With just three months to go until the primary in Louisiana’s governor’s race, Jeremy Alford says the only number that matters right now is $9.3 million.
“That’s how much U.S. Sen. David Vitter and his allied super PAC, the Fund for Louisiana’s Future, collectively have in the bank,” Alford writes in his latest column. “To put that figure into perspective, that’s more cash than some presidential candidates have behind their bids. And it’s a guarantee that Vitter’s opponents won’t come anywhere close to raising that kind of dough.”
But despite Vitter’s already-massive war chest—and the stakes involved—there’s been a chorus of complaints lately that no one is paying attention to the race, Alford says.
“After all, if it isn’t playing out on TV, then politically it doesn’t exist,” he writes. “But that’s going to change soon. All of the campaigns and outside groups will start unloading their cash and media buys in mid-August, if not sooner, which will shove the contest to the forefront.”
Alford says Vitter has become the frontrunner in the race. But as one of three Republicans running, he says, Vitter’s lead polling position could potentially be taken over by the lone Democrat, state Rep. John Bel Edwards, who only needs to consolidate the party’s traditional blocs to claim the top spot in October.
“Of course, that’s easier said than done,” Alford writes. “And what happens in a runoff after that is a completely different election, with the odds in Vitter’s favor.”
With universal name recognition and “piles of campaign cash that loom as large as his D.C. madam controversy,” Alford says, it’s possible that Vitter has nowhere from which to pull new votes.
“If he does somehow slide behind Edwards in the primary polls and lose some of his share—a big ‘if’—it could keep the other GOP candidates, Public Service Commissioner Scott Angelle and Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne, in contention,” he writes. “But they’ll never be able to outspend Vitter; any advances in this election will have to be accomplished through finesse and war-like tactics.”
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.
