Less Than A Week From Election Day, What’s The 5th District Going To Do?

Of the six Congressional races taking place around Louisiana, there is only one which looks competitive enough that it will generate a runoff. That would be the 5th District race centered in the northeastern part of the state, in which nine candidates are duking it out for a pair of spots in what looks like a Republican-vs.-Democrat finale in December.

Right now, the smart money on the two final contestants appears to have Luke Letlow on the Republican side and Candy Christophe of the Democrats as the top two finishers Tuesday night.

Letlow has been landing a slew of key endorsements in the past few days, including one from House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy this morning and, on Monday, pledges from 17 different sheriffs within the district.

The sheriffs’ endorsements were a rather bitter pill for Letlow’s chief opponent on the Republican side, state representative Lance Harris. Harris had positioned himself as the law-and-order candidate in the race, particularly with messages like this one…

Harris’ latest ad is a bit of a response to Letlow’s endorsements…

We haven’t seen any public polling on the race but what we’ve been told by observers close to the situation is that Letlow is ahead of Harris somewhat comfortably. His latest ad gives that impression…

That ad just screams “frontrunner.” It’s built to give off the impression of Letlow as more or less an incumbent, which he would somewhat be as current Rep. Ralph Abraham’s long-time chief of staff. While Harris’ ad has him all alone, Letlow has him taking pictures with Trump and on video with Abraham. And now he’s got the House Majority Leader endorsing him.

The ad doesn’t even talk about ideology, as Harris’ ads have frequently done. Letlow is positioning himself as a big-tent Republican whom Democrats can vote for.

There aren’t any polls out on the race, but, via Ballotpedia here’s what the money looks like on the race…

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What we’re told is that Christophe, who in her 2nd quarter campaign finance report was sitting on negative-$10,000 in cash on hand but has managed to right that ship slightly, is well ahead of Lemelle as the Democrats’ frontrunner.

Where that $71,000 went, we don’t know. She hasn’t put out a campaign ad that we know about. This is the last item to appear on her YouTube…

Christophe’s Facebook page is busier. But she has only about 1700 followers, which is the same number her chief competitor Martin Lemelle claims. By contrast Letlow has 5,000 likes and another 3,700 likes for a Facebook group dedicated to his campaign, while Harris has 2,400 likes and a third Republican, Scotty Robinson, has 2,000.

We’ll see if that kinda-sorta consensus of a Letlow-Christophe runoff pans out. It’s less than a week from the election, and it’s still anybody’s guess whether that prediction will hold true.

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