The Louisiana Democratic Party is constitutionally incapable of simply taking the win against Jeff Landry's constitutional amendments. They're much more focused on belittling the various community groups who did the actual work of delivering that win for them.
BATON ROUGE -- Louisiana Democratic Party Chair Randal Gaines Thursday called voters’ defeat of all four constitutional amendments backed by Gov. Jeff Landry “a defining moment in Louisiana politics” and attempted to take credit for the display of bipartisan opposition.
“What was determinative was, in my opinion, the messaging of the party,” Gaines told Gambit following a press conference at the party’s headquarters. “Because the activist groups don't have those relationships.”
Gaines went on to claim that’s because “they're not necessarily within a circle of trust of our Louisiana voters. The party is."
It's unclear what Gaines’ belief is based on. Democrats have had increasing difficulty in even fielding a candidate in local and state level races for the last decade, leaving many Republican state legislators to run unopposed for years. The party also lost the statewide election in 2023 badly, handing control of all levels of government to Republicans and leading many Democrats to call for totally rebuilding the party.
Remember Randal Gaines is only the party chair now because of the many failures alluded to in that last paragraph which were presided over by his predecessor. But, because the change in leadership was forced on the party by some of the activist groups Gaines is chiding here, the party is never going to forgive them for speaking out of turn. There's no "trust" left with the voters at all. The only circles in evidence come in the form of zeroes that show up on statewide Democratic ballot lines instead of viable candidates.
A post-mortem analysis by the Times-Picayune shows several factors behind the demise of Landry's amendments including organized opposition from religious conservatives concerned about taxation of church activities as well as from a coalition of progressive groups detailed here.
The progressive groups say each of them started out opposing individual amendments, but they ended up joining forces to oppose all four.
“We realized early on that if we got everybody under the same umbrella and had the same messaging, we could be more effective,” said Drew Prestridge, who handled communications for notothemall.org
Added Peter Robins-Brown, executive director of Louisiana Progress: “It all came together to create a pretty overwhelming chorus.”
His group opposed Amendment 1, fearing it would allow the selection of unelected judges by conservative lawmakers to supersede the power of elected progressive judges in big cities. It also opposed Amendment 3, which would have allowed more children to be jailed in adult prisons.
Invest in Louisiana, a Baton Rouge-based group, focused on the anti-Amendment 2 message.
Taking the lead in opposing Amendment 3 was a recently created coalition called the Liberty and Dignity Campaign, led by Kristen Rome of the Louisiana Center for Children’s Rights, Sarah Omojola of the Vera Institute of Justice and Ashley Shelton of the Power Coalition for Equity and Justice.
Gaines's "messaging of the party" isn't even discussed.
It's understandable that party brass would feel a little bit left out given the size of the victory they slept through. What it came down to, especially with regard to the absurdly byzantine Amendment 2, is voters correctly perceived that they were being bullshitted by the Landry camp. Shockingly, people don't like to be condescended and lied to. Even the voters who are normally your political allies will turn on you for it.
Jeff Landry, not being particularly known for his humility or his smarts, is having a hard time learning that lesson. In response to the election results, he chose more condescension saying in a statement that voters are "conditioned for failure." He also has resorted to more outlandish lies with "Soros" insinuations drawn straight from the stupidest corners of the conspiracy forums.
However, as we noted here, the Governor and his allies are preparing to try again, likely with more brute force; holding more of the state budget hostage, and possibly finding new ways to purge the voter rolls. It remains to be seen how much comfort Randall Gaines' "circle of trust" will be for anyone in the way of that.