Nation IN BRIEF : MISSISSIPPI : First GOP Governor Since 1876 Sworn In
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Kirk Fordice was sworn in as Mississippi’s first Republican governor since the Reconstruction era of 1876. Fordice, 54, a businessman who saw the Republican Party through two decades of building itself into a political force in Mississippi, won the Jackson Statehouse by defeating Democratic incumbent Ray Mabus. Fordice campaigned on a conservative platform opposing affirmative action and supporting welfare reform. He blasted comparisons between his positions and the similar gubernatorial platform of former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke, who ran for governor as a Republican in Louisiana.
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