With no small amount of attention or controversy, her office is endeavoring to buy new voting machines. She’s also traveling the state and spreading the word about Louisiana’s new party primary system, while preparing for another round of elections next month.
Late last week, meanwhile, she transitioned to 24/7 watch as the Legislature convened a special session to alter her office’s 2026 election calendar.
To put it mildly, Secretary of State Nancy Landry has one of the hottest elected seats in the state right now—and political temperatures are only increasing.
Pushing the thermostat further, Landry is engaged in a high-stakes disagreement with Attorney General Liz Murrill, who cancelled the secretary of state’s legal counsel over a dispute about Louisiana’s redistricting case before the U.S. Supreme Court.
As the U.S. Supreme Court decides whether the state’s congressional map and its two majority Black districts should stand, Murrill argued she was the state’s chief legal officer and Landry didn’t need a voice in the proceedings.
Landry, however, will have a voice in the special session as lawmakers debate delaying next year’s elections for a month as they await a court decision on the need for a new congressional map.
“We’ve just been providing them with the possibilities, because you can’t just move an election to any date,” Landry says. “Elections have a domino effect, and when you move one thing, it affects everything else.”
ABOUT THESE ELECTIONS
What matters most to Landry is not when the ruling comes, but when her office receives a new map from the Legislature.
She also has to consider all of the behind-the-scenes mechanics the average legislator overlooks. For example, under federal law, ballots must be mailed to military and overseas voters 45 days before the election.
Next year’s federal elections already carried the uncertainty of how voters will respond to the return of party primaries in Louisiana, which sowed confusion and frustration when they were last used here in 2008 and 2010.
As such, Landry’s office launched a “robust voter education campaign” to help citizens navigate the new system. That effort started with sending mail explaining the basics of party primaries to every voter household in the state, though those mailers included dates that won’t be valid much longer.
“We want [voters] to know in advance what their options will be,” Landry says.
