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Louisiana Senate: Landrieu, Cassidy Headed For A Runoff

Louisiana Senate: Landrieu, Cassidy Headed For A Runoff

By Evan Halper, Tribune Washington Bureau (MCT)

The closely contested race for Senate in Louisiana is headed for a runoff next month, after none of the candidates received a majority of the vote Tuesday, according to Associated Press projections.

It is a scenario Democratic incumbent Mary L. Landrieu had been hoping to avoid. Her best shot at holding on to the seat in this tough year for Democrats was an outright victory Tuesday. Polls show her facing difficult odds of surviving a runoff, when the GOP vote will no longer be split between two prominent candidates.

In next month’s runoff, Landrieu will face Rep. Bill Cassidy, who built his campaign around tying the moderate senator to the policies of President Barack Obama. Landrieu is one of the most conservative Democrats in Congress, but her support of Obamacare has proved damaging to her re-election prospects in a state that is deeply skeptical of the president’s health plan. Landrieu is also up against some rapidly shifting demographics in the state. It is a far more conservative place than it was when she was first elected in 1996.

Photo: Jason Paris via Flickr

Voting Starts In U.S. Polls Expected To Deal Rebuke To Obama

Voting Starts In U.S. Polls Expected To Deal Rebuke To Obama

Washington (AFP) — Americans trooped to the polls Tuesday in key midterm elections, with Republicans expecting to claim the Senate majority on a day of reckoning for Democrats weighed down by an unpopular president.

Although many battlegrounds may go down to the wire, Democrats could lose Senate seats in as many as 10 states, a result that would hamstring Barack Obama in his final two years as president.

Polls suggest Republicans are on course to win the six extra seats they would need to gain control of both chambers of Congress for the first time since 2006.

And the party of an incumbent president historically fares badly in elections in the middle of his second term.

Every president since Ronald Reagan in the 1980s has left office with the opposition party controlling Congress, and Obama — following the costliest-ever midterm, estimated at $4 billion — is likely to be no different.

Many Republicans have essentially based their campaigns on attacks against the president and his policies like health care reform.

Although the economy has improved gradually since the 2008 recession, the national mood is far from buoyant.

Economic gains have not translated into support on the campaign trail in red-leaning states with Democratic Senate incumbents, like Alaska, Arkansas, and Louisiana.

Much media attention has focused on recent crises like Ebola and advances by the Islamic State jihadists in Syria and Iraq, but polls suggest voters’ minds were made up months ago.

Republicans have successfully capitalized on Obama’s unpopularity to convince voters of a need for change on Capitol Hill.

“I think we need a change in American politics,” construction worker Charles Kaster told AFP outside a polling station in Berryville, Virginia.

“We’ve given the other side six years to have their way with things and it doesn’t seem to be working out too good, so I think it’s time to switch back to somebody else.”

Democrats hold a 55 to 45 seat advantage in the Senate, while Republicans control the House of Representatives.

Republicans, whom several top forecasters give about a three in four chance of winning the Senate, expressed confidence in the home stretch.

“Victory is in the air, we’re going to bring it home tomorrow night!” ebullient Senator Mitch McConnell, the top Republican and potential new Senate majority leader, told a crowd in Kentucky Monday.

Republicans have hammered home their message that a vote for Democrats is a vote for a tarnished Obama and his policies.

In the House, where all 435 seats are in play, experts predict the Republicans will gain more seats. Thirty-six of 100 Senate seats are up for grabs.

Voters will also elect dozens of state governors and hundreds of local legislators, and decide on ballot initiatives including marijuana legalization.

– A muddled picture? –

However successful the Republicans are, a complete picture may not emerge Tuesday.

There are strong prospects for runoffs in Louisiana and Georgia, where rules require a second round if winners do not earn more than 50 percent of the vote.

Add to that a probable days-long ballot count in remote Alaska, where there is an unpredictable and tight race.

Louisiana’s runoff is December 6, but a Georgia runoff would be on January 6, which means senators may not know who controls the chamber when Congress opens on January 3.

Voters could get a sense of how the chips will fall nationally by keeping a close watch on two eastern states: North Carolina and New Hampshire.

Virtually all scenarios for Democrats maintaining Senate control rely on winning these two states, but experts say that if they flip Republican then Democrats will be in for a painful night.

Complicating matters, Kansas independent Greg Orman is neck and neck against veteran Republican Senator Pat Roberts.

Should Orman win he would have to choose which party he caucuses with, and he was giving no hints Tuesday.

“I’m not going there to represent the Democratic Party or the Republican Party. I’m going there to represent Kansas,” Orman told CNN.

While both parties have rolled out their surrogates to rally voters, Obama — well aware of his status as lightning rod for Republican criticism — has largely steered clear of the campaign trail.

And he was laying low on Tuesday.

Vice President Joe Biden said he does not “agree with oddsmakers” and feels Democrats could hold the Senate, a sentiment the White House said Obama shared.

