Incumbent politicians are always looking for a way to better ensure their reelection, even with the odds already heavily stacked in their favor.
One of the more popular strategies has been to shorten the period for qualifying.
For the 2023 state and county elections in Mississippi, the qualifying period will be less than a month — from Jan. 3 to Feb. 1. That’s a month shorter than just four years ago, and four months before what had been the longtime qualifying deadline before incumbent lawmakers starting messing with it.
The early and compressed qualifying period is designed to discourage challengers by making it more expensive to run for office. It also gives incumbents an early heads-up if they are going to have an opponent. That’s especially helpful knowledge to lawmakers during an election-year legislative session.
