Formerly-Endangered Landrieu Suddenly Endangered Again

The number one Senate Republican takeover target this cycle is the Louisiana the seat held by Mary Landrieu. Chances of success improved after the GOP enticed state treasurer John Kennedy to switch parties to challenge her, and after Bobby Jindal won such a resounding victory in the state’s gubernatorial race last year. Then Rasmussen released a poll a few weeks ago showing Landrieu defeating Kennedy by 16 points. You can no longer find the poll results on Rasmussen’s site, but the release is cached here. There was plenty of gloating around the Leftoshpere. The left was right to crow, too. If the GOP was genuinely trailing that badly in their top takeover target, they’d be in real trouble this year. Fortunately, Rasmussen later acknowledged that the poll data was completely wrong:

In other Louisiana Senate news, a spokesman for Rasmussen Reports said that “human error” was to blame for the incorrect Landrieu-Kennedy race polling numbers that were released last week on the company’s Web site. The automated polling company first released figures that showed Landrieu ahead by 16 points and then later took down that release and posted new numbers that showed the race to be within the margin of error. After acknowledging that neither of the polling numbers were valid, the company spokesman said no new polling numbers were available on the race.

Besides not holding a dramatic lead in the polls, Landrieu also trailed Kenendy in first quarter fundraising. That’s not a promising position for an incumbent.

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