If you’re a follower of Louisiana politics, then you’re likely aware that the state House has an upcoming election for speaker in January, writes Jeremy Alford in his latest opinion piece. In fact, you probably became aware of the 2020 internal leadership election back in 2016, when the current speaker was elected.
The candidates for the speaker so far include Republican Reps. Stuart Bishop of Lafayette, Stephen Dwight of Lake Charles, Ray Garofalo of Chalmette, Lance Harris of Alexandria, Barry Ivey of Central, Sherman Mack of Denham Springs, Tanner Magee of Houma, Jack McFarland of Jonesboro, Clay Schexnayder of Gonzales and Alan Seabaugh of Shreveport.
However, in addition to the House election, the Senate has its own contest for president and this year there’s a new election process via secret ballot.
Candidates so far include Republican Sens. Bret Allain of Franklin, Page Cortez of Lafayette, Ronnie Johns of Lake Charles and Rick Ward of Maringouin and Sharon Hewitt of Covington.
Each candidate is finding that hard commitments from their peers are difficult to come by in the Senate right now, but that will change soon, Alfords writes, although no one knows what to expect from the new ballot process.
Read Alford’s full column, which goes over the stakes at hand with the Legislature’s internal elections and details how the Senate election process will work.
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
