After a nail-biting race decided by only a few thousand votes, Scott Colom was declared Mississippi’s first Black senator-elect in 145 years. “One of the best political ads ever,” an unconventional campaign advertisement about protein, helped him secure his historic victory.
The 30-second clip tees off a television interview featuring Colom’s opponent, Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, who was running for reelection, in which she responded to concerns about rising beef prices by saying there are “so many proteins to choose from.”
“Pick another protein? Shiiiid, I’d rather pick another senator instead,” one man says in the ad before flipping a beef patty on a grill.
“Pick another protein?” a woman says while enjoying a plate at a restaurant. “She done lost her damn mind. I’d rather pick another senator.”
Another woman at a grocery store freezer aisle nearly drops the f-bomb in response to being told to “pick another protein” when Colom appears on the screen, chuckling. “Pick another senator instead,” he says.
The video from last month, which has over 3.9 million views on TikTok, has been called the “coldest campaign ad ever” by online commenters. Its simple, straightforward messaging, and the rejection of Hyde-Smith’s “let them eat cake”-type statement stuck in the minds of Mississippians, so much so that “pick another senator” caught the attention of people across the country during midterm elections.
The ad even outperformed a video released a day earlier of former President Barack Obama encouraging Mississippi voters to vote for Colom. The senator-elect also received endorsements from Kamala Harris, Chuck Schumer, Raphael Warnock, Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, among others.
Last week, Colom gave kudos for the ad to two Black men: Patrick Gaspard, a former Obama administration diplomat who came up with the idea to “do something edgy” with Hyde-Smith’s “inexcusable gaffe,” and Ryan Sayles, a 27-year-old content creator from Mississippi who directed and edited the popular clip: “He should be considered the breakout-star of this cycle. He’s going to be a giant in the media consultant game. He did GAME CHANGING work with SO little.”
Now, Sayles has become one to watch. A mass communications alum of Alcorn State University, according to the Washington Post, he had never been involved with political campaigns before working with Colom. He was first brought on to the senator-elect’s campaign as a photographer for an event in October and did such a great job that the team wanted to continue working with him, Sayles told Politico.
District Attorney Colom prevailed over incumbent Mississippi Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith. His win, which was called Wednesday after counties verified outstanding ballots, makes him the state’s first Black senator since 1881, during the Reconstruction era, and the state’s first Democratic senator in 44 years.
It follows a blue wave that swept through the South, including Georgia electing Keisha Lance Bottoms as the nation’s first Black woman governor, and several historic wins for Black candidates across the country during this month’s midterm elections, in part due to high Black voter turnout. Nearly 40 percent of Mississippians and over 130,000 voters in the state are Black.
