In securing the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in elections Saturday, U.S. Rep. Julia Letlow carried most of the state in a low-turnout election.
Jamie Davis won the Democratic nomination in even more dominant fashion in a race that saw even smaller turnout.
Here are some takeaways that emerge when you break down the election results.
Turnout plunged
Turnout dropped precipitously in Saturday’s runoff election compared to the previous election last month.
There were 316,538 ballots cast in the Republican run-off between Letlow and Treasurer John Fleming, according to complete but unofficial results from the Secretary of State’s office. That’s a decline of 21% from the 401,174 people who voted in May.
Turnout plunged even more steeply among Democrats. Last month, 344,838 people voted in that party’s primary election — in Saturday’s runoff, 196,190 people voted. That’s a decrease of 43%.
Overall, turnout was about 17% on Saturday, according to pollster John Couvillon. The Secretary of State’s office has not yet released official turnout statistics.
Letlow carried most of the state
Letlow defeated Fleming by a margin of 57% to 43%. To get there, she carried most of the state geographically, including big margins in some of the more populous areas.
Fleming won a handful of parishes in his home turf of northwest Louisiana, in the Shreveport and Alexandria areas. But Letlow won elsewhere.
For example, Letlow won big in suburban New Orleans, beating Fleming 63-37 in Jefferson Parish and 65-35 in St. Tammany Parish. Given the larger populations in those parishes, that was enough to carry her to victory.
Letlow narrowly carried East Baton Rouge, the most populous parish, by a margin of 51-49.
See the map
To visualize where Letlow won, check out this map compiled by pollster Greg Rigamer.
Louisiana pollster Greg Rigamer assembled this map that shows how each parish voted in the U.S. Senate primary election. Parishes Julia Letlow won are in red and parishes John Fleming won are in green.
Bossier Parish was a tie
The Republican Senate election saw one unusual parish-level result: An exact tie.
Letlow and Fleming each got 4,351 votes in the parish.
A dominant win for Davis
Jamie Davis secured the Democratic nomination by an overwhelming margin, defeating Gary Crockett by a margin of 80% to 20%. To get there, he won every parish.
Staff writer Tyler Bridges contributed to this story.
