So, here we go. Republican Rep. Julia Letlow has entered the Senate race, and that entrance reverberates throughout Louisiana’s political environment putting her, for the moment, in the catbird seat.
She can be quite competitive. One lingering question has been whether jumping in nearing the qualification deadline over a year after the first serious challenger to incumbent GOP Sen. Bill Cassidy did would affect her ability to raise resources. With a little over $2 million in hand, as substantial as that might be with the Cassidy account at almost eight figures and several million more in political action committee funds, plus with other challengers having at least as much as she (plus a lead of months to build up name recognition statewide), she’ll need likely as much again and within the next four months.
That’s not insurmountable. As she received Republican Pres. Donald Trump’s effusive and explicit endorsement, that should open the taps to national donors in case those in state have fatigue. And it should poke off the sidelines those more comfortable with a Washington insider but who frowned upon Cassidy’s last five years in office.
It’s important to understand conservatives’ disenchantment with Cassidy, which seems to flummox some of his supporters who simplify erroneously opposition to him emanating solely from his vote to convict Trump in 2021. It’s much more than that.
After he won reelection in 2020, at first Cassidy didn’t think much of a Trump impeachment. In essence, he actually voted against that in January, 2021, before voting for it in February when on the earlier vote he sided with senators who wanted to dismiss the whole thing on the grounds of unconstitutionality. But within a month, he flip-flopped and voted for conviction even though Trump already had left office, and for poorly-sourced and reasoned articles of impeachment at that.
At best, this showed poor judgment that would lead people to believe he wasn’t up to effective representation in the Senate; at worst, it revealed a craven political opportunist who decided when it became certain that for the time being Trump was down to kick him to score political points. He then compounded his erraticism by siding with Democrat-backed bills over the next couple of years that at best showed a willingness to surrender principles for a payoff in presumed goodies for citizens and special interests and at worst questioned whether his principles had a healthy dose of liberalism attached to them. Most craven of all, Cassidy spent last year trying to graft himself onto Trump.
As it is, Cassidy has a history of melding to whoever is in charge. During Trump’s first term, Cassidy – who graded out at 62 lifetime – during the two Congresses involved from Heritage Action (with 100 being a maximal conservative on votes) scored 63 and 83. But when Trump lost reelection and looked to be on the ropes before staging his comeback while Republicans fell into a Senate minority, Cassidy dropped to 72 and then plunged to 46.
If you want a principled conservative in the current race by which to compare, try GOP Treas. John Fleming, the only one of the major candidates with congressional service, who in his eight years there came out with a lifetime 84 score (about 20 above the House average where he served, while Cassidy’s lifetime score is about equal to the Senate average). Even Letlow did better by this rating, with the last Congress pegging her at 62 and a lifetime 75 score.
So, if you are a less conservative Republican, Letlow gives you more moderation than the rest of the field without anti-Trump baggage hung around her neck. This is why while the other quality, more conservative candidates in the race take some votes from Cassidy but shuffle more among themselves, Letlow will acquire the majority of her votes from Cassidy. This means his danger of getting booted from the inevitable semi-closed primary election runoff has increased substantially.
At the same time, the risk also has increased that this will become a Cassidy-Letlow runoff. So many quality conservatives divvy up that vote to the point that they could dilute themselves enough to allow the runoff to feature only the moderate lane. But were one of the four, and certainly two, drop out prior to qualifying, Cassidy would be in real trouble of failing to make the runoff. Probably the least likely to go would be Fleming, because he has real staying power with his ability to self-finance his campaign (which is important because while in the primary Letlow may train her fire mainly on Cassidy, if she makes it into the runoff with a solid conservative she then picks up Cassidy’s donors and would have plenty of dough to aim at the opponent), but if, say, he were the solid conservative to make it to a runoff with Letlow, whereas he would be favored against a damaged Cassidy, an undamaged Letlow probably has the edge over him, or any other solid conservative in a runoff situation.
Letlow’s entrance also almost certainly closes the door on a farfetched, but perhaps pursued out of desperation, scenario: Cassidy runs as an independent or even as a Democrat. Even if he basically heads straight to the fall election, even more Republicans alienated by the switch would have a safe harbor candidate to head to with Letlow as a possible choice, who would be the favorite in the current field without Cassidy in it.
The key here is that Letlow without baggage becomes a strong candidate as a moderate with Trump’s endorsement, which the moderate and encumbered Cassidy didn’t get nor did the solid conservatives, and the fusionist candidacy she presents makes her the most likely (even if less than even money) as the field stands at present to emerge from a GOP primary process.
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