One of the most consequential bills of the Louisiana Legislature’s 2025 regular session – especially for reformers and Republicans – that has received no media attention now awaits the pen of Republican Gov. Jeff Landry to sign it into law.
HB 625 by GOP state Rep. Rhonda Butler would expand the municipal/party primary election date on Apr. 18, 2026 to include constitutional amendments. Otherwise, those amendments would be next eligible for ratification in 2026 on Nov. 3.
As of this writing, over half a dozen potential constitutional amendments remain realistically alive for supermajority approval in each chamber. While some would go to the voters on Nov. 3, three significant ones favored by Republicans and generally opposed by Democrats were amended to appear on the earlier Apr. 18 date – and in each case by doing so, raise their chances of passage.
Only months ago, the GOP received a rude reminder of why election dates matter. With that supermajority having sent four measures to the polls in the spring – the last time this time of the year had been tapped for amendment approval since 1989 – all went down to defeat, including a sweeping fiscal reform measure in scope not seen since another knocked down over three decades ago. Especially with that one, Democrats had demagogued against it.
And it worked because in recent years high-stimulus elections have disproportionately drawn Republican support. In many parts of the state with little or nothing else on the ballot, turnout on Mar. 29 was much lower than typical for ballots with statewide contests additionally on them.
Nov. 3 would guarantee a higher stimulus to aid Republican causes, in particular the three measures. Two would implement parts of the reform defeated this spring – HB 366 by Republican state Rep. Daryl Deshotel and HB 473 by Republican state Rep. Julie Emerson – while the third, SB 8 by GOP state Sen. Jay Morris, would give the Legislature statutory authority to add unclassified civil service positions to the state workforce.
But Apr. 18, 2026 would provide an even greater boost, for two reasons. First, this will be the initial primary contest for congressional offices, headlined by an ultra-competitive GOP Senate nomination focused on whether Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy can fend off a conservative challenge that will drive Republican turnout sky high. Meanwhile, turnout for Democrats in that party primary without such a barn-burner should be significantly lower. By Nov. 3, there should be more equality in partisan turnout that comparatively speaking would increase the chances of the measures’ defeats.
Second, likely before the end of this month the U.S. Supreme Court will rule the state’s present congressional map unconstitutional. In its place very well could rise one where there will be a single majority-minority race district and another “opportunity” district that will have a white voter plurality, meaning that without superior GOP voter turnout Democrats could win that one. If so, for that district in the primary phase both parties will concentrate on playing down competition to steer the nomination towards preferred candidates they think best able to win the general election in this environment, dampening turnout on Apr. 18. It then would be the Nov. 3 election marked by intense getting out the vote that could drive Democrat turnout as high as Republican in that district, working relatively against passage of the trio of items compared to the spring date and having outsized influence on the statewide vote since all other House contests should be perfunctory and have significantly lower turnouts.
It is no accident with the amendments the political left has actively campaigned against that the supermajority Republicans have slotted these to the earlier election date. Landry’s signature on HB 625 will give any that make it onto the ballot (all three are on the doorstep of doing so, procedurally speaking at this time) improved chances of putting GOP agenda items in to the Constitution.
No comments:
Post a Comment