AFP Photo/Mark Wilson

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Mary Landrieu, Republicans Gear Up For Two-Part Louisiana Senate Fight

Mary Landrieu, Republicans Gear Up For Two-Part Louisiana Senate Fight

By Lisa Mascaro, Tribune Washington Bureau (MCT)

BREAUX BRIDGE, La. — Ask Cajun food caterer Greg Latiolais how he plans to vote in Louisiana’s too-close-to-call Senate race and his answer leads to another question: Which time?

The disgruntled Democrat from the state’s crawfish capital plans to cast his ballot Nov. 4 for an alligator-wrestling Tea Party newcomer, Republican Rob Maness.

But as Latiolais and just about everyone else here knows, none of the nine candidates, including Democratic incumbent Sen. Mary L. Landrieu, is likely to cross the 50 percent threshold needed under Louisiana’s quirky law to seal the deal on election night.

So voters and candidates alike are already looking toward the Dec. 6 rematch, a race that, along with a similar potential runoff in Georgia, could leave Washington in suspense about which party will hold the Senate majority next year. If the Nov. 4 Senate showdown between Republicans and Democrats ends inconclusively, control of the upper chamber could all come down to what happens in potential runoffs in Louisiana and Georgia.

In the Pelican State, Republicans are already stockpiling cash to help GOP establishment favorite Bill Cassidy face Landrieu in the all-but-certain runoff. Outside groups are taking a strong interest.

Cassidy allies have purchased TV advertising time for late November and early December. Freedom Partners, a free-market “Super PAC” aligned with the billionaire industrialist Koch brothers, reserved $2.1 million in television ad time months ago, and the National Republican Senatorial Committee has plopped down $3.3 million for runoff ads.

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee says it has spent $2.1 million on post-November airtime for Landrieu.

That comes on top of the more than $25 million both sides have poured into the race since last year.

Democrats, meanwhile, are also asking their army of ground troops to plan on sticking around after Nov. 4 to help get out the vote in Round Two.

A similar national spotlight may also shine on Georgia, where a Libertarian candidate could force a Jan. 6 runoff between the front-runners, Democrat Michelle Nunn and Republican David Perdue. That could leave the question of which party controls the Senate in limbo until 2015.

Roger F. Villere Jr., chairman of the Republican Party of Louisiana, is alternately thrilled and anxious about his red state taking center stage in the battle for the Senate. But he worries the efforts of political outsiders won’t play well in a conservative state where the Big Easy quickly makes way for the Bible Belt.

“We’re going to have to manage the onslaught of national people coming in to help us out,” said Villere, standing outside party offices at a shopping mall in Metairie where Cassidy made a recent campaign stop. “It’s very hard.”

Part of the problem for Republicans is of their own making. The GOP vote is being split as Maness peels away support from physician-turned-congressman Cassidy, preventing either candidate from clearing the 50 percent mark. Many polls show Landrieu would lose in a head-to-head matchup against a lone Republican.

Landrieu’s team hopes the familiar GOP internal divisions will open an opportunity for her on Nov. 4. So while others look toward the runoff, her campaign and top allies are holding nothing back, spending twice as much in the run-up to November as her opponents, although so-called dark money from undisclosed donors almost evens the spending race.

Betting that Nov. 4 will be her best shot to win reelection, the senator’s campaign promises a vigorous voter turnout operation befitting her family’s New Orleans political dynasty — her father was a popular Democratic governor and her brother is the city’s mayor. Campaign workers have registered thousands of new voters, including many African Americans, whose support is crucial to Landrieu’s chances.

If Landrieu is forced into a runoff, money will not be problem, one Democratic strategist said, especially if the Senate majority is at stake — a sentiment echoed by Republicans.

“There will be more money than Donald Trump and God combined,” said the strategist, who asked for anonymity to discuss the Senate campaigns.

In some ways, Cassidy and Landrieu have already shifted their focus to the runoff, all but ignoring Maness, who wrestled an alligator in one ad but still trails in the polls.

Cassidy, an unsteady campaigner whose singsong cadence sometimes make his political speeches sound like nursery rhymes, has gained traction by linking Landrieu to the unpopular Obama administration.

“I am taking on the most powerful man in the world — and the senator that supports him 97 percent of the time,” Cassidy told a crowd at the USS Kidd Veterans Memorial Museum, home of a World War II destroyer docked on the Mississippi River in Baton Rouge. “She has used her clout. Unfortunately, she has used it on behalf of President Obama.”

Landrieu brushes aside criticisms that after three terms in Washington she is out of touch with Louisiana. She spends her days moving between the state’s diverse cultures: doing the hip-hop “wobble” dance with African Americans at a Southern University tailgate party and shoring up support from power brokers at a pork chop luncheon in the military town of Leesville.

“All he can do is throw rocks and stones,” she said about Cassidy after her talk at a Leesville church hall. “I would put my record fighting for my home state against any member of Congress.”

Down the highway, as he loaded groceries into the cab of his pickup outside Market Basket, retired Vietnam veteran Wayne Westmoreland, a Republican who used to be a Democrat, said he had not decided whether he would cast his ballot for Cassidy or Maness. “I just hope they beat Landrieu,” he said.

With a runoff, Westmoreland may be able to vote for both Republicans. But Landrieu is working hard to ensure he doesn’t get that chance.

