Louisiana’s low voter turnout attributed to apathy, mistrust

 

In an important election year — featuring races for governor, lieutenant governor, treasurer, secretary of state, attorney general and several local government seats — Louisiana saw historically low voter turnout. Experts are still looking at why.

Only about 36% of registered voters cast ballots in October’s primary election, marking the lowest turnout in a Louisiana gubernatorial primary since 2011. The general election in November saw even lower turnout, when only about 23% of registered voters made it to the polls.

“This entire state didn’t show up,” said Ashley Shelton, president and CEO of the Power Coalition, a nonpartisan civic engagement group.

Landry’s red wave to victory for governor also carries GOP women toward statewide office

Ultraconservative state lawmakers also avoid runoffs

Attorney General Jeff Landry’s stunning win in the governor’s race Saturday overwhelmed most other election news, but a few notable trends also emerged. Landry was not the only person with a surprising election victory this weekend. A handful of ultraconservative Louisiana Senate candidates also won their races outright and avoided November runoff elections.

State Reps. Rick Edmonds of Baton Rouge, Valarie Hodges of Denham Springs, Blake Miguez of Erath and Alan Seabaugh of Shreveport each claimed open Senate seats in the Legislature Saturday over fellow Republicans who are more moderate. Incumbent Sen. Stewart Cathey, R-Monroe, also beat a GOP challenger who was perceived to be more middle-of-the-road.

Hodges, Miguez and Seabaugh are among the most conservative members of the Louisiana House and have often challenged Republican legislative leadership on spending issues. They were among the 19 legislators who wanted the state to spend hundreds of millions of dollars less on roads and other infrastructure projects this year in order to limit government spending. 

Republicans advancing to the runoff stages of the attorney  general and treasurer races — Liz Murrill and John Fleming, respectively — were also the more conservative options in their primary races. They beat out other, more middle-of-the-road GOP candidates to head into the next stage of the election against Democrats on Nov. 18. 

The right turn in the state Senate should make life easier for Landry as governor. An ultraconservative himself, he should have fewer disputes with lawmakers overall because more of them will be aligned with his political ideology. 

Women rising

Louisiana has not had a woman in statewide office since early 2015, when former U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu left office after losing her reelection to Bill Cassidy.

But in 2024, women will hold at least two of Louisiana’s nine elected statewide offices no matter what happens in the runoffs.

Murrill and Democrat Lindsey Cheek have made it into the runoff for attorney general, and Republican Nancy Landry and Democrat Gwen Collins-Greenup will face each other in the secretary of state’s runoff.

Murrill and Nancy Landry, as Republicans, are considered the favorites to win the races, even though Louisiana has never had two Republican women serving in statewide office at the same time.  

The last time Louisiana had two women in statewide office at all was the beginning of 2008, right before former Gov. Kathleen Blanco stepped down and Landrieu was still in Congress. 

Low voter turnout 

Voter turnout was even lower than political experts and outgoing Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin predicted it would be for this election cycle. 

Unofficial returns indicated statewide turnout of registered voters in the governor’s race was 35.8%. Ardoin’s office predicted between 42% and 46%, and political consultant and pollster John Couvillon thought it would come in between 38% and 40%. 

Registered voter turnout dropped by 10 points from the last gubernatorial primary election in 2019, when it was 45.9%. Gov. John Bel Edwards received 625,970 votes in that election, but only 47% of the overall vote. By comparison, Jeff Landry won the governor’s race Saturday with 547,828 votes and 52% of the overall vote. 

The decrease was more dramatic in Democratic and Black voter strongholds. Orleans Parish voter turnout was nearly 12 points higher, 38.7% in 2019 compared with 27% this weekend. East Baton Rouge Parish voter turnout dropped even more dramatically, by about 13 points from 48% in 2019 to 34.9%.

Low Democratic voter turnout is thought to have benefitted Landry and other conservative candidates, since those constituents are the least likely to vote for far-right Republicans.

This article originally appeared in The Louisiana Illuminator on October 15th, 2023.  

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Bland gubernatorial election threatens to suppress voter turnout, Verite News 

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Bland gubernatorial election threatens to suppress voter turnout

by Robert Collins

In Saturday’s (Oct. 14) statewide election primary, many voters seem uninterested. To project turnout on election day, political analysts examine turnout during the early voting period. According to the Secretary of State’s Office, at the close of early voting, counting both in-person and mail-in voters, 344,878 had voted. For comparison, in 2019 during the last gubernatorial primary, 386,468 early voted. While mail-in ballots will continue to trickle in until Friday, so far, this is a drop off of 41,590, or about 11 percent. 

In the 2019 primary, Black voters made up 97,990 of the early vote total. This year, Black voters make up 90,118, or about 26 percent of the early vote total so far. Black voters make up about 31 percent of the total electorate. Many are surprised that we have not seen stronger Black turnout yet, since one of the major candidates, Shawn Wilson, is Black.

In the 2019 primary, turnout was about 46 percent. Before the start of early voting, the Secretary of State’s Office projected a primary turnout of between 42 and 46 percent. However, based on the lower-than-expected actual early vote numbers coming in now, many analysts are projecting around 40 percent or lower. 

Low turnout elections may disadvantage Black candidates and grassroots candidates, because they lack the resources to broadcast their messages widely, so they depend on riding the tickets of like-minded candidates at the top of the ballot. In an election that lacks enthusiasm, there are no coattails to ride, so the richest candidates can win by virtue of money. 

High turnout elections tend to correlate with Black voters and young voters representing an increased proportion of the total votes cast, while low turnout elections tend to be whiter and older in terms of the demographics of votes cast. Low turnout elections generally mean large parts of the electorate might not have opportunities to have their interests represented. 

How did we get here? Louisiana was the home of such characters as Huey Long and Edwin Edwards, and the state has a history of colorful politicians. Voters here expect their politicians to entertain them as well as inform them. They expect politics to be fun. Simply put, the current gubernatorial campaign is not fun, and, as a result, many voters are not excited. Many are not engaged at all. 

This race has been stagnant for months. Most pundits believe that Republican Jeff Landry and Democrat Shawn Wilson would run first and second and make it to the runoff. All of the polls have reinforced this expectation. None of the other Republican candidates have been able to displace Landry, because of his huge fundraising advantage. A stagnant race is a boring race. 

And yet, in spite of no excitement at the top of the ticket, it is still important that Orleans Parish voters show up on election day. There are many important races on the ballot, including a hotly contested race for House District 91 between incumbent Mandy Landry and challenger Madison O’Malley, that could help determine how the much-maligned Louisiana Democratic Party looks in the future. There is also a House District 23 race, an open Criminal Court Judgeship, as well as two proposed City Charter amendments and a school board tax renewal.  

There also are elections for all statewide offices, and a list of four proposed constitutional amendments that deal with issues as varied as whether or not nonprofits can be denied a tax exemption if they allow their properties to fall into disrepair; to whether or not external nonprofits, such as the Gates Foundation, can be banned from spending money on get out the vote efforts. 

The message from the candidates to the voters should be: Go vote, because these elections directly affect your quality of life. And the message from the voters to the gubernatorial candidates at the top of the ticket should be: If you could figure out how to add some fun and spice and excitement to your campaign, that would help voter turnout a great deal. This is Louisiana after all. To stay engaged, we need our politics to be like our food and music, hot and spicy.      

This article originally appeared in Verite News on October 10th, 2023.  

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