LaPolitics Weekly Publisher Jeremy Alford was enjoying boiled crawfish with his family last Friday when he received a text message from a longtime Capitol player, who wrote he felt like Louisianans were at a breaking point when it comes to status quo in government and politics.
The mood of the electorate would soon make way for change, the messenger said, before asking Alford for his thoughts. It was a lofty question, writes Alford in his latest column.
“As I peeled a crawfish, it occurred to me that the vast majority of residents aren’t engaged on government and political issues at all,” he writes. “We have a population of 4.6 million people in Louisiana, of which about 1 million of them are not eligible to vote.”
Another 600,000 residents are eligible to vote, but aren’t registered. And of the 2.9 million Louisianans who are registered, only a small percentage take the time to weigh in on elections.
The last statewide primary held in October drew just a 13.6% turnout, or 406,000 voters. Put another way, nearly 9% of the total state population decided those statewide elections.
“Yet even among those who never vote, and we all know someone who fits that description, the ‘same old song and dance’ sentiment appears to run strong. Even if it’s just a matter of cliche,” he says. “When it comes to chronic voters, or those folks I meet at chamber and Rotary meetings across Louisiana, the sentiment exists there as well. Sometimes to the extreme, and even more so lately.”
People want something different, declares Alford, pondering whether that explains why Gov. John Bel Edwards, the lone Democrat in the Deep South, continues to enjoy great poll numbers here.
“He’s different—none of the wonk of Bobby Jindal, without the emotions of Kathleen Blanco and devoid of the political pragmatism of Edwin Edwards,” he writes. “President Donald Trump, of course, showed us what that anti-status quo sentiment can really look like when voters pounce. He’s the real case study.”
Jeremy Alford publishes LaPolitics Weekly, a newsletter on Louisiana politics, at LaPolitics.com. Follow him on Twitter, or on Facebook. He can be reached at JJA@LaPolitics.com.
