David Duke’s candidacy could swing majority in U.S. Senate to Democrats
22nd August 2016 · 0 Comments
By Christopher Tidmore
Contributing Writer
National Democratic attention focused on Louisiana two weeks ago as Sen. Tim Kaine attended a local foodies fundraiser at $15,000 a plate. The Democratic Vice Presidential candidate joined James Beard Award Winning Celebrity Chef Donald Link at Calcasieu in New Orleans on August 10.
Most in the room remembered that the Crescent City has proven a good money haul for the Clinton campaigns in the past, but there was another reason for Kaine providing such a high-profile visit with less than 90 days to Election Day. The Pelican State may prove the pathway for the Democrats to win the U.S. Senate, and it’s all thanks to David Duke.
DUKE
If Marco Rubio prevails in Florida and Rob Portman in Ohio, where both GOP incumbents are leading despite Trump, the fifth needed seat could come down to Louisiana. Normally that would mean a GOP Senate, even if other open seats like Nevada stay in the Democratic column, yet David Duke changes all of the math. If the former KKK Grand Wizard gets in the runoff with a Democrat, the Democrat wins the Louisiana Senate seat, providing Hillary Clinton with allied Upper House.
Noting the recent July 27-28 UNO survey, veteran Republican political consultant James Farwell sees a real possibility of Duke making it past the primary to the December election. As he explained to The Louisiana Weekly, “I think Duke is under polling at 13 percent. I think the real numbers at least 16 percent. If it is as high 18 percent (as some have suggested), then Duke has a real chance of making the runoff. The question is, with whom?”
The veteran GOP consultant noted that the Louisiana Democratic electoral floor is roughly 42 percent. Should Josh Pellerin spend the millions that the Lafayette-based energy magnate has promised on his Democratic bid for the U.S. Senate, that “number could go to 44 percent,” Farwell added.
That leaves 56 percent for the remaining Republicans, Indepen-dents, and Libertarians. This newspaper had speculated in early May that a maverick Independent could rob enough of the GOP vote away to force two Democrats into the runoff. (http://www.louisianaweekly.com/in-red-louisiana-can-two-democrats-make-runoff-for-vitters-senate/ )
Since that point, the Right has become even more divided, and with Duke having the potential to steal enough votes to emerge on top with conservative voters, that means whatever Democrat might emerge into a December runoff would be insured of victory.
The reality of this has caused the Democratic fight between the two frontrunners, former Lt. Gubernatorial candidate Caroline Fayard and PSC Commissioner Foster Campbell to become even more acute in recent weeks. Campbell is Gov. John Bel Edwards’ officially endorsed candidate, which would normally make the PSC member the frontrunner, save that Fayard has proven far more popular with mainstream Democratic contributors, far outpacing Campbell in the money race.
Notably, both candidates have begun to issue campaign missives pointing to the likelihood of a Dem v. Duke runoff, and utilizing that possibility to both draw contributions and pull support from wavering centrists that normally vote Republican.
With Acadiana’s Third District Congressman Charles Boustany, North Louisiana’s 4th District Congressman John Fleming, former New Orleans Second District Congressman Joseph Cao, La. State Treasurer John Kennedy, retired Air Force colonel and 2014 Senate candidate Rob Maness, and New Orleans Economic Development exec. Abhay Patel all in the race on the GOP side, along with two Libertarians and multiple “others,” there already is division enough in conservative ranks, even if no regularly Republican voter is wooed by the Democrats in the November 8 primary.
The one wild card in this scenario is whether the GOP leadership can coalesce the anti-Duke conservative vote around one Republican contender before November 8. As 1996 U.S. Senate race almost proved, it is quite easy for the Right to divide so completely in an open primary that there is a danger that no GOP contender will emerge as a standard-bearer in the runoff. Leadership on the Right, however, can forestall that GOP nightmare.
In 1996, multiple Republican congressmen statewide elected GOP officials, and legislators ran. A week before the election, polls indicated that the two establishment Democrats, Richard Ieyoub and Mary Landrieu would make the runoff. Led by Cong. Bob Livingston, the La. Republican Party hierarchy united behind Woody Jenkins. At the time, the BR State Rep. was the GOP front-runner by a whole percentage point — ranking at a whooping 11 percent. And, Livingston almost did not pull off that show of party unity to propel Jenkins into the runoff.
