More on the Louisiana runoff

A couple days ago this article on the Fix at The Washington Post popped up in my Google Alerts. In it, Aaron Blake brings up something I had written about five days earlier--the very strong possibility that the Senate election in Louisiana will proceed to a runoff due to the inability of the two highest-polling candidates, incumbent Sen. Mary Landrieu and U.S. Rep. Bill Cassidy, to break 50%. 

Blake suggests a pretty simple (and pretty good, roughly) way to interpret the polls that don't ask about the head-to-head between Sen. Landrieu and Rep. Cassidy--just stack up the votes for Republican candidates--that includes state representative Paul Hollis and retired USAF Col. Rob Maness as well as Rep. Cassidy--and those are the votes Republicans get in the runoff.

Pollsters Are Looking at the Wrong Race in Louisiana

Don't get me wrong; the Senate race is the only statewide one this year. (Louisiana holds its statewide elections every fourth year; the most recent one was in 2011.)

What I'm referring to is the Pelican State's unique (well, within the United States) system of elections, a holdover from when New Orleans was the largest city in the French North American colonies. A holdover from French civil law, Louisiana doesn't hold primaries; instead it pits every candidate that files from all parties into a great one-versus-the-world battle, known as a "jungle primary". If no majority is reached by a single candidate, the two highest-performing candidates advance to a runoff held on December 6. This allows for some great political theater, but it's hard on pollsters who have to decide which candidates to include in their polling, especially since it's possible for multiple candidates to run from each party.