Dave Elliot thanks so much for joining me we start with our state's primary elections coming up on Tuesday and joining us from the Capitol City Mississippi Secretary of State Michael Watson secretary Watson always good to see you thanks so much for being with us ahead of the election pleasure my friend busy days ahead but we're gonna be all right so uh you know we're going to have uh Statewide Senate race we have house races including a GOP Primary right here in the fourth congressional district
are you feeling confident do you have any concerns you know look we've done a lot of work with the legislature over the past four years tightening up our system returning confidence to the process uh we saw a lot of questions come out after 2020 and I think we focused on those to make sure mississippians could trust that the the ballot that they cast is the ballot that's counted I think that's an important piece I will say our absentee request numbers are a little bit down just north of 15,000
which indicates a smaller turnout than normal so I hope all mississippians will get out and vote this coming Tuesday very important election in our country's um future as well as here in Mississippi you know our Ed officials that are going to be representing Us in DC so I hope folks will pay attention do their homework do their research and get out and vote on Tuesday yeah well of course I agree with you 100% we always lament our our our low voter turnout usually in the 18 to 24% range and like
you said uh Michael I think it might be in that low end of that probably about 18% do you have any brilliant ideas to change that to improve that you we've done a lot of things our ambassador program dealing with our high school seniors that we teach them about elections our PTV program getting into schools I go to Rotary clubs I go to kanana clubs you name and I always talk about voting and the importance of that so I'm not exactly sure what else we can do uh in our 82 County tour a lot of time
s clerks mention that people just don't know when elections are so I think it's incumbent on people like you and and us to continue to spread that word so having us on this early before an election is really important again to talk about election day and make sure people are turning out to vote what about some reforms how about making a lot of people say it's it's it it could be so much easier to vote when it comes to absentee ballots I like what Louisiana does not that Mississippi's going to do
that Saturday elections and I also like their jungle primary that they do but I mean is there anything that we can do to just make the process easier besides just talking to people and telling them over and over again how important it is well I will tell you as far as being easy to vote in Mississippi it's never been easier you look at 2020 the numbers back when Co was in our face and we broke records voter turnout was incred Back Then There are some conversations in the legislature going on ri
ght now one dealing with early voting one dealing with a few other pieces of of moving election legislation around so the legislature is looking at that outside of them doing something though as far as our office is concerned again it's about getting the word out traveling around the state encouraging folks to vote and telling them why it's so important let's talk about the big story Colorado Supreme Court a judge in Illinois and a secretary of state in Maine all tried to keep Donald Trump Trump
off the ballot I think if anyone's an honest person they'll say they knew the Supreme Court was going to uh uh overturn that shoot that down and they did it was unanimous but it brought up and raised some questions about exactly what role States play in federal elections uh Enlighten us tell us about that yeah so look Article 1 Section four in the Constitution known as the elections Clause uh so that gives the states the ability really just the process of election so states do have a big role i
n that to play however when it comes to Federal elections there's some interesting questions to be asked and I think the the question that we all should be asking ourselves should states have the ability to take presidential candidates off the ballot in their separate states I think that's a terrible position to take and I think we all expected the Supreme Court to overturn it I don't know that we predicted a 90 vote from the Supreme Court so a resounding no to States being able to take off the
president from their ballot so I think it's important that we really abide by that and and look you got active Secretary of States out there some that make good decisions some that make bad and so I think it's important that this ruling set the the rules of the road ahead for us coming into 24 well you know I have to talk about tidelands and we're going to do that in a second but I have one more election uh question for you I was watching this super Tuesday night your favorite network MSNBC and
I saw this reporter doing a live shop from outside of a drive up Dropbox for ballots and that just struck me as kind of odd and a lot of states are are really getting out there with some of the things they're allowing what do you think about that I can't stand dropboxes uh you know one of the things that that we talk about all the time is making sure that you can control the access to ballots and also knowing when and where they're cast I think that's an important piece uh we've talked about dif
ferent states that are putting on uh videos and and cameras on those boxes to make sure that they're watching that again you got different states that are that like you said are getting out there they're on the edge uh it's important to protect the Integrity of the process so ballot drop boxes are something that I hope we don't have here in Mississippi in the future we do not have them now and I think it's important that we keep it that way okay here we go tidelands always contentious on the coa
st especially in buuy uh two bills in the legislature the way I read it they don't seem to dramatically change the Secretary of State's Authority but do seem to kind of clarify and codify existing statute is that how you read it it is uh really to return the process back to the intent of the original Titans legislation passed back in 1989 uh then the map that was put into place in '93 again I think the important piece here is it gives stability and certainty to the market uh to our gaming indust
ry which is so incredibly important and I'll tell you this we've worked at very hard with Senator Thompson with Senator blunt many of our Coast legislators Senator deleno and others to make sure that we're getting a piece of legislation that's good for everybody I think the cities will be really excited when when they see the final product uh that probably will be on the floor next week in the state senate and again I like to remind folks I'm from the coast I want to make sure the coast does wel
l so it's important for us to get a good balance between what traditional public trust Thailand's law is as well as how do we give the cities the most flexibility possible to let them do what they want to do with those those small craft Harbors okay I know you like winning but you're 0 for two on the Veterans avenue Pier uh we had a uh a Chantry Court uh here here in Harrison County and then the state supreme court who are both sided with buxy and Harrison County on that Pier with our W developm
ent I mean basically you've exhausted you don't plan on still challenging I mean it's done right yeah those are done and again I think the decisions were both flawed uh that said you know that they did go into law so we've got to abide by that and then we saw the gaming commission and my opinion use them as a springboard and I think it was really political in the sense that you remember that didn't happened long after the governor's race was over with uh and that decision may have been toyed aro
und with politically who knows but at the end of the day what we're trying to do is again return the law to the intent as it was passed in 1989 I think it's important to give certainty and stability to the industry but also to respect State lands you know look we don't want Hattisburg or Telo or mome or anybody else taking State lands just because they want them they have to have conveyance it's basic property law and that's what dealing with our small craft Harbors but once those cities have th
at conveyance have the lease then they can do what they want with them so again an important piece to return back as much possible power as we can to the cities when dealing with our small craft Harbors yeah well you know me I have to fight a little bit for the coast I have to get a little bit on buuy side on this one and and it seems like as far as harbors and peers where there's Public Access that's separate then the casino tiin leases but then you get into some gray areas and some of the othe
r commercial stuff gray is about what do you mean well uh I mean uh Margaritaville just and as an example it's cacy know so again I I think it it matters not at the end of the day it's public trust tidland it's state owned property and these cities have to have access to that that access is granted through 5951 which is small craft Harbor act and so again no matter what it is if it's State Property they're going to have to get access to it via a lease a conveyance of the right to use the land ok
ay very quickly because we're out of time Michael you do have an interesting Ally in this fight against the casino or the gaming commission approving the RW site and that just happens to be all the other casinos on the coast again it's about stability they want to make sure that they're operating by the law as they understand it and when you rip the rug out from under them just what the gaming commission did with RW development uh granting them the sight Authority there we've got to look at what
Alabama is doing what Georgia is doing what Florida is doing what other states are doing and look if it's unstable and casinos don't understand what the rules of the road are they're less apt to reinvest in those properties because they don't know how the gaming commission Will Roll next time so again it's very important to get stability and certainty for this organization along the coast all of the casino industry and I think that's what we're doing with this legislation Secretary of say Micha
el Watson thanks so much for being with us Michael we hope for big voter turnout numbers on Tuesday and again thanks for being with us amen you got it my friend
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