There’ll be no drama, but déjà vu, in the First
Congressional District, where Republican Rep. Steve Scalise will meet two retreads,
and win just as decisively as always. Second CD Democrat Rep. Cedric Richmond also drew a retread
and also several newcomers among them two Republicans challenging him for the
first time in eight years, but he’ll still win easily.
Third CD Republican Rep. Clay Higgins also doesn’t look to encounter
much trouble. Democrats didn’t want to let the outspoken disruptor go without more
than token opposition so enter pastor and nonprofit manager Braylon Harris, who has a slick web
presence but little in the way of resources. Still, if any congressional incumbent
gets held below 60 percent, it likely would be in this race given Higgins’
bombastic style that might turn off some voters and the presence of two other
minor candidates in the contest.
In CD 4, Republican Rep. Mike Johnson has drawn two
unknowns and a retread, Democrat true believer Ryan Trundle, who’s all in on marijuana
legalization and refuses to take political action committee money. You can see
where this one will go.
CD 5 will have the only real action in the state,
to replace outgoing GOP Rep. Ralph Abraham. Nine
candidates have hit the barricades, but by the campaign fundraising numbers only
three Republicans have a chance for the inevitable runoff – which will not
feature a Democrat as four such minor candidates will split that vote – state
Rep. Lance Harris, Abraham former chief of
staff Luke Letlow, and Ouachita Parish
Police Juror Scotty Robinson.
Harris has the best name recognition, not the
least of which comes from having served as the GOP leader in the House, although
in the smaller part of the district around Alexandria, plus some ability to fund
himself. Letlow has connections through Abraham and in constituent service which
have garnered already over
half a million dollars, and he ran Abraham’s first successful campaign. This
makes them likely the runoff candidates, with anybody’s guess as to who wins.
Things revert back to form in District 6. There, Republican
Rep. Garret Graves will face a
Libertarian, Democrat, and no party challenger. Democrat Dartanyon Williams
will make a go of it, on the heels of a self-published
memoir that tells how he reformed himself from an identity thief who stole
millions (although at the time it came out he said he would run for the Senate,
not the House). He would have needed every penny of his ill-gotten gains to be
competitive against Graves.
Finally, while Louisiana’s left would love to hope
Democrat Shreveport Mayor Adrian Perkins has a chance against incumbent
Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy (listen to
some of the swooning here,
starting about 30 minutes in), any such defeat would require bizarre circumstances.
Democrats have long tried a strategy of running military veterans for Congress
to obscure their ideology painting America as an institutionally racist, sexist,
and classist society and reflected in governance, with
mixed results. That veteran Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards squeezed
his way to two terms merely encouraged the delusion among Louisiana Democrats that
military service displaces issue preferences in the minds of a sufficient mass
of voters.
But with the many
mistakes Perkins has made in his short time in office, he’s just too flawed
of a candidate to fool enough of the state’s center-right electorate – and
another slipup may emerge in the light of day to compound that. As Perkins
basked in the glory of announcing his Senate run last week, Shreveport Auditor
Leanis Steward – who busted Perkins earlier this year on misusing
his car allowance and last year on his actions that underinsured
the city at a dramatically higher cost – indicated
she sought any existing police records on traffic stops of Perkins that rumor
has he should have been run in for by reason of impaired driving.
All of this will put a light lid on his electoral
ceiling. Cassidy actually may end up below 55 percent when all the counting
ends, but that won’t be as a consequence of Perkins but from having 14
challengers (a few being perennial candidates including Democrat Derrick Edwards, who rode an absence
of opposition and everything going possibly right to pull 44 percent of the
vote in the treasurer special election of 2017, and now so predictably runs for
everything in sight that he has a
toll-free number for his campaign). Even though Perkins won’t go much past 40 points
if even reaching that, at least Democrats will make Cassidy break a sweat to
earn his next six years in office.
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