An anemic voter turnout and a “historic failure” of the state’s Democratic Party apparatus allowed Republican Jeff Landry to defy the polls and win Saturday’s governor’s race without the need for a runoff, a political analyst said.
“The Louisiana Democratic Party is no longer a legitimate opposition party,” Robert Collins, professor of Urban Studies and Public Policy at Dillard University, told the Louisiana Record. “... It needs to be burned down and basically rebuilt from scratch.”
Landry, the state’s attorney general, garnered 52% of the statewide vote, according to the secretary of state’s unofficial tally, despite being listed on the ballot with 14 other candidates. Democrat Shawn Wilson, a former secretary of the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development, won only 26% of the vote.
“I was as surprised as anybody else that we didn’t have a runoff,” Collins said, adding that the pollsters and political scientists he has worked with projected there would be a runoff between Landry and Wilson.
No one expected the state’s turnout to dip down to about 36%, he added. In the governor’s race, 35.8% turned out statewide, with less than 35% casting ballots for some down-the-ballot races and issues, according to the Secretary of State’s Office.
“With turnout rates that low, the Black vote is always going to be disproportionately low,” Collins said, noting that turnout in the Democratic stronghold of Orleans Parish had sunk to 27% in the election.
This led to a “perfect storm” helping Landry to garner a majority of the vote in the primary election, he said. Landry already had strong name recognition and the largest campaign war chest of all of the candidates.
“Landry really kind of coasted that final week because his own internal poll numbers said there would be a runoff,” Collins said.
Republican Stephen Waguespack, the former president and CEO of the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry, came in a distant second with just under 6%. Waguespack brought up the issue of excessive civil litigation in Louisiana and Landry’s financial support from trial attorneys.
Rep. Richard Nelson (R-Mandeville) dropped out of the governor’s race in September and endorsed Landry, but he polled only about 1% of the vote and likely didn’t move the needle much for Landry, according to Collins.
The outgoing governor, Democrat John Bel Edwards, congratulated Landry for running a campaign that sought to unite Louisiana residents and offer ways to deal with “kitchen-table issues.”
“A smooth transition of power following an election is a core tenet of American democracy,” Edwards said. “My staff and I will ensure the incoming administration has every opportunity to be ready on day one.”
In the secretary of state election, incumbent Kyle Ardoin did not run for reelection. On Saturday, the unofficial results show Democrat “Gwen” Collins-Greenup, an attorney and law firm owner, and Republican Nancy Landry, the current first assistant secretary of state and a former state lawmaker, both advancing to the November general election.
They outpaced candidate Clay Schexnayder, the Republican speaker of the state House of Representatives, who garnered only 15% of the vote.
“Statewide, people don’t know who Schexnayder is,” Collins said. “Only political junkies know that.”