Vitter Haunts Dardenne's Election Bill

JUNE 1, 2009 POLITICS / JOHN MAGINNIS



Call him paranoid, but Sen. David Vitter is taking no chances with any change in the law that could threaten his re-election next year--that is, more than he already has threatened it by his past association with an escort service in Washington, D.C.

The junior senator's acute sense of survival drew his attention to a seemingly harmless legislative bill concerning minor political parties that was offered by Secretary of State Jay Dardenne. While the bill, on its surface, had no effect on his candidacy, Vitter and Republican supporters approached it like it was the first skirmish of next year's election. For those keeping score, he won.

Dardenne was trying to avert an unforeseen consequence of the state's return to party primaries in congressional elections. His office crafted a bill that, in effect, would require the state to conduct primary elections for only the two major parties and not for the three other officially recognized but minor parties: Libertarian, Green and Reform. Combined they have about 5,000 members statewide.

Say, for example, a power struggle breaks out in the Libertarian Party, and two of its members decide to run for the U.S. Senate. Assuming multiple Democrats and Republicans ran, the ballot would list candidates under three separate party primaries. Trouble is, the state has invested in new computerized voting machines that only display two sets of primaries. Dardenne estimates it would cost $38 million to reprogram all the voting machines and to train voting commissioners on the lockout procedures, which, even as they now stand, proved to be confusing to voters and commissioners in last fall's elections.

Rather than go through all that, under the proposed law, if two minor party rivals could not settle their differences beforehand, both their names would appear on the general election ballot in November.

Enter Sen. Vitter, who cares not a whit about Secretary Dardenne's software concerns but seemed leery of his ulterior motives. Dardenne has said he is considering challenging Vitter in next year's Republican primary. According to the bill's sponsor, Rep. Wayne Waddell, R-Shreveport, Vitter called him a half dozen times to express concern that Dardenne would later try to have the bill amended to allow independents to vote in either party's primary. That would not suit the senator at all.

When the Legislature reinstated party primaries for congressional elections, it let the parties’ governing bodies determine which voters could participate in each. The Democrats opened their primary to independent voters, those unaffiliated with either party, while Republicans closed theirs to members only.

Vitter much prefers a closed GOP primary, because that would not give pesky independents the opportunity to vote against him should Dardenne or some other Republican challenge him.

Rep. Waddell wasn't the only one Vitter called. After the author and Dardenne explained the bill to the House & Governmental Affairs Committee and pledged to entertain no amendments, Rep. Noble Ellington, D-Winnsboro, said he had received phone calls from individuals he did not name who were still concerned about the legislation.

That got a rise from assistant secretary Tom Schedler, who said no one contacted him or Dardenne about the bill. "We cannot respond to a ghost," said Schedler. "Let the ghost call me."

Ellington said he was satisfied with Dardenne's explanation, but asked to delay voting on the bill, saying, "It would give me some time to talk to the ghost. . . . It's a big ghost."

The delay was granted, but the damage was done. Spooked Republicans may have trusted Dardenne, but they have seen enough slippery maneuvers in this session--"rookiedoos," in legislative parlance--to be wary of what could happen to the bill once it left the committee.

Democrats on the committee, perhaps delighting in the GOP squabble, seized the opportunity to defend the voting rights of the minor parties. The following week, the bill was deferred and is presumed dead.

Vitter and the status quo prevailed. Dardenne didn't exactly lose, but now that he has drawn attention to the possibility of a minor party primary, it is ever more likely he will have to conduct one next year.