Now that Blacks represent a third of Jefferson Parish’s demographic, will that impact election results?

By Christopher Tidmore
Contributing Columnist

A critical threshold was passed this year according to demographic surveys. African Americans now constitute at least 33 percent of the Jefferson Parish population, with more than 15 percent identifying as Hispanic.

At current rates of growth, the 2023 elections (with early voting starting September 30 and the primary on October 14) may stand as the last quadrennial cycle where Caucasians go to the polls as a majority of the population in the largest parish in the Greater New Orleans Region to elect their parish leaders.

Similar to a phenomena already affecting nearby St. Bernard politics, another suburban parish which carved its current political dynamics after surging in population from the “white flight” of the 1970s, demography has the potential to swing several key parish elections, but most of the candidates running underestimate the impact of minorities approaching a plurality of the electorate. Geography more than race underpin most of the electoral contests this year, yet a simple cross-racial appeal could prove the upset in many of these contests.

Take the battle royale of the political dynasty. State Senator Patrick Connick, nephew and brother of the DA who has never before suffered an opponent in any of his elections, faces a serious challenge from Tim Kerner Jr. On the surface, the contest for the West Bank’s 8th Senatorial District appears as a GOP turf-fight, with Kerner, a scion of the family which has ruled Jean Laffite town politics since the city’s creation, facing off against the Connick clan’s strength in the New Orleans suburbs. However, more than the north/south Jefferson divide, the increasingly vocal Black community of the West Bank, which is close to a plurality of the electorate, stands as the natural kingmakers.

Neither contender has truly found an effective means to appeal to Black voters, much less Hispanics, in a measurable way, though Connick knows their power. His uncle Harry effectively constructed biracial coalitions in Orleans Parish, keeping him in office long after the city achieved an African-American majority. Likewise, Patrick Connick has reached out to the Black leadership in West Bank Jefferson, yet in the all-Republican contest, there is a limit to how far he can coalition build without being outflanked on the Right by Kerner.

The same dilemma faces the two geographically influenced Jefferson Parish council at-large contests. Division A incumbent Ricky Templet won his parishwide seat unopposed, so powerful was his base in Gretna where he previously served as a councilman and state representative before representing the West Bank in a district parish council seat. This year, though, District 5’s Jennifer Van Vrancken seeks to oust Templet in what appears on the surface as a Metairie v. Gretna slugfest. However, Van Vrancken also has made serious attempts to garner allies in the local African-American community, particularly in Templet’s West Bank base. Both are Republicans, so they face the partisan limit on their appeal, but Blacks could prove the wild card in this race – and in the Division B contest as well.

District 4 Councilman Dominick Impastato aims to unseat at-large incumbent Scott Walker in what would seem to be a Kenner v. Metairie contest. Impastato has also earned the support of most the West Bank political elite as well. The question remains whether he can influence the African-American vote to cast a ballot for his candidacy and take out the incumbent.

Impastato has labored hard to woo the Black electorate, acutely aware of the changing demographic realities of Jefferson Parish; however, he faces the normal African-American hesitancy to vote for any Republican. In many elections, Black voters often skip the line on the ballot where no Democrats are options.

Perhaps a better bellwether to the rising strength of the Black electorate in Jefferson Parish may come from either the open District 5 councilmanic contest where African-American Democrat Howard Eugene Harper Jr. seeks to run up the score against the favored Republican (and former Judge) Hans Liljeberg or the BESE 1 seat where Black Democrat Lauren Jewett seeks to beat former GOP State Rep. Paul Hollis, though the Northshore/Southshore makeup of the district favors him. How she fares in the Jefferson precincts will harken to how Black candidates will fare parishwide in the coming years.

This article originally published in the August 21, 2023 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.