Maness hopes Tea Party will put him in run-off for Vitter’s seat
21st December 2015 · 0 Comments
By Christopher Tidmore
Contributing Writer
The 2016 U.S. Senate race to succeed David Vitter swelled this week with both GOP Congressmen John Fleming and Charles Boustany formally filling to run, and former Republican Congressman Joseph Cao surprising many of his closest supporters with a letter announcing a bid as well.
GOP PSC Commissioner Eric Skrimetta of Jefferson indicated his interest in the Senate seat by hosting a private $100 per person fundraiser, renting out a Metairie AMC Theatre for a showing of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Republican Jefferson Parish President John Young strongly indicated that he also was leaning towards a bid (a story first broken in this newspaper). A surrogate for State Treasurer and 2008 GOP Senate nominee John Kennedy released a poll that all but trumpeted Kennedy was in, and both State Rep. Paul Hollis and PSC Commissioner Scott Angelle inched closer to their bids.
And, that’s just the Republican side. Democratic State Sen. Eric LaFleur admitted his interest in entering the race, as did fellow Democrats PSC Commissioner and 2007 Gubernatorial candidate Foster Campbell and 2010 Lieutenant Gubernatorial nominee Caroline Fayard. State Sen. Gary Smith went so far as to meet with the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. And, Independent Troy Hebert, a former Democratic state legislator who is leaving a job in the Jindal administration, also moved closer to a run.
Only former Congressman Don Cazayoux decided against a bid in the last week, after flirting with one.
The increasingly crowded Senatorial field excites the one GOP candidate who has been effectively running for over a year. Retired Air Force Colonel Rob Maness bets that the 14% that he earned in the 2014 U.S. Senate race will translate into enough support next year to get into the runoff.
Maness formed GatorPAC in the wake of his strong showing with Tea Party voters in 2014, and has used this SuperPAC to keep in communication with his base ever since. Working his contacts on behalf of Bill Cassidy in the 2014 runoff, and statewide Republican candidates in 2015, the Tea Party contender earned considerable goodwill amongst establishment figures as well. Keeping his political presence known, yet still maintaining his outsider status, Maness argued in an interview with The Louisiana Weekly, gives the Retired Air Force Colonel a better chance to make the runoff than many of the sitting Republican officeholders.
“We had 14% of the vote [in November 2014], and more than half of it was new Republican voters. We also got 14% of the vote in an environment where we got 1% more of the white vote in the state than Mary Landrieu did. That tells you that a lot of conservative Democrats and Independents that consider themselves Center-Left came over and voted for us. And it wasn’t because it was that I was some Left-wing guy either. It’s because they want somebody that believes in America and believes in Louisi-ana… We have a candidate that can hold that base. There’s no candidate that has either declared or become a prospect that can dip into that base effectively, in our mind.”
Through GatorPAC, Maness continued, “We’ve kept our base informed. We’ve kept them engaged for well over a year. And we’ve also created goodwill amongst grassroots Republicans in the state that we weren’t as effective at in the first race. And, you can see that in Dr. Cassidy’s numbers in the primary. But where we were strong in the primary, Mary Landrieu was weakened in the primary, and that tells us we have a very solid base that is going to stay with us.”
“We’ve already seen it in early polling. John Kennedy put out a poll that showed that, and it’s been consistent over time with that particular poll. So, we’re not concerned about that. That’s our starting point.”
The survey in question, commissioned by former Kennedy aide Jason Redmond, puts Maness in a strong position, statistically tied with Congressmen Fleming and Boustany, and barely behind Angelle, all within the 4.1% margin of error. John Kennedy and Foster Campbell are ahead of all, however, with 21% and 23% of the vote respectively.
Maness emphasized that the Kennedy poll underestimated the number of likely GOP candidates in the field, a reality confirmed just last week. As he explained to this newspaper. “There’s going to be a bunch of candidates. There’s going to be seven or eight candidates, and there all going to be able to raise a little money, and with a 14% base that’s not going to leave you, you still have an opportunity to do that.”
The money element is essential, he maintained. Most of the other GOP candidates do not have the Colonel’s ability to tap into grassroots dollars. “We also raised $3 million in the last race, and those dollars were not large dollar donars. They were small dollar donors, and we have a professional team that’s capable of not only doing that again, but even increasing it.”
Maness predicates his strategy on the idea that Tea Party activists constitute enough of discontented force that they will reject elected officials if they have a legitimate outsider alternative. If only one establishment candidate chose to run, such as the sole sitting Congressman the Retired Air Force Colonel faced in 2014, Maness’ pathway to a runoff might prove difficult. With multiple elected officials in 2016, he argued, it is not.
Congressman Fleming, for example, should constitute Maness’ strongest competitor for the Tea Party support. The North Louisiana U.S. Rep. is a one of the leaders of the House Freedom Caucus, the gathering of Tea Party members in the Congress. Fleming has a near-perfect rating with the Right, and opposed the same recent Omnibus Spending Bill which Maness decried to this newspaper. (The Retired Colonel accused GOP Speaker Paul Ryan of “already selling out,” yet Fleming was just as biting against his own Speaker as Maness.)
Fleming’s voting record did not perturb Maness, though. “He’s been in office for four terms..eight years…If you haven’t changed anything in eight years, it’s time to move on. They only thing Congressman Fleming seems to want to move on to is the U.S. Senate.”
Rob Maness’ Exploratory Committee is actively fundraising and organizing for his US Senatorial bid next year, rolling out a formal campaign in a fashion only Boustany and Fleming have equalled. (Kennedy is expected to transfer his state campaign funds into a federal SuperPAC after the first of the year.) Yet, the Retired Colonel and his GOP Peers may face another sure Republican contender soon.
In a holiday letter emailed to family, friends and supporters former 2nd District Congressman Joseph Cao outlined his intention to run. “Sen. Vitter will not be running for re-election, so this is a great opportunity to have a Vietnamese-American/Asian-American voice in the U.S. Senate,” Cao wrote.
Like Maness, the former U.S. Representative noted a growing GOP field would work to his advantage, yet the decision by New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, a Democrat, not to follow his sister into the Senate most excited Cao.
This will work to my advantage as the votes in New Orleans, the district that I represented, will gravitate towards me, as well as the votes of independents, center-right Republicans and center-left Democrats,” Cao wrote. “In a race this big and this important, it will boil down to money, and I ask that you all help me raise the money that I need to win this race.”
The former Congressman estimated he needs $2 million to make it to the primary. The letter did not mention that New Orleans area Republicans John Young, Paul Hollis, and Eric Skrimetta also were considering a bid. Yet, Cao predicates his runoff chances around a small but loyal core base, like Maness. In a field as potentially crowded as 2016, anything is possible. Fourteen percent could win a runoff slot, theoretically.
This article originally published in the December 21, 2015 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