Photo via Wikimedia Commons

Georgia Seat — And U.S. Senate Control — Might Require Runoff

Georgia Seat — And U.S. Senate Control — Might Require Runoff

By Jim Gaines, McClatchy Washington Bureau

MACON, Ga. — They are scions of two of Georgia’s most prominent and popular political families, one the daughter of iconic Democratic former Sen. Sam Nunn, the other the cousin of Sonny Perdue, the first Republican to win the governor’s office since Reconstruction.
Yet neither Michelle Nunn nor David Perdue has been able to lock up the race for the state’s open U.S. Senate seat. And with a Libertarian candidate drawing a small but steady sliver of the vote, the contest for closely divided Georgia — and perhaps control of the entire Senate — may not be decided until a runoff in January.
“It may not be over in November. It may last until the next Congress is actually sworn in,” said Charles Bullock, a political scientist at the University of Georgia.
It’s a potentially crucial race as they seek to replace Sen. Saxby Chambliss, a Republican, who isn’t running for re-election.
Republicans are expected to win several seats from Democrats nationwide, perhaps gaining control of the Senate. But Georgia is one of the few states where the Republicans are at risk of losing a seat, which could complicate their march to power in Washington.
Perdue has the edge. “I still think it’s probably Republicans’ to lose,” said Bullock. Republicans have been gaining in Georgia for the last decade: Since Sonny Perdue won the governor’s office, they’ve taken the Legislature and both U.S. Senate seats.
But the state isn’t a slam dunk. Perdue doesn’t have majority support in the polls — necessary on Election Day to win outright and avoid a runoff. Chambliss himself had to win re-election in 2008 in a runoff. And while President Barack Obama isn’t popular in the state, his numbers aren’t as bad here as they are in much of the rest of the South, instead reflecting the national average.
The two major-party candidates are running as outsiders, despite their pedigrees.
Nunn, who’s 47, moved to Washington with her family after her father was elected in 1972 — she was 6 when he won — but stresses that she moved back to the state in 1989. “As soon as I graduated from college I moved back to Georgia, and I’ve been here ever since,” she said. Her father held the seat until 1997.
Back in Atlanta, she co-founded the nonprofit Hands On Network volunteer group, which in 2007 merged with the Points of Light Foundation, founded by former President George H.W. Bush. Nunn became the president of the combined organization.
Perdue, who’s 64, is also a Georgia native who moved out of the state, then came home.
He worked at companies in Atlanta and eventually as the CEO of Dollar General, Reebok, and Pillowtex. He’s a founder of Perdue Partners LLC, an international trading company, and he’s the CEO of the investment firm Aquila Group LLC. Those jobs took him “from Singapore, Hong Kong, and Paris to Dallas, Boston, and Nashville,” according to his website.
“We were gone from — let’s see — from probably somewhere around 1990 to the mid-2000s, 2005 or 2006,” Perdue said.
If the candidates’ paths brought both of them home to Georgia, their approaches to issues differ greatly.
Perdue paints Nunn as a rubber stamp for Obama. Nunn says she’d work across the aisle to break partisan gridlock in Washington.
Among the flash points: health care, immigration, and taxes.
Perdue calls for repealing the Affordable Care Act and says his own health insurance was canceled because of the changes it required. His campaign provided a June 2013 letter from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia that said his wife’s plan would close, due in part to the act’s requirements for comprehensive benefits. Perdue said his new insurance included features he didn’t want at twice the premium cost.
He urges an alternative that would give tax credits and deductions for insurance purchases. It includes neither a mandate for coverage nor a requirement for insurers to cover pre-existing conditions.
Nunn said the Affordable Care Act needed to be accepted and improved. She also urges reducing the backlog of claims in the Veterans Health Administration. She calls for integrating health records to speed the process, making it easier to get services and giving employers incentives to hire veterans.
On immigration, Perdue raises fears of Middle Eastern terrorists sneaking across the U.S.-Mexico border.
“I think we ought to absolutely separate it from the immigration issue and deal with it as a security issue,” Perdue said. He calls for intensive surveillance and more patrols.
Nunn’s campaign mentions border security but also calls for “an accountable pathway to citizenship that requires those currently living here (to) go to the back of the line, pass a background check, learn English, and pay back taxes.” If that happens, she said, penalties should exist for anyone who doesn’t follow the new rules. She said she expected most to leap at the chance to become legal residents.
On taxes, they clash over the proposed Fair Tax, which would replace corporate, payroll, income, and estate taxes with a national sales tax. Proponents say a 23 percent rate would bring in the same amount as the taxes it replaced, but the nonpartisan analysis group FactCheck.org says a bipartisan panel indicates it would take a 34 percent tax rate to be revenue neutral.
“My preference is the Fair Tax,” Perdue said.
Nunn said the Fair Tax would cost most people about $4,000 a year more than they were paying now while giving the wealthiest 1 percent an average cut of $200,000.
“That is not a ‘Fair Tax’ reform for the majority of Georgians,” she said.

Photo: Be The Change, Inc via Flickr

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