2023 Louisiana Gubernatorial Election: An Autopsy

Topic: Elections

I’ve been asked repeatedly for my thoughts on Saturday’s Louisiana gubernatorial election, which saw Jeff Landry seize the needed majority to lay claim to his role as the state’s chief executive.  Remember, ladies and gentlemen – politics is a local thing, and no races except for previous presidential elections should be used to make hardline predictions about a forthcoming election (or quasi-election, in these pages) to elect (or select)someone to the most powerful office in the world (at least for now).

I posted the following blurb on social media yesterday as I was taking off from Orlando to Phoenix:

What the media isn’t quite telling you - in flipping the Louisiana governor’s mansion away from the Dems, there were actually 8 GOP candidates in the race, and 2 Dems.

The Republican candidates had 64.5% of the vote together, the Dems 28.5%, for a 36 point margin. Landry won with a narrow majority.

In the last race’s first round (2019), the three GOP candidates split the vote and wound up with a 51.9% to 47.4% edge over the two Dems, including the incumbent governor who went on to win the runoff narrowly.

While off-cycle elections are not necessarily indicative of presidential sentiment, that’s a 31.5% swing toward GOP gubernatorial candidates in four years in a working class state with tons of blue dogs, and that also tells me there’s a major shift in the black vote underway (and southern black vote is the most loyal to Dems regionally).

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Three working class states have long voted for GOP presidential nominees by large margins while still sitting on huge Democrat registration advantages (Oklahoma fits into this technicality as well but hasn’t voted for a Democrat presidential nominee since 1964).  They are West Virginia, Kentucky, and Louisiana, which all voted for Bill Clinton twice.  Notably, West Virginia and Kentucky, just like Florida, have flipped to a Republican voter registration advantage for the first time in modern history following the national disaster sometimes referred to as the “2020 presidential election.”  Louisiana is well on the way, with Democrats clinging to a lead of just over 146,000 registrations and falling.  These registration trends alone signal the reddening of these states in any given election, but 2024 has the potential to be a special combination of factors in which many Democrats abandon ship from the sinking establishment vessel.

Disclaimer: Louisiana is a weird place.  LSU wears white jerseys at home, the counties are called parishes, and even the most ardent gun-toting survivalists are often registered as Democrats from as far back as fifty years ago.

Let’s have a look at what the data show in all six gubernatorial races this millennium.  Louisiana gubernatorial races take place in what is called a jungle primary – in which candidates of all parties are on the same ticket, and if none reach 50 percent, the top two (regardless of party) advance to a run-off.

2003

Jungle Primary – all candidates

Republican 535,973 (39.3%)

Democrat 810,478 (59.5%)
Other 16,073 (1.2%)

Total votes (all candidates) 1,362,524

Ultimate Winner – Kathleen Blanco (Democrat) in run-off, 52.0% to 48.1% over Bobby Jindal, a future Louisiana governor.

2007

Jungle Primary – all candidates

Republican 699,672 (53.9%) – outright winner, Bobby Jindal

Democrat 397,369 (30.6%)
Other 200,902 (14.4%) – large share by independent candidate John Georges

Total votes (all candidates) 1,297,943

2011

Jungle Primary – all candidates

Republican 673,239 (65.8%) – incumbent Jindal re-elected, wins every parish, including Orleans

Democrat 288,161 (28.2%)

Other 61,763 (6.0%)

Total votes (all candidates) 1,023,163

2015

Jungle Primary – all candidates

Republican 637,938 (57.3%)

Democrat 463,700 (41.6%)

Other 12,698 (1.1%)

Total votes (all candidates) 1,114,336

Ultimate Winner – John Bel Edwards (Democrat) in run-off, with his serious gratitude owed to Republicans David Vitter, Scott Angelle, and Jay Dardenne for each taking at least 15% of the vote and still having a Democrat win the run-off even though Republican candidates took over 57% in the first round collectively.  This is called a lesson on party unity.

