Fayard: 1st Dem. to vie for Vitter’s seat

By Christopher Tidmore
Contributing Writer

As Mardi Gras distracted, the United States Senate race to replace the retiring David Vitter grew even more crowded. New Orleans lawyer Caroline Fayard announced her candidacy, making the unsuccessful 2010 Lt. Gubernatorial contender the first major Democrat to join the frey.

Meanwhile, Retired Air Force Col. Rob Maness might have been a minor candidate during the 2014 Senate race, but he has used his GatorPAC in the intervening two years strategically aid candidates and build up influence with the La. GOP establishment. In this year’s contest, the Colonel has called in some of those markers.

Last week, Maness managed an endorsement from the new Lieutenant Governor Billy Nungesser. He had helped the out-going Plaquemines Parish President hold on to the statewide Tea Party vote in 2015, despite a heavy effort by Elbert Guillory and John Young to court the Right’s favor.

Moreover, despite Nungesser’s sparkling conservative credentials, he is as far from an enemy of the La. GOP establishment as possible. In fact, his father (of the same name) served as the long-time party chairman when Louisiana barely had a Republican Party.

Nungesser likely will not guarantee any GOP voter constituency by himself, yet he does provide Maness an establishment seal of approval that could lead to other establishment endorsements for the onetime extreme outsider.

The non-establishment is already behind the retired Air Force Colonel. Maness also recently won the endorsement of the Tea Party of Louisiana. That was a nod for which North Louisiana GOP Congressman John Fleming had ardently fought, and possessed of one of the most conservative voting records in the US House, might have enjoyed were Maness not in the race.

Still, Fleming ranks far ahead in the ‘money primary’, reporting $2.2 million in cash on hand at the end of 2015. His GOP Chief Congressional rival, Charles Boustany of Lafayette, raised almost $553,000 in the fourth quarter and had $1.6 million in the bank. As a contrast, Maness only “reported $26,940” in his campaign account.

And the money and endorsement contest may grow even tighter—if the man who narrowly lost the Lt. Governorship to Nungesser runs for the U.S. Senate. Former Jefferson Parish President John Young, who raised over $2 million for his bid last year, tells The Louisiana Weekly that he is still strongly considering the Senate race. He will make his final decision on his candidacy in early March.

GOP State Treasurer John Kennedy is already in the U.S. Senate race. While little is in his federal campaign account currently, Kennedy’s transfer of his state campaign dollars into an independent SuperPAC insures him a strong presence on statewide TV. And former New Orleans Republican Congressman Anh “Joseph” Cao is already tapping his contacts in the national Asian & Vietnamese communities to make himself a credible contender to succeed Vitter.

Troy Hebert, a former state senator and former commissioner of the state Alcohol and Tobacco Control Office, also plans to run for the U.S. Senate this fall. The Democrat-turned-Independent said he remained determined and in the contest despite a potential FBI Probe alleging the ATC Commissioner abused his position to receive sexual favors from a New Orleans woman who had problems with a liquor license.

This article originally published in the February 15, 2016 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.