Nearly three years after the votes were counted, they will be counted again. On June 3, Special Judge Barry Ford ordered a do-over of the 2023 Democratic primary for the Hinds County Board of Supervisors District 2 seat, ruling in favor of former Supervisor David Archie. The Hinds County Election Commission has since set the new contest for July 14.

Ford did not find fraud. He found that the county could not prove what its own voters had done. According to Mississippi Today, Ford ruled that significant errors occurred in the safekeeping of ballots, and he cited Circuit Clerk Zack Wallace's testimony about the lack of a chain of custody for voter materials.

The judge framed his decision as a matter of arithmetic he could not perform. “I cannot determine the will of the voters,” Ford said, per Mississippi Today, adding that case law requires a do-over when that will cannot be established.

The mechanics are narrow. WJTV reported that only Archie and current Supervisor Anthony “Tony” Smith will appear on the ballot, with 26 precincts across District 2 open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. on July 14. Smith keeps the seat in the meantime.

The case turned on what happened to the ballots after the polls closed. WJTV reported that during the proceedings Archie's attorney showed videos of what they described as empty and unsealed ballot boxes, and that Wallace, called to the stand, testified he was no longer in possession of the boxes and related materials. “I never had possession of it,” Wallace said, according to WJTV, describing a county split across two buildings.

WLBT reported a blunter moment from the earlier hearings: asked under oath, Wallace said he could not say the election was run with integrity. WLBT also reported that the judge found negligence in the vote counting and noted the election was certified despite missing votes, with three members of the Hinds County Democratic Executive Committee having signed the 2023 certification.

The numbers being erased were not close. After the August 2023 runoff, the Secretary of State's office certified Smith with 67 percent of the vote to Archie's 33 percent, according to SuperTalk Mississippi. Archie kept the challenge alive after a lower judge dismissed it; the Mississippi Supreme Court revived the suit in September 2024.

Smith is not conceding the rematch. He told Mississippi Today he has no plan to appeal and that he is confident he can beat Archie again.

His attorney, Warren Martin, cast the ruling in starker terms. Martin told reporters the decision invalidated thousands of Black votes in District 2, called it “an abomination,” and argued that Wallace, not Smith, should be held accountable for the missing materials, according to Mississippi Today.

Archie, for his part, claimed the outcome as a win for the ballot itself. He said outside the courthouse that Hinds County would now take every vote seriously regardless of party, and that the nation would be watching how the county handled it, Mississippi Today reported.

There is a calendar coincidence worth noting. The federal bribery trial of District Attorney Jody Owens, former Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba and former Councilman Aaron Banks is set to begin July 13 in downtown Jackson. The day after jurors are seated to weigh how Hinds County's officials behaved, the county's voters in District 2 will be asked to redo an election its own clerk could not vouch for.

Polls open July 14. This time, the chain of custody is the whole story.