My Advocate column will return next week. In its place comes instant
analysis of tonight’s state election results, followed by some more in-depth focus in this
space in the upcoming week.
As expected, in the governor’s race
Democrat state Rep. John Bel
Edwards got around 40 percent. While this is better than any other
statewide Democrat, it’s just on the cusp of his ability to win in the runoff.
He would have to bag a quarter of the vote for the Republican candidates Public
Service Commissioner Scott Angelle and Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne against Republican
Sen. David Vitter, who underperformed
slightly at 23 percent, which is a tall ask but not impossible. Also not
working in his favor is that his supporters almost certainly are less likely to
vote in the runoff than those who did not vote for him.
The race could go two ways here. If
Angelle and Dardenne really feel concerned about policy preferences pursued
over the next four years, they don’t have to endorse Vitter but at least not
work actively against him, and Vitter will win the runoff by single digits. But
if they are really bitter at Vitter, it could be 1979 all over again when
vanquished Democrats crossed party lines and cooperated with Republican Dave
Treen to give him a narrow victory over Democrat Louis Lambert (another
parallel here is that Democrat then-Gov. Edwin
Edwards did not aid Lambert in the runoff; Republican Gov. Bobby
Jindal will not help Vitter, nor would Vitter accept it if offered, for
that matter). Only with a repeat of 1979 dynamics does Edwards have a chance.
Republicans wiped out their
Democrat opponents in all of the other statewide contests. Secretary of State Tom Schedler,
Treasurer John
Kennedy, Insurance Commissioner Jim Donelon, and
Agriculture Commissioner Mike Strain all won
handily. Democrat Baton Rouge Mayor-President Kip Holden barely finished first for
lieutenant governor but right behind him was former Republican Plaquemines Parish
Pres. Billy Nungesser, barely
holding off Republican Jefferson Parish Pres. John Young. Nungesser therefore
likely will win the runoff handily.
And two Republicans advance to the
runoff for Attorney General, the incumbent Buddy Caldwell and challenger former
Rep. Jeff Landry. With
Caldwell narrowly leading, he
did what he had to do, make it to a runoff. Conservative Landry is not
likely to pick up much of the vote from the other vanquished candidates, as two
Democrats collected nearly 30 percent, so Caldwell becomes the favorite to win
the runoff.
With the Board of Elementary and
Secondary Education contests not having partisanship very relevant but instead
views on reform and the Common Core States Standards Initiative, the results so
far indicate pro-reform, pro-Common Core sentiments will continue to command a
majority. The two biggest reform critics, Lottie Beebe and Carolyn Hill, were
swept out, and they also opposed Common Core. Further, incumbents and part of
the existing majority James Garvey, Kira Orange Jones, and Holly Boffy won
reelection, joined by newcomer Gary Jones, who won an open seat, whose
sympathies appear to lie with them. With victorious challengers Sandy Holloway
and Jada Lewis, these six will control the 11-member BESE (three are appointed
by the incoming governor).
That might be all they get. Appointed
incumbent Mary Harris will face
off against Tony Davis in District
4, but the other candidate in that race had leanings much closer to Harris’
anti-Common Core and lukewarm reform views, so she is favored to win this. In
District 6, reactionary and anti-Common Core Kathy Edmonston almost won outright, so
her reformer, pro-Common Core opponent Jason
Engen has an almost impossible task of triumphing in the runoff, especially
as over 15 percent of the vote went to candidates echoing Edmonston.
Finally, the Legislature looks
headed to a status quo ante. In the
Senate, only two partisan contests are headed to a runoff, and in both
Republicans are favored two win, leaving the GOP with its same total of 26
seats as each party looks to have flipped a seat. In the House, the GOP has
picked up two seats, with in the runoff phase an outside chance of getting another
but perhaps losing another, making their most likely total for the next term
starting at 60. Only three House incumbents, state Reps. Stephen Ortego, Ebony
Woodruff, and Nick Lorusso, lost outright, and five others got pushed into runoffs;
no incumbent senator lost or has to go to a runoff.
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