Courtesy of the indispensable AOSHQDD comes the first early voting numbers for Louisiana’s Senate runoff numbers, and if the trends hold they’re gruesome for Mary Landrieu. The summary: about 136,000 people did early/absentee voting as of 11/25/2014. 72% of those voters were white, 25% black, the rest ‘other.’ If the numbers found here are accurate, Landrieu got 94% of the black vote in the primary… and 18% of the white vote. Some back of the envelope calculations later… if the same electorate that voted in the general election also votes in the runoff, Bill Cassidy is ahead of Mary Landrieu, 62-38 (if you spot all of the Other votes to Landrieu the win goes ‘down’ to 61/39).
Those are a lot of assumptions, mind you. The racial breakdown of the vote is largely based on the CNN exit polls; and, of course, local Democrats are going to go do their level best to increase black turnout. But even if the Democrats manage to get a runoff electorate that’s 30% black Mary Landrieu still loses. Badly (59/41)*. This is so much of a looming disaster for the Landrieu campaign that I’m actively slightly suspicious of it. No way is she losing this badly, right?
Moe Lane (crosspost)
PS: Seriously, though, DOOM.
*I didn’t even bother to factor in the ‘Other’ votes, that time. The only difference would be in in how far the rubble bounced.