Tag Archives: New Orleans

Familiar Challenger in CA-41;
Special Election RI-1 Candidates Grow, Skepticism in WI-3 Race;
New Orleans Recall Effort Fails

By Jim Ellis — Friday, March 24, 2023

House

California Lake Elsinore City Councilman Tim Sheridan (D)

CA-41: Rep. Calvert Draws Familiar Challenger — Lake Elsinore City Councilman Tim Sheridan (D), who challenged Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Corona) twice in the pre-redistricting and much more Republican 42nd District, announced this week that he will return to again run for the House in 2024.

In November, Rep. Calvert survived his second closest re-election effort, a 52-48 percent win over former federal prosecutor Will Rollins (D) in the new 41st District that is fully contained within Riverside County. We could see action in the all-party jungle primary because Rollins is also considering waging a return re-match with the 16-term incumbent.

RI-1: Special Election Candidate Count Expands to Six — As we reported yesterday, the RI-1 special election will be scheduled when Rhode Island Rep. David Cicilline (D-Providence) resigns from the House on June 1. This week, another four individuals announced their special Democratic primary candidacies already bringing the field’s total number to six.

Those previously declaring are Lt. Gov. Sabina Matos (D) and state Sen. Sandra Cano (D-Pawtucket). The latest to enter are state Rep. Nathan Biah (D-Providence), corporate Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) consultant Nick Autiello, financial consultant Allen Waters, and bus driver Mickeda Barnes. Also as mentioned yesterday, the special election will effectively be decided in the Democratic primary from a seat that the FiveThirtyEight data organization rates as D+32.

WI-3: Potential Challenger Candidates Skeptical — The 3rd District of Wisconsin occupies the state’s southwestern region and while often voting Republican for president, the electorate returned Democratic Rep. Ron Kind (D-La Crosse) to office 13 consecutive times. Kind retired in 2022, and the Democratic leadership basically conceded the seat to Republican Derrick Van Orden in that the national party spent no money to protect a seat their member held for 26 consecutive years. In the end, Van Orden did win, but his victory margin fell far below predictions in defeating state Sen. Brad Pfaff (D-La Crosse) 52-48 percent.

It appears that Pfaff and two other former congressional candidates, La Crosse City Councilman Mark Neumann and small business owner Rebecca Cooke, are considering entering the 2024 congressional race. All, however, are saying they won’t run unless they are assured of national outside party support.

Mayor

New Orleans: Recall Effort Fails — The move to force a recall vote against Crescent City Mayor LaToya Cantrell (D) came to an abrupt end at the petition signature deadline. The recall organization fell woefully short of recruiting the 45,000 registered voter signatures necessary to force a confirmation election. The Cantrell opposition group was only able to qualify approximately 27,000 signatures, or just 60 percent of the required number. The next regular mayoral election is scheduled for 2025.

Hogan Won’t Run for President; RFK Jr. May Soon Announce; No Senate Run for Nevada’s Amodei; OR-6 Candidate Redux; New Orleans’ Mayoral Recall

By Jim Ellis — Monday, March 6, 2023

President

Former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R)

Gov. Larry Hogan: Won’t Run for President — Over the weekend, former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan said he would not join the Republican presidential field. Hogan explaining his decision said, “I have long said that I care more about ensuring a future for the Republican Party than securing my own future in the Republican Party.”

Hogan had previously expressed his analysis that a crowded Republican field would only help Donald Trump win renomination, something the former Free State governor wants to see avoided. He also indicated his belief that with Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis running far ahead of the lesser-known candidates, it doesn’t leave the lower tier contenders much of an opportunity to compete for the win.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. May Soon Announce Presidential Campaign — Robert F. Kennedy Jr., son of the late senator and attorney general, Robert F. Kennedy, is moving closer to announcing a presidential campaign. It appears he will run in the Democratic primary on an anti-vaccination platform. Kennedy became a national activist opposing mandatory vaccinations during the Covid shutdown.

