Voters will decide the special election for District 41 state representative on Tuesday.
Incumbent Kabir Karriem faces Pierre Beard for the seat. Both are running as Democrats.
Polls are open 7 a.m.-7 p.m. at 12 voting precincts across the district, which includes much of Columbus and part of Lowndes County north of the city.
No Republican is running in District 41, so the primary winner will not face a general election opponent in November.
Karriem, a former Ward 5 Columbus councilman, was first elected to the house seat in 2015. Beard served six years as Ward 4 councilman before losing his latest reelection bid in June.
So far, the Lowndes County circuit clerk’s office has received 153 absentee votes in the race, with another 28 mail-in absentee requests that have yet to be returned, Deputy Clerk Ann Marie Higgins said.
The deadline to vote absentee in-person is noon today. Mail-in absentee ballots must be post marked by or before Tuesday and must be received by the circuit clerk no later than Aug. 12.
Tuesday’s voting precincts include: East Columbus Gym, Columbus Christian Academy, District 2 Volunteer Fire Station on Jess Lyons Road, Lion Hills Center, Rural Hill Fire Station, Columbus Housing Authority, Southside M.B. Church Life Center, Townsend Park, Stephen Chapel Life Center, Trinity Retirement Home, Fifteenth Street Church and the Boy Scout Building on Second Avenue North.
The special election comes after a panel of federal judges ordered the Mississippi Election Commission to redraw select legislative districts after ruling the 2022 maps diluted Black voting power in DeSoto and Chickasaw counties. As a result, other counties saw a change in district lines as well, including House Districts 39 and 41 in the Golden Triangle.
The redrawn House map was approved in April, and the federal judges ordered more than a dozen special elections to take place in November.
In District 39, incumbent Republican Dana McLean is running unopposed.
PODCAST
■ BETWEEN THE HEADLINES: Listen to us interview candidates Kabir Karriem and Pierre Beard together at Apple Podcasts or cdispatch.com/podcast
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