- Important state and national stories, market and business news, sports and entertainment, delivered in quick-hit fashion to start your day informed.
In Mississippi
Currie wins Mississippi Leopold Conservation Award
Jim Currie has been selected as the recipient of the 2025 Mississippi Leopold Conservation Award®.
The award honors farmers, ranchers, and forestland owners who go above and beyond in the management of soil health, water quality, and wildlife habitat on working land. Currie lives in Pass Christian and owns forestland near Picayune in Hancock County.
The $10,000 award was presented at the Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation’s Annual Meeting.
Sand County Foundation and national sponsor American Farmland Trust will present Leopold Conservation Awards to landowners in 28 states this year. In Mississippi the award is presented with the Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation.
National News & Foreign Policy
1. Vote on Obamacare subsidies could come this week in U.S. Senate
The Hill reports that the battle over the extension of Obamacare subsidies “may come to a head this week as time is running out before prices are set to spike for millions of Americans.”
“Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) plans to force a vote this week on his own proposal for a three-year extension of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) tax credits, which are set to expire at the end of the month. He has said he expects every Democrat to support it,” The Hill reported. “But the legislation will fail without support from at least 13 Senate Republicans to reach the required 60-vote threshold to advance.”
The Hill continued, “Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) is also expected to introduce House GOP leadership’s own health care proposal, with the goal of receiving a vote before the end of the year. The details of the plan aren’t clear, but Republican leaders have signaled it will focus on alternative health care affordability provisions to the subsidies.”
2. SCOTUS to hear arguments the president’s authority to remove officials
According to the New York Times, “The Supreme Court on Monday will consider whether President Trump can fire independent government officials despite laws meant to protect them from politics, a major test for the justices to determine how far to expand presidential power.”
“The justices are being asked to overturn a landmark decision from 1935, which said that Congress could put limits on the president’s authority to remove some executive branch officials,” NYT reported. “In recent rulings, the court’s conservative majority signaled that it was receptive to Mr. Trump’s claims that a president should not be forced to delegate authority to agency heads at odds with his agenda.”
NYT went on to report, “A decision in the president’s favor would call into question the constitutionality of job protections extended to more than two dozen other agencies Congress has charged with protecting consumers, workers and the environment — and potentially upend the fundamental structure of the modern government.”
Sports
1. Huff leaves USM after 1 year
First year Southern Miss head football coach Charles Huff has left Hattiesburg after posting a 7-5 record. It was confirmed over the weekend that Huff has been named the new head coach at Memphis.
Offensive Coordinator Blake Anderson, a former head coach himself, has been named the interim head coach for USM. He will lead the team in their New Orleans Bowl game appearance versus Western Kentucky on December 23. Anderson is said to be among the possible candidates to replace Huff.
Southern Miss Athletic Director Jeremy McClain thanked Huff for helping get the program back on a winning track.
2. Ole Miss to face Tulane in CFP Round 1
No. 6 Ole Miss will take on Tulane for the second time this season in the first round of the College Football Playoff.
The matchup is set for December 20 at 2:30 p.m. in Oxford.
2025 Ole Miss Football season ticket holders will have first right to playoff tickets. Season ticket holders can access the ticket portal, with a priority deadline of Fri., Dec. 12 at 5 p.m. CT. A student sale will begin Dec. 12 at 8 p.m. CT, with tickets allotted in a first-come, first serve fashion. Student tickets are not eligible to be transferred. If tickets are still available, they will be made available to the general public the week of Dec. 15.
3. 5-7 Mississippi State going bowling
After a few bowl eligible schools declined their postseason bowl bids, Mississippi State at 5-7 will play in the Duke’s Mayo Bowl.
A team typically needs to get to at least 6 wins to be bowl eligible.
Yet, the Bulldogs will take on Wake Forest in the Duke’s Mayo Bowl at 7 p.m. CT/8 p.m. ET on Jan. 2 at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, N.C. The game will be televised on ESPN.
Tickets are now available.
Markets & Business
1. Wall Street notches second positive week in a row
CNBC reports that stock futures “were relatively unchanged on Monday, following another winning week for Wall Street, as investors look toward the Federal Reserve meeting.”
“Monday’s action comes after a second positive week in a row for the three major indexes. The Dow and Nasdaq Composite added 0.5% and 0.9%, respectively, in the week,” CNBC reported. “The S&P 500 added around 0.3% last week, bringing the broad index about 0.7% off its all-time intraday high. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq also notched four-day winning streaks on Friday, while the Dow has been positive in three of the last four sessions.”
CNBC noted, “Stocks received a boost on Friday after the delayed release of September’s core personal consumption expenditures price index came in softer than economists anticipated. That was one of the last major economic releases ahead of the Fed’s policy gathering taking place this week.”
2. China’s trade surplus top $1 trillion
China’s trade surplus in goods this year topped $1 trillion for the first time, the Wall Street Journal reported. WSJ called the news “a milestone that underscores the dominance that the country has attained in everything from high-end electric vehicles to low-end T-shirts.”
“For the first 11 months of the year, China’s exports increased 5.4% from the year-earlier period to $3.4 trillion, while the country’s imports declined 0.6% over that same stretch to $2.3 trillion. That brought the country’s trade surplus this year to $1.08 trillion, China’s General Administration of Customs said Monday,” WSJ reported.
WSJ added, “That remarkable figure, never before seen in recorded economic history, is the culmination of decades of industrial policies and human industriousness that helped China emerge from a poor agrarian economy in the late 1970s to become the world’s second-largest economy.”