It is possible that he could win the New Hampshire primary. President Biden may not enter the Granite State nomination contest if the NH leadership doesn’t recognize the new Democratic National Committee schedule that takes New Hampshire out of their traditional first-in-the-nation voting position. Therefore, it is quite possible that the primary race could come down to a contest between Kennedy and author Marianne Williamson, who formally announced her own candidacy on Saturday.

Senate

Nevada: Rep. Amodei Won’t Run for Senate — Nevada’s lone Republican Congressman, Rep. Mark Amodei (R-Carson City), said on Friday that he will not challenge Sen. Jacky Rosen (D) next year. The Nevada race should be one of the most competitive campaigns in the country, just as it was in 2022. In that election, Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D) slipped past GOP challenger Adam Laxalt by only a 7,928-vote margin (48.8 – 48.0 percent), which was the closest raw vote spread of all ‘22 Senate campaigns.

At this point, Republicans have no announced candidate, but that will soon change. Along with Montana, Ohio, and West Virginia, the Nevada race will eventually become one of the Republicans’ 2024 top-tier challenge races. Disabled Iraq War veteran and 2022 Senate candidate Sam Brown is considering running again. No one else has so far made a move to enter the Senate race including the state’s two down ballot constitutional officers, Lt. Gov. Stavros Anthony and state Controller Andy Matthews. Look for this race to become the top candidate recruitment target for the national Republican leadership.

House

OR-6: 2022 Candidate Will Try Again — Dundee Mayor David Russ (R) announced on Friday that he will return to again run for Congress in 2024. In the previous election, Russ placed sixth in a field of seven Republican candidates with only 3.8 percent of the vote, more than 30 percentage points behind the GOP nominee, Mike Erickson. Erickson would hold then-state Rep. Andrea Salinas (D-Tigard) to a 50-48 percent victory margin in the 6th District’s first ever congressional race. Due to population growth, Oregon was awarded a new seat in the 2020 national reapportionment formula.

The 6th will again yield a competitive race, but chances will likely prove that the Republicans’ best chance to win this district occurred in the last election. Rep. Salinas will begin as the favorite to hold the seat in the ’24 cycle.

Cities

New Orleans: Mayoral Recall Drive Changes — The signature petition drive to qualify a recall effort against New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell (D) is continuing toward a March 22 deadline. Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin has set 45,000 valid registered voter signatures as the number necessary to force a recall vote.

Mayor Cantrell was elected in 2017 and was easily re-elected in 2021. The NoLaToya campaign is centered upon the rising murder and crime rate in the city, along with a decline in local services. It remains to be seen if the committee can gather the necessary number of petition signatures in order to schedule a recall election.

LA-2 – Troy Carter Wins Special

By Jim Ellis

Louisiana state Sen. Troy Carter (D-New Orleans), the establishment candidate, defeated state Sen. Karen Carter Peterson (D-New Orleans) who the Justice Democrats supported, in the LA-2 special election Saturday. (Photo: Troy Carter Campaign)

April 27, 2021 — In a race pitting the Louisiana Democratic establishment opposite the national progressive left Justice Democrats’ movement, state Sen. Troy Carter (D-New Orleans), the establishment candidate, defeated state Sen. Karen Carter Peterson (D-New Orleans) who the Justice Democrats supported, to win the 2nd Congressional District special election on Saturday night.

The district, open because former Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-New Orleans) resigned from Congress to accept a position in the Biden White House, featured a double-Democratic runoff, meaning the party was guaranteed to hold the seat, but which faction ultimately would end up with the win was open to question.

In the end, the competitive and at times nasty campaign between the two state legislators culminated in a 55-45 percent win for Sen. Carter, a margin of 9,216 votes. The unofficial final turnout figure was 87,806, a little less than 6,800 voters under the original March 20th primary participation factor of 94,567. The figures translated into a vote drop-off percentage rate of 7.2.

Sen. Carter captured six of the 10 parishes that comprise the 2nd District. He recorded a big win in Jefferson Parish (67-33 percent), the district’s second-largest local entity. The now representative-elect performed better only in St. Charles Parish (70-30 percent). As was the case in the primary election, Sen. Peterson’s greater strength came in the Baton Rouge area, and the pattern repeated itself on Saturday.

