Governor Jeff Landry has issued the call for a redistricting special session. It will begin Monday and legislators will have until January 23rd at 6 PM to finish their work. Senate President Cameron Henry says legislators will redraw the Congressional and Supreme Court map and debating a move to a closed primary elections…
“I know the clock is really ticking on the congressional maps, to an extent its ticking on the Supreme Court. Closed primaries is something that I know the governor wants to get done.”
Moving from open primary elections to closed primaries would be a major change in how we elect our officials. Henry says the special session is at least giving legislators the ability to debate this issue and can vote on it at a later time…
“Going to want to look at it now and maybe you can bring it up in the criminal justice session or you can bring it up in the regular session based on how long it would take to implement and the cost of it.”
Currently all of the candidates are placed on a primary ballot, regardless of party and the top two vote getters head into a runoff, unless one of the candidates has a majority of the vote. A closed party primary system would have Republicans and Democrats holding their own primaries and the winners facing each other in a general election.
Henry says a closed party primary election would end the December run-off in Congressional elections, which hurts newly elected U.S. Representatives and Senators when it comes to seniority…
“We all know that seniority is the main issue that drives committee assignments and influence in Washington. We start ours off at a one month disadvantage which is huge.”
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