They face different challenges in the election next month to replace the vacated seat. For Democrats, they not only don’t have a horse in the race, but solely Republicans entered the starting gate. For Republicans, they must figure out how to choose among the three.
Lining up are former state Rep. Damon Baldone, orthopedic surgeon Dr. Craig Greene, and former state Rep. Lenar Whitney. Each has different charms and warts depending upon the partisan leanings of a voter.
Baldone served three full terms, as a Democrat. In 2015, he wanted to slide back into the House in a neighboring district, but could not run the way he desired, as both a Democrat and Republican. State law requires picking only one recognized label, a designation as “other,” or no label.
Making matters more interesting, around the same time a hacking that revealed this his name turned up on a website catering to married people wishing to have affairs; although single, he claimed ignorance of that. And a couple of years before, the Louisiana Supreme Court disciplined him for failing to supervise his employees that permitted their charging his clients improperly. However, as the interim commissioner, Baldone could tout his limited experience in the role as a reason for him to continue as a counterweight to his colorful recent past.
Even though he alleges he always harbored conservative views (something his voting record according to the Louisiana Legislature Log’s voting scorecard does not support), his long association with the party may attract Democrats. Conversely, that should discourage Republicans.
Greene never has held public office, although his father Tom Greene served in the state Senate and ran for governor in 1999 by proclaiming himself more conservative than incumbent GOP Gov. Mike Foster. He also enunciates conservative credentials at the drop of a hat.
But the mark of the father also has competition from the mark of the current governor. Greene supported Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards in the 2015 gubernatorial runoff over Republican former Sen. David Vitter, apparently over concerns about character, backing him with $1,000. Edwards reciprocated by reappointing Greene to a state board.
That marked the first donation Greene had made to a Democrat, and he gave more to other Republicans in that and other contests. While Republican voters could view this gift as a deviation, that makes it difficult to reconcile with Greene’s claimed conservatism: he had to know of liberal Edwards’ record in the Legislature and that the new governor would try to expand vastly state spending and increase taxes, yet did not go with Vitter, the antithesis of those preferences and aligned with those allegedly Greene’s, or at least refrain from supporting so vigorously Edwards.
For that reason, conservative Republicans should view Greene’s candidacy with skepticism. At the same time, liberal Democrats may want to take a chance on him.
Whitney poses the least ambiguity for partisans. She voted as conservatively as they come while in the Legislature. In the 2012-15 time span, her Louisiana Legislature Log voting score was over 91, the highest (higher scores meaning more conservative/reform-oriented) of any legislator. She succeeded Baldone, whose score from 2004-11 averaged just above 40, with his scores above 50 coming in the last couple of years in office. Plus, she has served in numerous state party positions, most recently as a committee member of the Republican National Committee.
Thus, if using ideology on a host of issues much broader than the portfolio of PSC member, conservatives definitely should prefer Whitney. For the same reason, liberals should shun her.
Which points to the direction this election could head. Whitney would do best among strong Republicans, probably enough to get her in the runoff. But whoever can make it there with her probably would become the eventual victor, as that guy could do better in the political center and on the left in a district that breaks down about three-eighths Republican, there-eighths Democrat, and one-quarter no party/other.
Whether the male candidates make explicit pitches to Democrats, despite their rhetoric about conservatism, may make the difference between one of them winning or Whitney triumphing.
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