SUNO Prof. Delaney seeks to flip GOP state house seat

By Christopher Tidmore
Contributing Writer

If there is a legacy Republican seat in Louisiana, the 82nd District could best qualify. Many of the Old Metairie precincts within District 82 were once the strongest cores of support for Dave Treen when he embarked upon his lonely quest to get Republicans elected in the late 1960s Democratic Louisiana. These affluent suburban neighborhoods launched the careers of David Vitter, and countless other Republicans – including one candidate much of the GOP would like to forget, David Duke.

Admittedly, District 82 was not the first State House seat in Jefferson Parish to elect a GOP Representative. That honor went to Charlie Lancaster in the adjoining district in 1971, who joined four other lonely Republicans in the once Democratic-dominated legislature. In fact, the current District 82 no longer has the New Orleans Riverbend and central Metairie precincts which once elected GOP star Quentin Dastugue. Regardless, GOP Rep. Charles Henry won the current seat, previously held by his brother Cameron Henry, with 70.4 percent of the vote in 2019. He abruptly resigned on January 11, 2021, though, ostensibly for financial reasons taking a lobbying job with law firm Adams & Reese. Henry’s departure started a scramble where by January 27 two Republicans and one Democrat qualified to succeed him. It also engendered hope in the Louisiana Democratic Party leadership that opens in the District 82 special election constitutes their best chance to flip a seat in years.

DELANEY

This district, stretching from Bonnabel to Old Metairie to Old Jefferson to the North Bridgedale and Willowdale neighborhoods, resembles a giant “U,” running along the Mississippi River from the Orleans Parish line to the edge of Harahan at Hickory, with West Napoleon Ave. generally providing the border on the central Metairie peninsula and Veterans Blvd. on the Old Metairie one. Nevertheless, the very changes to the lines of the seat in the 2010 redistricting may make the seat competitive. Caucasian-majority neighborhoods were drawn out into neighboring seats, while the historic African-American Shrewsbury/New Harlem neighborhood remained. Moreover, the upper-class Old Metairie precincts with its educated, affluent electorate, which historically branded the seat quintessentially suburban Republican, also created the best chance for the Democratic Party to increase its caucus in the State House in the March 20 special election – potentially electing the first African-American representative ever to come from Metairie – at least that’s what the Louisiana Democratic leadership believes. Black voters joined with educated whites to create an upset in a core GOP seat.

Logically, Democrat Dr. Raymond Delaney Jr. should not have a prayer of victory in a district whose largest portion, Old Metairie, once elected David Duke to the Louisiana Legislature. The SUNO professor of criminal justice also serves as the president and CEO of the nonprofit Louisiana Coalition for Offender Resources (LaCOR), which helps formerly incarnated inmates re-enter society. A Black advocate for the recently jailed would seem to be the most improbable candidate to win the metro’s most affluent suburb, especially one where in 2019, the last Democrat to stand for District 82 only earned 29.6 percent.

In that same election, though, John Bel Edwards won District 82 with 53 percent of the vote. Democratic partisans argue that the strength of the brother of the former incumbent might have temporarily disguised the fact that District 82 constitutes just the type of affluent, educated inner suburb that has begun to turn away from the GOP in the wake of Donald Trump. They maintain that Delaney has a real chance on March 20, even against well-known Republicans Edwin Connick and Laurie Schlegel – the cousin of the district attorney and the wife of a 24 JDC Judge respectively.

Statistically, it is possible, if improbable. Cameron Henry won District 82 in 2007 with just over 57 percent of the vote, and at that point, the district had a higher percentage of Caucasian voters than it does now, and it did not contain Old Metairie. With two Republicans dividing the vote on the Right, Delaney has a good shot of making the runoff. All he would need is to earn the 30 percent that Democrat Trey Mustain did in 2019. In the April 24 runoff, the only other election on the ballot is the Second Congressional District race, and the only part of District 82 in the Congressional seat is the Shrewsbury/New Harlem neighborhood. Therefore, if Delaney can count on a surge of Black voters in April matched with crossover educated Caucasian swing voters in Old Metairie, he might have a chance for a runoff victory.

However, the SUNO professor faces a frontrunner in Eddie Connick, who can boast of one of the most famous last names in New Orleans Metro politics. (No word as of yet if his cousin Harry Connick Jr. will do a musical fundraiser for him like he did for DA Paul Connick.) Scott Schlegel, as a judge, cannot provide as direct aide to his wife Laurie, yet never underestimate how the fundraising network of a sitting judge can be beneficial. Moreover, the LAGOP controls the state House by a 66-35 margin with two independents and two vacancies, just shy of a 2/3 majority, and state Republican leaders will fight to keep that margin.

Early voting is March 6-13 (excluding Sunday, March 7) from 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. The deadline to request an absentee by mail ballot is March 16 by 4:30 p.m. You can request an absentee by mail ballot online through www.voterportal.sos.la.gov or in writing to the local Registrar of Voters office (other than military and overseas voters).

This article originally published in the February 1, 2021 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.