The district’s largest locality, Orleans Parish, which encompasses the city of New Orleans, produced a little more than half of Saturday’s turnout. The parish yielded a close vote with Sen. Carter prevailing there with only 53 percent in the area where both candidates call home.

Each contender spent upward of $1 million for their campaigns, with outside organizations also weighing in with equivalent expenditures.

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LA-2’s Saturday Special Election

(LA-2 Candidate Troy Carter’s Closing Ad)

By Jim Ellis

April 26, 2021 — The special election to fill the vacant Louisiana congressional district from which former Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-New Orleans) resigned when he accepted a Biden White House appointment was decided Saturday, with the contest having evolved into a more significant race than originally anticipated.

The one thing we knew coming into the special election was that a Democratic New Orleans state senator would win the race, but the question around which of the two would prevail was one of longer-term national importance. We saw in this race not just a runoff between two Democratic contenders for a Democratic congressional seat, but rather an intensifying battle between the more traditional party base and the hard left movement that has had success in other places.

A victory for the Justice Democrats in the person of state Sen. Karen Carter Peterson (D-New Orleans) will increase the movement’s strength and likely lead to stronger primary challenges against more traditional Democratic incumbents come 2022.

Remember, state Sen. Troy Carter (D-New Orleans) placed first in the March 20 jungle primary with 34 percent of the vote. Sen. Peterson edged Baton Rouge community activist Gary Chambers, Jr. by 22.9 – 21.3 percent, a margin of 1,510 votes of 94,567 votes cast and spread among 15 candidates.

In the LA-2 special election on Saturday, Carter won by a 10-point spread over Peterson, 55-45%.

Peterson ironically qualified for the runoff with a better-than-expected performance in the Baton Rouge section of the district and fell below expectations in her home city of New Orleans. Conversely, Chambers proved weaker in his home of Baton Rouge but stronger in New Orleans.

Chambers’ endorsement of Sen. Peterson marked the beginning of the support we saw moving toward the second-place finisher, but the lack of available polling data – the last poll we’d seen for this race came from Edgewater Research over the March 1-2 period, which gave Sen. Carter a 35-24 percent lead – allowed us to surmise that Saturday’s end result was likely to be close and could have trended in either direction.

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LA-2 Special Election Tightening

By Jim Ellis

April 1, 2021 — The Louisiana special congressional election between two New Orleans Democratic state senators appears to be tightening after the perceived underdog just scored an important endorsement that could help produce a closer than anticipated finish on April 24.

Louisiana state Sen. Troy Carter (D-New Orleans)

Sen. Troy Carter (D-New Orleans) placed first in the March 20 jungle primary with 36 percent of the vote. Sen. Karen Carter Peterson (D-New Orleans) was second with 23 percent, just ahead of Baton Rouge community activist Gary Chambers Jr. who posted 21 percent. Because no one reached the majority threshold, the top two finishers, Sens. Carter and Peterson, advanced to the special runoff election scheduled for late April.

Chambers, the third-place finisher, announced Wednesday that he is endorsing Sen. Peterson. With his 23 percent of the vote, Chambers can be a major influence in the runoff election. This is particularly true within the East Baton Rouge and Orleans parishes, where he performed well.

Louisiana state Sen. Karen Carter Peterson (D-New Orleans)

In the Baton Rouge area, for example, meaning both the East and West Baton Rouge parishes (though the West Baton Rouge entity only produced a total of 1,414 votes in the March 20 jungle primary election), Chambers and Sen. Peterson combined to record 65 percent of the original vote as compared to Sen. Carter’s 25 percent.

Also, the Congressional Progressive Caucus organization began running television advertising Wednesday that thanked Sen. Peterson for voting to expand the number of those eligible for Medicaid health benefits.

The outside CPC assistance supports the Peterson campaign strategy. One of her main goals is to identify herself as the more progressive of the two candidates. In this same vein, for example, she draws the distinction between her position and that of Sen. Carter regarding the Green New Deal. His public statements for the program have not been as strongly favorable as Sen. Peterson’s.

