Excuse Republican Treas. John Fleming if he wants to party like it’s 2008, because to date there is considerable congruence between the election that introduced him to Congress the next year and the one that could propel him to the Senate in 2027.
In the most recent poll fewer than three months out from the GOP primary election, Fleming held a lead of nearly ten points on his closest rival Republican Rep. Julia Letlow, who was up a few points on GOP incumbent Sen. Bill Cassidy. Letlow’s and Cassidy’s numbers tracked similarly to those of a poll released a few days earlier, while Fleming had expanded his share by several points.
Cassidy’s campaign dynamics are such that he really only can make a runoff by attacking and flipping votes from Letlow, which eventually may not be enough to succeed yet will detach voters from her that don’t want Cassidy, mainly for a series of poor decisions, and therefore will settle on Fleming, who at this juncture with certainty would defeat Cassidy in a runoff and probably win over Letlow if, benefitting from the endorsements of Republican Pres. Donald Trump and GOP Gov. Jeff Landry, she hangs on despite an effective ethics attack deployed by Cassidy surrogates. The reason this is a realistic, if not the most likely, scenario is because Fleming has gone through this before and come out on top.
Fleming, whose only elective office prior to 2008 had been a term as coroner of Webster Parish, was a rank outsider when he first ran. He would have had a difficult time winning the primary (reinstituted after an absence of over three decades) had either of a pair of prominent GOP candidates, Caddo Sheriff Steve Prator or state Rep. Mike Powell, decided to take the plunge.
They declined, and the field at first lined up with Fleming and added another. The later addition, then-state Rep. Jeff Thompson, came with the backing of activists and officials in the district’s second parish in population (and Republicans), Bossier as well as with outgoing GOP Rep. Jim McCrery, who wanted an insider. That’s because they didn’t think much of the first insider to get it, from Caddo the largest in population (also in GOP voters), Chris Gorman, who, unlike Thompson, built his insider credentials through big donations to big-name candidates, such as in the previous year to victorious gubernatorial candidate Republican Bobby Jindal.
Gorman made up for his lack of positive name recognition by spending all outdoors, loaning himself nearly $1.8 million, and he lapped the field in spending throughout the primary, which leveraged him into the runoff. Fleming loaned himself $1 million and also made it. Thompson loaned himself much less spent much less, ending up as a near-miss.
Despite being outspent, Fleming won the runoff because he left no doubt about his full-spectrum conservatism while GOP voters had reservations about Gorman, who seldom rose above mouthing broad platitudes, had been in the state fewer than five years, made questionable statements about his background, and who for years hadn’t even been registered as a Republican. Fleming’s reward? Facing Democrat Caddo Parish District Attorney Paul Carmouche in the general election.
The DA for three decades, Carmouche had plenty of campaign dough and activist resources upon which to draw – but these were dwindling as white voters in particular were abandoning the party, which showed when he was forced into a primary runoff with a black political unknown. He won that, but then, despite outspending Fleming with huge dollars rolling in from Democrat activists and groups (many out of state), black voters disproportionately stayed home for the general election, handing Fleming a narrow win and what would turn out to be four terms in Congress.
Now in 2026, there is big state and outside money backing, with organizations to match, Letlow and Cassidy. The latter is spending enormously to try to reverse an image unflattering to many Republican voters and to prevent Letlow’s smaller but considerable resources from avoiding his shaping her image as unflattering. It keeps both from burnishing their conservative credentials to match Fleming’s who again finds himself as the demonstrably conservative outsider and reaping the rewards. Which may in 2026, as it did in 2008, propel him to victory.
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