Midterm Election Results in Louisiana

In this year’s midterm election, all six Constitutional Amendments were passed. Also, four republican and one democrat were elected as U.S. Representatives, including Steve Scalise (R), Cedric Richmond (D), Ralph Abraham (R), Garret Graves (R), and Walter Lanier (R). The two Secretary of State candidates, Kyle Ardoin (R) and Gwen Collins-Greenup (D), will have a run off soon.
Over 60 percent of the state of Louisiana voted, which is almost unheard of for a midterm election. More people voted in this election than in the last election for governor.
The most talked-about amendment that was passed requires a unanimous jury decision for all felony cases. Louisiana is one of the last states to pass this.
LSU criminologist, Peter Scharf, feels that not having a unanimous jury was a way to keep more black people in jail. “In the 19th century, it was an effort to make sure African-Americans got put away no matter what the niceties of law were. How many people are in jail because of non-unanimous jury verdicts? This is a very powerful amendment,” said Scharf.
The other amendments passed were to prohibit felons from running for public office for at least five years following release, to allow political subdivisions to exchange public equipment and personnel for authorized activities, to prohibit using money in the Transportation Trust Fund by state police for traffic control purposes, to allow special assessments for certain homes held in trust, and to require a tax phase-in for primary homes when an assessment increases by more than 50 percent.
According to Tyrane Hardy, a senior psychology major from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, the results for the Representatives were no surprise because Louisiana is a known Republican state. “Louisiana is a red state and has been my entire life. It didn’t surprise me or anybody really that mostly republican representatives won. I’m more surprised that we got a democrat elected as a Representative” said Hardy.
Political Analyst, Jim Engster, says that voter turnout for the Secretary of State runoff is expected to be low. “The only thing keeping the race interesting is late drama with the state’s contract to replace thousands of voting machines,” says Engster.
Whoever wins the runoff election will be responsible for not only securing new voting machines in 2019, but also for ensuring trust and confidence in the voters that the new machines will call for fair elections.
The runoff election will be held on December 8.