access to affordable healthcare to rural Mississippi, which has some of the most dire health outcomes in the nation. 

“My commitment to you is that I am going to fight to do everything in my power to save our healthcare and save our hospitals,” Colom said.  

Buttigieg said healthcare issues show the Trump administration and Republicans are out of touch.

“Folks are saying, ‘We need help with healthcare,’ and they are saying, ‘OK, let’s build a new ballroom in the White House,'” Buttigieg said. “Folks are saying, ‘I need help affording the things that I buy at the store every week,’ and they are busy protecting whoever is in the Epstein files.”

Earlier in the day, Colom and Buttigieg had a press conference at the Coast Transit Authority in Gulfport, where the two celebrated the 2025 restoration of Amtrak’s Gulf Coast route from Alabama to Louisiana, called the “Mardi Gras Service.” 

The route was shut down after Hurricane Katrina and likely wouldn’t have been resurrected without a significant injection of federal money from Congress’ passage of the bipartisan infrastructure bill in 2021. 

Mississippi Sen. Roger Wicker was one of 19 Republican senators and the only Republican in Mississippi’s congressional delegation who voted for the federal legislation. Both Buttigieg and Colom praised Wicker’s support of the program and denounced Hyde-Smith’s opposition.  

“Let’s be very clear, there was a Republican U.S. senator from Mississippi who voted and acted to bring those dollars to this state,” Buttigieg said. “Just not Cindy Hyde-Smith because she was incapable of doing something without the permission of the then-former president.” 

Hyde-Smith at the time said she opposed the infrastructure legislation because it would increase the national debt, something Colom on Tuesday said was hypocritical because Hyde-Smith hasn’t voiced concerns about the debt increasing under Trump. 

“She doesn’t care about debt,” Colom said. “She cares about politics.” 

Colom also criticized Hyde-Smith for appearing with “Mardi Gras beads” at a ribbon cutting celebrating the reopening of the rail line, calling her dishonest for not disclosing to the public that she voted against the infrastructure bill. 

Buttigieg’s visit to the Magnolia State comes one day after Trump rallied for Hyde-Smith in Corinth in northeastern Mississippi, where he called Colom a “Democrat communist” and accused him of being soft on crime and overly supportive of transgender rights.

Colom called Trump’s description of him lies and pointed to his track record as a district attorney in north Mississippi as evidence that he’s tackled violent crime while in elected office. 

“Can you fill your gas up with those lies?” Colom said of Trump. “Can you pay your grocery bill with those lies?” 

Democratic leaders from outside of the state, such as Harris and Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia, have campaigned for Colom in hopes of energizing Democratic turnout on Election Day. 

Hyde-Smith and the GOP have sought to tie Colom to the far-left of the Democratic Party and criticized him for welcoming national Democratic leaders to the conservative state. 

But Colom said Mississippi voters should ask themselves why people such as Buttigieg “care more about roads and bridges” in Mississippi than Hyde-Smith does. 

If Colom wants to pull off an upset, he would need to make significant inroads in the Gulf Coast area, which has become a firewall of support in recent years for Republican candidates. Colom told reporters he believes he’s gained support there because he’s had multiple events in the region and listened to voters’ concerns.

Buttigieg last visited Mississippi in 2024 while he was transportation secretary, to help break ground on a $20-million renovation of Medgar Evers Boulevard in Jackson. He also toured the Medgar and Myrlie Evers Home National Monument and visited the Mississippi Delta, Laurel and Meridian. 

Buttigieg is a potential 2028 Democratic candidate for president and would likely need to shore up support among Black voters to capture the party’s nomination. Mississippi has the largest percentage of Black voters in the nation, but the national party often overlooks Mississippi because of its overall conservative electorate. 

Buttigieg said the national party needs to spend more time in conservative states such as Mississippi because “there’s no such thing as a permanently red state, district or county” and that Southern states deserve better than the incumbents serving them. 

“I think it’s always been a mistake to overlook Mississippi,” Buttigieg said.

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