This might be fun—to see perhaps the most arrogant, partisan, and fraudulent governor in Louisiana history getting his ego busted.

It appears that Democrat former Gov. John Bel Edwards has held multiple conversations with Democrat Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer about running for GOP Sen. Bill Cassidy’s seat in 2026. It’s not clear who is courting whom, but the electoral map is such that for Democrats to take control of the chamber, they would need an extremely good election night—which means recruiting candidates who stand at least a ghost of a chance of winning. Seemingly, Edwards told Schumer to check back with him later this summer.

Edwards doesn’t fall into that category. He rode into office presenting himself as a generic blank slate—but in a way that made voters think he was conservative, by emphasizing alleged traditional social values. He became the only governor ever to win reelection with fewer votes than in his initial term (though that’s a small sample size, as consecutive terms weren’t possible constitutionally until 1975), barely skating by thanks to the Trump 45 economic recovery wave—even as he pursued policies within Louisiana that ran counter to the ideas behind that recovery.

But any political future he had in Louisiana beyond a menial office collapsed as his second term began. This was the governor whose overly-restrictive Wuhan coronavirus pandemic policy cost more lives than they saved—and which ran afoul of the state constitution, a battle that confronted him right off the bat. Over the next four years, he lied in public about the death of black motorist Ronald Greene for political reasons and, as it now turns out, lied in private to the federal government to secure approval of the Mid-Barataria Sediment Diversion Project, depending upon politicized data. He also nearly doubled the state budget while leading the policy charge that depopulated the state more than nearly any other, and simultaneously made Louisiana an economic leper of the South.

As if this wasn’t enough for most Louisianans to tire of this fake, he revealed his true social liberalism in that second term as well. He fought to let unscrupulous adults mutilate children, tried to circumvent the criminal justice system to thwart capital punishment, and revealed himself as favoring certain instances of abortion. No candidate for statewide office can win with a record like that.

This disgust is confirmed by the swift dismantling of nearly everything he did in state government. Oversized government takes time to shrink, and Medicaid expansion still bedevils the state (and at the expense of its most vulnerable citizens), but under the impetus of Republican Gov. Jeff Landry the vast majority of Edwards’ imprint has been erased. Dozens of bills that sharply contrast with Edwards’ blocked agenda have now become law in just one year. Perhaps most galling for him, his departure and Landry’s takeover has sparked a renaissance of economic development.

So, we begin from the premise that, given this history, Edwards would be unelectable—even though watching his policy impact disappear as quickly as did statuary to Stalin must prick at his inflated ego and sorely tempt him to run for something substantial. It won’t work, and here’s why.

The fantasy at play here for the left is that Edwards sails through the new party primary system to face a bruised GOP survivor. Then, being an off-year election where in recent elections Republicans have been favored by higher-turnout affairs, such as during presidential elections, he reconstitutes the magic, each time previously in facing a depleted Republican, who allowed him to slide into office.

There are many reasons this won’t happen. First, there’s absolutely no guarantee that he makes it out of the Democrats’ primary. In the  2022 Senate cycle, the fading white economic liberal/social conservative wing of the party backed another white male military veteran as their favored son, only to get their helmets handed to them by the more numerous in support and now dominant part of the party, blacks, who ended up giving more votes to a buffoonish black community organizer detested by the old guard.

Any semi-credible black candidate would likely ace out Edwards in a semi-closed primary. Imagine someone like Democrat Rep. Cleo Fields–who weeks from now may find his congressional district on the way to being dismantled into a map where he cannot win–deciding he has nothing to lose by trying for Cassidy’s seat. Edwards wouldn’t stand a chance.

And even if he did advance, the general election dynamics are not in his favor. We’re not talking about five weeks between elections as he took advantage of in years gone by; this time it’ll be six months—ample time for the Republican nominee to unify the party and mount an aggressive campaign And, in this century Senate off-year contests in Louisiana, while averaging over 20 fewer points in turnout than presidential elections, still outdraw gubernatorial ones by a bit.

Louisianans had eight years to get to know the real John Bel Edwards, and they won’t forget–as a Republican campaigner won’t let them forget – if a black Democrat doesn’t torpedo him first.

The dynamics that once allowed him to squeak into statewide office no longer exist. He has no realistic path to victory.

Which means, if he does run, it will be purely to satisfy his vanity. Whether that alone will be enough to compel him into a humiliating defeat next year remains to be seen—but if it does, observers should enjoy the spectacle of watching him get knocked down to size.