Saturday, Democrats elected their first governor in the Deep South in eight years, as Louisiana state legislator John Bel Edwards defeated GOP US senator David Vitter. He was unabashedly pro-gun and anti-abortion, and he emphasized that he’s a graduate of West Point who had served in Iraq as an Army Ranger. This was a case where the GOP went to war with each other and the Democrats ended up winning (even if Jack Bel Edwards seems pretty conservative).
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In a reference to Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal, who has been criticized for focusing on his presidential campaign at the expense of Louisiana, Edwards said the people of a state that is “embarrassed by the vanity and unrestrained ambitions of its leadership” have chosen to pursue a better future.
The victory followed three years of work rebuilding Louisiana’s Democratic Party and dissatisfaction with Jindal, said Karen Carter Peterson, state Democratic Party chairwoman and a state Senate leader.
Would his lopsided loss Saturday to a little-known Democratic state representative – John Bel Edwards, of Amite – after a campaign that focused on his character flaws have made Vitter unelectable?
Edwards has pointed to Vitter’s scandal as proof that he is untrustworthy to Louisiana voters.
Mr. Edwards said in debates, speeches and ads that he would be faithful to his state and to his wife.
But the race shifted dramatically in recent months as Vitter clashed with other Republican candidates and Edwards cast him as no different than Jindal in a state that is struggling economically.
Edwards – about as conservative as Democrats come – racked up 56% of the vote compared to Vitter’s 43%.
Vitter’s emphasis on Syrian refugees not only failed to propel him to victory, it didn’t allow him to unite Republicans.
“A Republican ought to win automatically”, Charlie Cook, a Louisiana native and author of the Cook Political Report in Washington, D.C., told the New Orleans Times-Picayune.
The outcome of the election, however, may have turned more on Vitter’s weaknesses than Edwards’ appeal.
Each runoff contender sought to tie his opponent to an unpopular figure in Louisiana: Edwards claimed Vitter would represent a “Jindal third term”, while Vitter tagged Edwards as an “Obama liberal”.
“I think people have had enough of politics for awhile”, Kennedy said.
DAVID VITTER: But I’m only going to be doing that for one more year, through this term. He angered Vitter when he refused to endorse the Senate against Edwards in the runoff election. Would Democrats, normally facing long odds in a statewide election, see a chance for a repeat of the perfect-storm governor-race scenario, in which a consensus Democratic candidate matches up against a battered, vulnerable Vitter, who squeezes by Republican challenges to make the runoff?
New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu also declined to rule out a run for Senate when asked by a reporter recently.
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And when Vitter entered the race in January 2014 as the frontrunner, he was pulling in tremendous sums of campaign cash and firing up a dominant political machine that he’s used to get himself and his allies regularly elected to Louisiana offices.
