In tough Senate race, pork couldn’t buy Landrieu victory

Much has been written about the national Democratic Party’s decision to abandon Landrieu in her runoff against Republican Rep. Bill Cassidy. There’s been a lot of talk about Landrieu’s futile struggle to distance herself from President Obama. And her lonely role as a disappearing southern Democrat.

But there’s been less attention paid to something that was absolutely central to Landrieu’s re-election bid: Her effort to shower Louisiana in election-year federal largesse. As polls showed her in a difficult race, Landrieu tossed taxpayer dollars right and left, looking to buy enough support to get herself over the finish line one more time.

Landrieu’s fundamental argument for her re-election was that she “delivers” for Louisiana. Everybody knew what that meant. And in case they didn’t, month after month, Landrieu’s Senate website announced the awarding of new federal grants to her constituents. Here is a selection from just the last six weeks of the campaign:

That went on for month after month. And it wasn’t just handouts of money. Many municipalities in Louisiana still had outstanding Federal Emergency Management Agency loans dating back to Hurricane Katrina. As Landrieu saw a tough re-election race approaching, she worked loan forgiveness into a Homeland Security bill. And then she crowed about debts being forgiven all around the state, courtesy of Louisiana’s senior senator.

The result was that some local Republican officeholders developed a sense of indebtedness to Landrieu and decided to support her re-election bid, or at least sit out the contest with Cassidy.

Take, for example, St. Tammany Parish, an electorally crucial Republican suburb of New Orleans. The parish school system received forgiveness for nearly $68 million in Katrina loans last December. Then came $10 million in forgiveness for the Parish Sheriff’s Office, and $14.5 million in forgiveness for the parish government. After all that Landrieu-driven generosity, Pat Brister, the Republican president of St. Tammany Parish and a former chair of the Louisiana state GOP, decided not to endorse fellow Republican Cassidy. While Brister did not endorse Landrieu, either, she did appear at a Landrieu fundraiser, and, when I visited last March, explained that Landrieu had done an awful lot for St. Tammany. At the fundraiser, Brister said, “I thanked her profusely. I was happy to do it, because I think she’s done a lot.”

Landrieu made federal money work in other ways. One of Louisiana’s more powerful economic players is Bollinger Shipyards, run by big Republican donor Boysie Bollinger. Despite his relationship with the GOP, in 2014 Bollinger decided to endorse Landrieu. Only a cynic would have concluded that his endorsement had anything to do with the fact that in late 2013 the Coast Guard awarded Bollinger a $250 million contract to build six new cutters. Landrieu got that into the Homeland Security bill, too.

That kind of clout was hard for Cassidy, a three-term representative of Louisiana’s 6th Congressional District, to match. Yes, Cassidy talked a lot about his work securing federal flood insurance for Louisiana. But the fact is, he couldn’t match Landrieu’s ability to shower the state with federal money. So he argued — and hoped — that his state’s voters would be influenced by his policy ideas and opposition to Obama programs.

“The issue is who can bring you better ideas,” Cassidy told me in March. “If the issue is good policy and effectiveness, I win.”

Cassidy supporters filled in the case that Louisiana voters wouldn’t be swayed by federal spending as much as they had been in previous years. “I think the Washington approach, the Landrieu approach, that she has used the last few times to win re-election, about what she delivers from Washington — Washington-based solutions — that’s effective with a certain ruling establishment class, but your rank and file are more concerned with what’s hitting their pocketbook and what’s impacting them every day,” Jason Dore, executive director of the state GOP, told me.

One Cassidy aide put it in a catchier way: The political debate, he explained, has moved into a “post-pork paradigm.” Voters care more about policy than goodies from Washington.

I have to admit I was skeptical last spring, as I surveyed the incredible amounts of money Landrieu was spreading around the state. Sure, anybody can announce a “post-pork paradigm,” but money still goes a long way in politics, doesn’t it? But it turned out Cassidy was right.

Cassidy also got a huge assist from the other Republicans who won control of the Senate in November’s midterm elections. Landrieu’s argument that she could continue to “deliver” for Louisiana was predicated on Democrats keeping the Senate, and her becoming chair of the Senate Energy Committee. But a Landrieu chairmanship became officially impossible on Nov. 4, and Louisiana voters knew that even if they sent Landrieu back to the Senate, she would be in the minority and therefore wouldn’t have the power to bring home a virtually endless supply of bacon to her home state. So a campaign based on the promise of pork collapsed on itself.

Now Cassidy is heading to the Senate. He’ll no doubt do some “delivering” for Louisiana, too; politics is still politics. But the fact is, voters had a look at Landrieu’s old-fashioned way of doing things and decided it was time to try something new.