Hundreds planning to protest Trump’s Mississippi visit

Hundreds of Mississippians are planning to protest President Trump’s visit to the state on Monday ahead of the run-off election between Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.) and Democrat Mike Espy.

The Mississippi Rising Coalition is organizing a protest on the beach opposite a venue where Trump is speaking, according to the Biloxi Sun Herald.

The coalition, a non-profit civil rights organization, urged activists in a Facebook event to bring their “banners, signs and voices” to the non-violent gathering.

{mosads}“We can not and will not let Hyde-Smith and Trump’s racist rhetoric go unanswered directly by the people, and we must not allow Hyde-Smith to represent our state any longer,” the group wrote.

As of Sunday morning, more than 300 people responded that they are either “going” or “interested” in the “Battle of Biloxi Protest.”

Trump is speaking at two locations in the state on Monday in support of Hyde-Smith. The former state senator and Mississippi commissioner of agriculture is facing backlash over her comment that she would be in the “front row” if she were invited to a “public hanging.”

Hyde-Smith, who was appointed to replace retired Sen. Thad Cochran (R), claimed her words were “twisted” and that she meant “no ill will.”

Photos of Hyde-Smith in Confederate garb have also surfaced.