No GOP leader today enjoys the party clout that the ‘almost-Speaker’ enjoyed in the 1990s. Moreover, Livingston had an easier sale since Congressman Jimmy Hayes — the next nearest contender — had only become a Republican the year before.
Then, as now, David Duke was another one of the candidates, so the Republicans feared not unifying lest the KKK Grand Wizard prevail, but the LAGOP has become something of a victim of its own success. Thanks to a broader base, no senior Pelican State Republican holds the singular stature equal to Livingston’s ability to convince the conservatives to coalesce. Moreover, there are far more Republican Senatorial candidates than 1996, and all are better financed and supported by various wings of the party.
Still, as Jeremy Alford of Lapolitics.com countered to this newspaper, “I can’t see Duke making the runoff.” Alford contends that Duke’s reputation has taken enough of a hit with the criminal allegations in recent years, that enough of the GOP vote will combine behind one of the other mainstream contenders to deny Duke a runoff slot. “I don’t see him getting much support beyond 13 percent.”
Troy Hebert’s Diminishing Role…
Speaking of the independent that The Louisiana Weekly referenced on May 9 as a potential player in the U.S. Senate contest, David Duke seems to have inadvertently relegated the pro-Trump populism of former legislator Troy Hebert to irrelevance.
As Louisiana Voice’s Tom Aswell commented, “Poor Troy Hebert. Like his mentor, Bobby Jindal, he just can’t seem to get any traction or notice in a crowded field of candidates. Unlike Jindal, however,…Hebert, one of 24 candidates for the U.S. Senate, is making his case in the courts.”
“He should be right at home there, given the number of times he was sued by agents he fired and/or harassed during his tenure as Jindal’s Commissioner of Alcohol and Tobacco Control (ATC). Hebert is suing a polling firm because he was incorrectly identified as a (gasp!) Republican!”
Hebert, a former Democrat while serving as a State Representative from the parishes of Vermilion and Iberia, is a declared Independent, running without party affiliation. Since his announcement in December, he had adopted the mantle of an anti-immigrant, anti-free trade populist who loudly stood behind Donald Trump from the beginning of the campaign, despite Hebert independent affiliation. In other words, Hebert had attempted to fill the space David Duke has claimed, yet even after months of campaigning, the former ATC Commissioner could not achieve the polling numbers the former KKK Grand Wizard reached by just signing up to be a candidate.
Aswell continued, “[Hebert] doesn’t seem to be commanding the same respect as a candidate that he did as head of ATC where employees were required to stand and chirp, ‘Good morning, Commissioner,’ when he entered the room. So he’s claiming in his lawsuit that a May poll (not to be confused with a maypole) conducted by Southern Media and Opinion Research and its veteran pollster Bernie Pinsonat was ‘flawed’ because it incorrectly identified him as a Republican.”
In a court filing, Hebert implied fraud against SMOR, and at worst declared that the polling service was “intentionally misleading respondents” in listing him as a member of the GOP. He added, “The system is definitely rigged against independent candidates” because the survey was used to keep him from participating in two candidate forums.
Hebert contended that he was barred from a June 29 forum sponsored by the Louisiana chapter of the National Federation of Independent Businesses and the Louisiana Restaurant Association and from a July 28 event put on by the Louisiana Municipal Association because the former legislator could not achieve the required five percent in the Southern Media survey.
Pinsonat defended his poll, stating that identifying Hebert as an Independent would not get him better numbers. In the May 19-23 survey, State Treasurer John Kennedy and “Undecided” were neck and neck at 32 percent. The only other candidate to touch double digits was U.S. Rep. Charles Boustany with 10 percent. Hebert, with two percent.
Duke was not included in the SMOR poll, and how the former KKK Grand Wizard affects the ‘horse-race’ numbers has yet to be surveyed. The aforementioned UNO poll conducted immediately after qualifying revealed 13 percent of respondents said that they would vote for David Duke, though it did not poll the other candidates’ levels of support.
This article originally published in the August 22, 2016 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
