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78-Year-Old Congressman Bennie Thompson Defeats a Millennial in Mississippi

Rep. Bennie Thompson, 78, wins his Democratic primary by a landslide, defeating a 34-year-old challenger pushing for generational change in Mississippi.

By Yusra Khan
U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, a longtime Mississippi Democrat, secured the Democratic nomination for the state’s 2nd Congressional District on Tuesday, defeating a primary challenge from a young antitrust lawyer with experience working in Washington.   Seeking to serve an 18th term in Congress, Thompson captured 84.8% of the vote in the heavily Democratic district. The 78-year-old congressman’s opponent, Evan Turnage, was 1 year old when Thompson was first elected to Congress. Turnage, the 34-year-old attorney and former aide to Chuck Schumer (D-NY), focused his campaign on the incumbent’s tenure and the argument for generational change, but the long-shot bid to unseat the incumbent failed, as he secured only 13.8% of the vote. Ahead of Election Day, Turnage posted on X, “People are fired up and ready for change.” He added, “The last 33 years, we’ve had some of the same persistent issues.”  One of Turnage’s campaign ads described Mississippi’s 2nd Congressional District as “the poorest district in the poorest state in the country.” Turnage added, “That was true when I was one year old, when our congressman was first elected, and it’s true today.”  At a time when several longtime House members are stepping aside, Bennie Thompson is running for another term in Congress, while colleagues such as former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Reps. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and Jerry Nadler (D-NY) have opted to pass the torch. Thompson, who made history as the first Black Democrat to represent Mississippi in Congress, is expected to be easily re-elected. Mississippi’s 2nd District is the most Democratic among the four districts in the state. In the 2024 election, the district voted for former Vice President Kamala Harris over President Donald Trump by about a 60% to 40% margin. Bennie Thompson, who is now the ranking member of the House Committee on Homeland Security, is also the former chairman of the House select committee tasked with investigating the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol storming incident. Former U.S. President Joe Biden conferred the Presidential Citizen Medal, which is the second-highest honor for U.S. citizens, on Bennie Thompson for his work on the Jan. 6 committee. Thompson is planning to head back to Washington to concentrate on resolving the partial government shutdown and to work towards transparency in the war in Iran since Feb. 28. He also stated that Donald Trump has to be accountable. Regarding her choice, Dyamone White stated that she knows Turnage from high school but decided to vote for Bennie Thompson. She has a business next to Bennie Thompson’s office in Bolton, Mississippi, and was at his election night party on Tuesday. She stated that Bennie Thompson should be remembered as a leader who has represented his constituents well.

Evan Turnage is part of a group of younger Democrats who were trying to unseat incumbent party leaders who had served for many years. Turnage’s campaign focused on his platform of economic populism and his background in regulating Big Tech and AI.

Although he conceded his loss, he said he wished Rep. Bennie Thompson all the best and hoped that his second term would be one of action to meet today’s challenges. He also said that the people of his district were not able to afford ten more years of the same thing.

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