The next stop in the fight over $20 million in annual payments to an anti-tobacco program is the Mississippi Supreme Court.
At a fish fry Tuesday night in Hattiesburg, Gov. Haley Barbour made no secret that he intends to appeal the decision by a Jackson County judge to postpone the hearing over the tobacco money for a year.
The Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi currently receives $20 million annually from the tobacco settlement payments. Barbour has long contested the payments, saying the courts do not have the right to decide how public funds are spent. Attorney General Jim Hood disagrees.
“This $20 million a year that’s going to a private charity would pay through Medicaid for health care for 50,000 Mississippi children for a whole year,” Barbour said. “Now that’s not right, and I think the Supreme Court will make it very plain that the reason the attorney general wanted a delay is because they know they’re going to lose.”
Barbour says his office will wait until the judge’s order is signed before filing an appeal to the Supreme Court.
