In Louisiana politics this year, perhaps the only thing more inevitable than a Republican Jeff Landry gubernatorial victory was the Louisiana Supreme Court denying an appeal of lower courts’ decisions rerunning the Caddo Parish sheriff’s contest. By contrast, successfully picking a winner in the Mar. 23 faceoff is very much evitable, an exercise that will be determined more by forces outside of the contest than the campaigning and dynamics within the parish.
After the Nov. 18 runoff, Democrat former Shreveport police chief and chief administrative officer Henry Whitehorn led Republican former city councilor John Nickelson by a single vote. However, a district court found enough irregularities under law to order another election, and the Second Circuit agreed. This week, the Louisiana Supreme Court ratified that with its action.
Given the undisputable proof and wording of Louisiana law, as was the case with the appellate court. the only real question was whether the non-Republicans on the Court would try to bring the matter to a potential reversal. Once again, they tried. Democrat Assoc. Justice Piper Griffin voted to hear and in a dissent essentially repeated the same objections made by the dissenters at the appellate level: elections with illegal ballots have these sanitized into legal ones if the unrealistic laws in place to challenge these can’t be followed. No party Chief Justice John Weimer provided a further rationale in his for empowering tainted election results and dispensing with common sense by saying procedures to overturn certified election results should be onerous, if not unworkable, such was the sanctity of the process compared to the desirability of judicial intervention.
Arguments which Republican Assoc. Justice James Genovese easily slew in his concurring opinion:
In a two-candidate race, the mere fact that one candidate ends up with one or more votes than his opponent, without regard or consideration given to proven fraud and unqualified voters casting ballots, does not equate to a just and fair election under our law and jurisprudence. A just and fair election can only be had when one candidate wins by a majority vote of qualified electors ….
… this election was not a free and fair election. A one-vote margin of victory supported by clearly established eleven unqualified voters cannot be said to constitute a fair election.
What is fair and essential to the candidates and the electorate, and to preserve election integrity, is to have a new runoff election with a winner decided by qualified voters.
As clear-cut as the case for a new election was, who will win is anything but. The date is significant in that it will coincide with the state’s presidential preference primaries, which for both parties will come later rather than sooner in the national delegate-collection process.
This means the most likely outcome of that process would be both nominees – almost certainly Democrat Pres. Joe Biden and Republican former Pres. Donald Trump – mathematically will have been decided by then, leaving little on the ballot to generate enthusiasm for the mass public and lowering turnout for all partisans. The next most likely scenario is that Biden has things wrapped up, but that Trump still hasn’t sealed the deal although it may be only a matter of time. Less likely still is neither has unassailable leads, and the least of all that Trump has secured the nomination but Biden hasn’t.
Reviewing the general and runoff elections this fall, Nickelson did better the higher the turnout. Reviewing those turnout figures with past Louisiana presidential preference primary turnouts under the varying competitive environments, this means if the GOP’s nomination remains in doubt, he will have the edge; otherwise, Whitehorn likely does, all things equal.
Money initially seems to be. Nickelson plunked down $565,000 throughout but held only $16,000 at year’s end. Whitehorn spent only $140,000 and raised nothing after the general election, but has $50,000 banked. Nickelson likely can outraise Whitehorn, but the latter seems to be able to gather enough to offset the former’s advantage.
Yet Whitehorn has a better rallying cry to mobilize partisans, regardless of exogenous turnout factors or money. Look for his campaign to trot out some version of he was robbed of a win, coupled with the race card played in some diluted version that stands the best chance of mobilizing his largely black voting base. Note that as soon as the news of the Court’s declination came out, he began going very negatively against Nickelson and his supposedly favored treatment by the courts, and earlier he alleged, using a racial dog whistle, that prospective voters in the runoff supporting him needed to vote “Because Your Life May Depend Upon It.”
It may well work. Excepting that one scenario where the GOP presidential nomination remains somewhat competitive, the turnout cards are held by Whitehorn. Nickleson will have to come up with an excellent strategy to outplay those.