Race Analysis

10/28/14 -- This race seems clearly headed for a December runoff, where Cassidy currently has a polling edge.

10/17/14 -- The rallying of Tea Party voters around Rob Maness seems to be driving this election toward a runoff, where Cassidy appears to be the increasingly heavy favorite, for now.

9/29/14 -- For a while it seemed at least possible that Cassidy would avoid a runoff, but the endorsement of various conservative groups for Rob Maness probably puts an end to that. Cassidy still has the edge in a likely runoff.

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Like many Southern states, Louisiana was long dominated by Democrats -- from 1900 through 1964 there wasn’t a single Republican member of the statehouse, to say nothing of federal office. Also like other Southern states, this masked a competitive system -- Louisiana was split between the Catholic south and Protestant north, and between the populist Long and conservative anti-Long factions.

As the Democratic stranglehold on the South began to collapse, the state began electing Republicans, first to Congress, then as governor. But the state resisted sending a Republican to the Senate. There were near misses: John Breaux won in 1986 by six percentage points, while Mary Landrieu’s 1996 margin of victory was only 5,000 votes. Republicans finally broke through in 2004 when Breaux retired and David Vitter won a majority of the votes in the open primary, avoiding a general election; he was re-elected handily in 2010 despite suffering a prostitution scandal in the interim.

This year, Landrieu faces re-election in the worst environment she’s ever had to run in. First, she drew a credible opponent in GOP Rep. Bill Cassidy. Second, she has to run for re-election in a state where President Obama’s job approval rating is mired in the 30s. Finally, she is running in a midterm year, when the African-American support that buoyed her in 2008 is likely to weaken. A runoff in December seems likely at this point. Cassidy has led, but no one can really say with certainty at this point what that electorate will look like, or how things will play out if control of the Senate is already decided.