Scott Colom Wins Mississippi Senate Seat by Under 5,000 Votes

Democrat Scott Colom defeated Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith in Mississippi's U.S. Senate race, with The Associated Press calling the contest on Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2026, more than a week after the Nov. 3 election. Colom, 43, a district attorney, won 49.2% to Hyde-Smith's 48.7% — a margin of fewer than 5,000 votes out of nearly a million counted. Hyde-Smith conceded in a video posted to social media Wednesday evening.

Colom becomes Mississippi's first Black U.S. senator since the post-Civil War Reconstruction era. The last Black man to represent the state in the Senate left office in 1881. The win came six years after Mississippi retired its Confederate-themed state flag.

The result ends decades of Republican control of the seat. The last time Mississippi chose a new Democratic senator was 1947. Mississippi has the largest share of Black residents of any U.S. state and has been controlled mostly by white conservatives for generations.

The narrow margin and the week-long ballot count show how little separated the candidates in a state that has been reliably conservative. The Associated Press called the race after a prolonged ballot-counting process, with the delay reflecting the processing of a small number of votes that decided the outcome.

The result gives Democrats 55 seats in the 100-member Senate, with Alaska still uncalled. It adds to Democratic midterm gains in several Republican-controlled states and lands as a midterm rebuke of President Donald Trump in a reliably conservative stronghold.

It also feeds the Democratic argument that the party's future runs through the American South.

The Alaska Senate race remains uncalled.