AG Jeff Landry says if he runs he’ll beat Gov. John Bel Edwards

Republican Attorney General Jeff Landry says he is considering challenging Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards in next year’s election, The News Star reports, because so far no other GOP candidate has united the party for the race.
“There’s no doubt if I run I will beat John Bel Edwards, and you can tell him I said that,” Landry said Wednesday in an interview with USA Today Network.

Landry, in his first term as attorney general, said his plan, prior to Wednesday’s interview, was to run for re-election.
“When I fill up with gas, when I’m at Walmart, when I’m speaking to groups, the people keep saying, ‘I hope you’re running for governor,’” he said, “and I’m finding it harder and harder to tell them no.
“We don’t have a candidate who has said (he or she) is running who has been able to unite the (Republican) party (against Edwards). So that has caused me to reconsider. It has caused me to re-evaluate the political landscape.”

Landry and Edwards, the only Democratic governor in the South, have been feuding since both were elected in 2015.

Their latest dust-up is over the death penalty, which hasn’t been carried out in Louisiana for years because the drugs are unavailable for lethal injection. Landry has said the state should find a way to carry out executions whether it be from gas, hanging, firing squads or bringing back the electric chair.

“It’s no secret I disagree with the governor more than I agree with him,” Landry said.
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