2019

Jungle Primary – all candidates

Republican 696,434 (51.8%)

Democrat 636,963 (47.4%)

Other 10,084 (0.8%)

Total votes (all candidates) 1,343,481

Ultimate Winner – Edwards reelected in run-off, defeating Eddie Rispone, once again the victim of party discord that squandered a majority in the first round.  Turnout exploded to 1,508,784 for the run-off, with Edwards winning over Rispone by 2.7%.

I believe widespread election manipulation began in 2018, and suspect that could have been in play here, although the total vote count in the jungle primary lags 2003’s, because I’m looking at the total turnout in…

2023 adjusted to reflect on the spot changes to uncertified totals

Jungle primary – all candidates

Republican 696,161 (65.5%) – Jeff Landry wins with outright majority (51.6%)

Democrat 303,190 (28.5%)

Other 63,148 (5.9%)

Total votes (all candidates) 1,062,499

Conclusion

My brief assessment of the past six gubernatorial contests in Louisiana leads me to the following conclusions:

1)    The Democrat Party is in Dire Straits

Yes, turnout was down as a percentage for both parties, but Republicans nearly matched their 2019 first-round total to the exact number.  Democrats, on the other hand, lost over 333,000 votes from Edwards’s total vote pile in that same first round four years ago.  Either that means the 2019 election was ripped off by the typical methods in a deep-red Trump state, or the Democrat coalition is on the brink of collapse.  I lean toward the latter after reviewing the results from the two largest Democrat voting parishes, Orleans (metro New Orleans) and East Baton Rouge (metro Baton Rouge):

Democrat Votes

Orleans Parish

2019 Jungle Primary

87,734

2023 Jungle Primary

52,484

Democrat Votes

East Baton Rouge Parish

2019 Jungle Primary

85,286

2023 Jungle Primary

45,078

            What!?  Democrats are down 40% in New Orleans, and 47% in Baton Rouge in one election cycle for total votes?  In examining the Republican column, the GOP was also down in East Baton Rouge Parish, by 688 votes total (from 50,460 in 2019 to 49,762 in 2023).

            Ready for something amazing?

            Republican candidates went from 10,786 votes in Orleans Parish to 15,737 in 2023, for an increase of nearly 46% in total votes.

            Orleans Parish is 53.6% black, and nearly 70% non-white.  If this is not an outlier, but rather indicative of a trend, there is good reason for Democrats to cry “doom.”  Similar voting populations (Orleans parish went to Biden by more than a 68% margin in 2020) exist in Atlanta, Philadelphia, Milwaukee, Detroit, Charlotte, Raleigh, Chicago, Newark, and across many major metros critical to sustaining the perverse Democrat coalition.

2)    This Election Doesn’t Seem Manipulated

Total votes are down nearly 300,000 from the 2019 race, which (as I wrote above) either means there were far too many votes cast in 2019, or the Democrats are dying on the vine.  Either way, this race shows a major Republican surge and loss of Democrat participation in the inner cities post-Obama, as all reasonable forecasts foresaw for the 2020 quasi-election (because they were all present in 2014 and 2016).

3)    One for Optimism and One for Devil’s Advocate

On the side of optimism, this shows hope for the Republicans going forward, with a major uptick in urban and minority support coming at the expense of the inner-city Democrat coalition, and the firm grasp they hold over college counties (parishes in this case, for East Baton Rouge, home to LSU).  This trend, if reflected nationally, will doom the Democrats in states people never would imagine being in play.

Unfortunately, we all know those in power aren’t going to just give us back our country without a fight.  Donald Trump got behind Landry early, and finally, the old political science is back in play in an off-year election with a pissed-off opposing party from a red state wanting to take back the mansion.  Not enough has been done legislatively for election reform to prevent Democrats from taking note of this debacle and making plans to “turn out” the inner cities and their phantom voters in 2024.

Time will tell, but much can be gleaned from a quiet off-year election in a state the coastal elite could care less about.

Author’s Note: This article is intended to relay critical information about a recent event, and to fulfill my pledge to make relevant analysis for today’s issues available to all my subscribers.  I am reader supported and if you have the means, I would greatly appreciate your paid membership to this journal.  Thank you!