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Julia Letlow Wins LA-5; LA-2 to Runoff

Julia Letlow (R), widow of Rep-Elect Luke Letlow (R) who passed away at the end of last year, easily won Loiusiana’s 5th District special election Saturday.

By Jim Ellis

March 23, 2021 — The two Louisiana special elections turned out as expected on Saturday night but with a slight surprise.

Julia Letlow (R), the widow of Rep-Elect Luke Letlow (R), who passed away at the end of last year, easily won the 5th District special election. Her 65 percent outright win over a field of 11 opponents will allow her to assume the office that her husband won in early December but who died from the effects of COVID and heart disease before the new Congress convened.

In the New Orleans-Baton Rouge 2nd District, vacated when Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-New Orleans) resigned from the House to accept a position in the Biden Administration, two Democrats will advance to an April 24 runoff election. Both outcomes were expected, but the margin for second place in the 2nd District was much closer than anticipated.

Letlow had the support of the entire Republican hierarchy while running in a GOP district, from former President Trump and former Vice President Pence, to Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA), and the Louisiana Republican Party. She also had a huge campaign resource advantage and was expected to exceed the 50 percent mark to win outright. The second-place finisher, Democrat Candy Christophe, fell way back to 27 percent of the vote. No other candidate even exceeded the five percent mark.

Turnout was relatively strong, with 103,609 people voting in the Saturday special election and during early voting. In the pre-election day balloting, Letlow captured 59 percent support, meaning she performed much better in Election Day voting. The total exceeded the Dec. 5 runoff vote that elected Letlow. In that election, 79,306 people voted.

In parish voting, Letlow won 23 of the district’s 24 local parishes, called counties in every other state. The only one she lost, and by just one percentage point, was East Feliciana Parish, but the total vote cast was only from 1,517 individuals. She carried 18 of the 24 parishes with majority support and reached or exceeded the 70 percent threshold in eight localities.

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Special Elections Update: LA Votes

https://www.facebook.com/Karen.Carter.Peterson/videos/2521633831472770/Karen Carter Peterson promotional video.

By Jim Ellis

March 22, 2021 — Five special congressional elections are now on the political calendar, and we see current action in all.

Beginning with the two Louisiana seats, voters went to the polls Saturday in the first round of elections in the state’s 2nd and 5th Congressional Districts.

The 2nd, anchored in New Orleans and Baton Rouge, is a Democratic seat left vacant when former Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-New Orleans) was appointed to a White House position in the Biden Administration. The northeastern Louisiana Republican 5th CD became vacant when Rep-Elect Luke Letlow (R), three weeks after winning the seat in a post-general runoff election, passed away from a heart attack and COVID.

The 2nd District sees 15 Democrats, Republicans, minor party, and Independent candidates all on a jungle primary ballot. The political odds favor two Democratic New Orleans state senators, Troy Carter and Karen Carter Peterson, advancing to a general election runoff on April 24. The tone of this week’s candidates’ ads, with Sen. Peterson already being attacked, suggest that the special general between Carter and Peterson is already underway.

Prospects were promising that we would see a winner in Saturday’s 5th District race. Though 12 candidates are on the ballot, just one has strong campaign resources and public backing. Julia Letlow (R), wife of the deceased congressman-elect, looks well positioned to exceed the majority support threshold tomorrow night meaning she would claim the seat outright.

Armed with a 9:1 fundraising lead over her closest competitor at the end of February and holding endorsements from former President Trump, former Vice President Mike Pence, Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA), the Louisiana Republican Party, and the Louisiana Sheriffs of the 5th Congressional District committee, among others, Ms. Letlow appears poised to score a convincing win over a crowded field.

The first poll for the Texas special election was just released. In this 6th District race, vacated because of Rep. Ron Wright’s (R-Arlington) death from cancer and COVID, a whopping 23 candidates are vying to replace the late incumbent. The first election is May 1. If no one receives majority support, which is likely, a runoff will be scheduled after the primary voters officially determine the final results.

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