The last statewide election of 2019


 The Daily Brew

Welcome to the Friday, November 15, Brew. Here’s what’s in store for you as you start your day:

  1. Louisiana voters to decide governor, state legislative races Saturday
  2. Patrick joins 17 Democrats running for President
  3. What’s the Tea?

Louisiana voters to decide governor, state legislative races Saturday

The last statewide elections of 2019 take place Saturday, Nov. 16, as Louisiana holds general elections for offices where no candidate received a majority of votes in the primary elections held Oct. 12. Louisiana voters will elect a governor and secretary of state, as well as five state Senators and 24 members of the state House.

There has been significant satellite spending by both parties in the weeks leading up to the election. The National Democratic Redistricting Committee (NDRC) contributed $100,000 to the House Democratic Campaign Committee of Louisiana, the Senate Democratic Campaign Committee of Louisiana, and Louisiana Democrats at the end of October. The NDRC is a 527 group chaired by former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder that aims to position Democrats favorably for the round of redistricting following the 2020 census. Politico reported that the Republican National Committee spent $1 million on get-out-the-vote efforts in the days leading up to the election, bringing their contributions to $2 million.

Republicans secured a supermajority in the state Senate in the October 12 primary. Heading into Saturday’s election, Republicans are seven seats shy of a 70-seat supermajority in the Louisiana House of Representatives. Party control of eight state House seats will be decided in the general election. Republican candidates need to win all seven races in which they are facing a Democratic or independent candidate in order to win a veto-proof House majority. The other 16 races feature two candidates from the same party.

These are the last legislative elections before the state government redraws congressional and state legislative districts following the 2020 census. If Republicans win veto-proof majorities in both legislative chambers, they will have control over Louisiana’s redistricting process, regardless of the gubernatorial election’s outcome.

Gov. John Bel Edwards (D) and businessman Eddie Rispone (R) will face off in the state’s gubernatorial general election. In the Oct. 12 primary, Edwards finished first with 46.6% of the vote, Rispone was second with 27.4% and U.S. Rep. Ralph Abraham (R) was third with 23.6%.

In-person early voting for the general election took place November 2-9. The total number of early votes cast broke a record for a non-presidential election in Louisiana, with 489,649 people voting early in person (451,171) or by absentee ballot (38,478). Here are the total number of early votes cast by year:

In the previous four Louisiana gubernatorial races decided in a general election, the total votes cast increased—from between 3.3% and 11.5%—from the primary to the general, as shown in the chart below:

*—There is no figure listed in the “Total votes – General election” column in 1999, 2007, and 2011 as the  gubernatorial race in those years was decided in the primary election when one candidate received a majority of the votes cast.

Learn more

Patrick joins 17 Democrats running for President 

Former Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick (D) announced Thursday he would seek the Democratic presidential nomination. He filed as a candidate for the New Hampshire state primary ahead of its deadline today. Patrick did not file for the Democratic primary in Alabama and Arkansas—which had filing deadlines on Nov. 8 and Nov. 12, respectively.

Patrick joins 17 other notable candidates in the Democratic primary. That number could increase as former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg (D) has filed for several state primaries without formally announcing his candidacy.

In the 2016 Democratic presidential primary, the last notable candidate to enter the race was law professor Larry Lessig in September 2015. At this point in the 2016 cycle, there were three Democratic candidates—former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Sen. Bernie Sanders, and former Gov. Martin O’Malley.

There were fifteen Republican candidates for president on this date four years ago. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal suspended his campaign on Nov. 17, 2015.

Learn more→

We took a week off from our What’s the Tea? segment last week so that we could provide as much election coverage as possible. But our survey question is back this week, and we’re continuing with asking readers about how they’ve participated in our political process.

This week’s question is, Have you ever donated to a candidate’s political campaign?

  1. Yes
  2. No