Lane Kiffin, Mike Leach join call for Mississippi to change its flag

The top football coaches in the state of Mississippi have joined the growing movement for the state to remove the Confederate symbol from its state flag, the last banner in the U.S. to include that pattern.

Lane Kiffin at Ole Miss and Mike Leach at Mississippi State University, two famous college coaches hired this year to resurrect the Rebels and Bulldogs football programs in the vaunted Southeastern Conference, are joining calls to change the flag.

Their names were among dozens of football coaches at several Mississippi schools who said they would participate in a Thursday rally.

The coaches’ support comes on the heels of a renewed legislative push to get the Confederate battle star off the upper left corner of the state flag. Other states that were in rebellion during the Civil War have all removed Confederate images.

Mr. Leach and Mr. Kiffin plan to be in Jackson, the state capitol, on Friday where momentum is building to get the necessary two-third legislative majority to change the flag. The legislature has until the end of business Friday to suspend its rules and hold a vote.

Republican Gov. Tate Reeves has long maintained that any change to the flag should be made after it is approved by a statewide referendum. The last time Mississippians went to the polls with such a question in 2001, voters by a nearly 2-1 margin chose to keep the flag they had.

While some Republican leaders in the state house have already indicated they favor changing the flag, and were reportedly whipping votes among their supermajority in both the House and Senate, the party as a whole has not taken a formal position on the issue. That changed a bit this week, when Mississippi GOP Chairman Lucien Smith issued a statement opposing the banner.

“My personal view is that now is the time for Mississippi to retire its current flag and adopt a flag that unifies all Mississippians,” his statement read.

Meanwhile, the coaches’ planned attendance at the capital rally comes as the SEC threatened to withhold championship events from the Magnolia State if its flag is not changed. Last week, the NCAA Board of Governors changed its rules to prohibit championship games in states where a Confederate symbol has a prominent presence.

“It is past time for change to be made to the Flag of the State of Mississippi,” SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey wrote in a statement. “Our students deserve an opportunity to learn and compete in environments that are inclusive and welcoming to all. In the event there is no change, there will be consideration of precluding Southeastern Conference championship events from being conducted in the State of Mississippi until the state flag is changed.”

Earlier this week, the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest Christian group in the state, reiterated its opposition to the flag, and Walmart announced it would not fly it over its 85 Mississippi locations.

The flag has simmered as a political issue in Mississippi for decades, but received new impetus in the wake of George Floyd’s death at the hands of a White Minneapolis police officer while in custody last month.

On Wednesday night, the MS Poor People’s Campaign announced “a clarion call for a weekly prayer vigil to start tonight and continue every Thursday until the flag comes down,” said Melissa Garriga, a spokeswoman for that and other coalitions working against the flag.