midnight: The margin in LA-02 did narrow - but not enough for Jefferson to take the lead. With all precincts reporting, Cao prevailed by 3% (about 2,000 votes). For an explanation as to how a Republican can beat a Democrat (even an indicted one) in a 50% African-American district, take a look at the drop in turnout in Orleans Parish: On November 4th, about 150,000 voters went to the polls. Today, that number fell to about 45,000!
A fuller analysis will wait until tomorrow, but this is clearly a great night for Republicans who save a highly endangered seat and pick up another one almost out of nowhere - holding the overall number of Democratic pick-ups to a net of 19 (with OH-15 and VA-05 still outstanding). It might also be a good night for the House Democratic leadership: They are finally rid of the Jefferson problem that has been giving them huge headaches for the past three years!
11:15pm: The AP calls New Orleans-based LA-02 for Republican Joseph Cao! This is an extremely heavy Democratic seat that virtually no one was paying attention to despite Jefferson’s indictement for corruption (it was assumed that Jefferson could only be defeated in the Democratic primaries). In fact, it is more Democratic than any red district is Republican. Beyond Jefferson’s indictment, an upset of this nature was only made possible by low turnout.
11pm: Republicans saved LA-04 in a tight finish - though the race could be thrown into a recount since the margin is inferior to 0.5%. Bossier County’s final precincts allowed Fleming to take a stunning last-minute lead of only 356 votes - making this one of the tightest House races of the 2008 cycle and yet another heart-warming save for the GOP. Note that the AP has not yet called the race, so perhaps there is a reservoir of votes left somewhere (provisionals?), and we should postpone a final call if there is indeed the potential for a recount.
10:50pm: All parishes but Bossier have now finished reporting, accounting for 94% of the total vote, and Carmouche is ahead by 1,850 votes. If the remaining 37 precincts of Bossier comes like the 38 precincts that have already reported, Fleming should pick up about 1,750. Needless to say, this race remains too close to call.
10:35pm: With 90% of precincts reporting, Carmouche is holding on to a 1,900 lead. However, more than half of Bossier Parish (an extremely conservative area in which Fleming is demolishing Carmouche by 1,600 votes already) has yet to report. Carmouche should be helped by 20 counties that are left in Caddo County but the margin is almost sure to narrow considerably. In LA-02, Jefferson has cut his deficit by half - but he still trails by 10% with more than half of the vote in! Keep in mind that we do not know which parts of New Orleans have reported and Jefferson could gain rapidly if the most heavily African-American precincts have yet to report.
10:20pm: Incredible numbers are pouring in from LA-02, a very Democratic district with a 50% African-American electorate: Rep. Jefferson is trailing by 20% with a fourth of the vote in! Even though the Republican parish is more than half-reporting (while the New Orleans parish is only at 20%), we might be in for a wild ride here.
In LA-04, meanwhile, things are looking better for Carmouche, who is now leading by 2% (1,100 votes) with 70% of the vote reporting. Half of the remaining precincts are located in heavily Democratic Caddo County.
10pm: With exactly 50% of the vote reporting in LA-04, Fleming leads by 400 votes - but the Republican parishes have been tallied more than Democratic parishes (there is a lot of Caddo County left). In LA-02, votes are starting to come in - and have the Republican nominee crushing Jefferson. It would be a huge upset for a GOPer to win New Orleans, but it is not entirely impossible.
9:40pm: Democrat Paul Carmouche has grabbed a 2% lead with 16% of precincts reporting. The good news for Carmouche is that Coddo County (the only county Obama won in the district) has barely started reporting. There are no results from LA-02 for now, where Rep. Jefferson is expected to survive despite his indictment.
Original post: Polls have now closed in LA-02 and LA-04, the last two elections of the 2008 cycle! The latter race attracted the most attention, of course, as Democrats are trying to add one more pick-up to their already impressive roster. With only 18 precincts reporting (out of 640), Republican nominee John Fleming has a narrow 50% to 48% lead - but these are obviously very early results.
I wonder if Rep. Jefferson’s constituents would ever kick him out, but seeing how it is a Black Majority district and I believe one of, if the the most, Democratic District in Lousiana it is very unlikely he could lose to a Republican even if he was actually convicted, althrough that event would probably cause him to lose a primary if it happened before then.
Woah, could Jefferson actually lose? I actually believe that he deserves to lose, even to a Republican, seeing as how corrupt he is.
In LA-04, Carmouche is showing that he is much stronger opponent than Martin in Georgia. A big part of it is that his opponent is not an incubement and has little political experieince, but also that Carmouche is a better fit for his district and he isn’t shamelessly trying to go on Obama’s coattails, but instead worked on how he himself would help the people of the district…with a little help from the House Democrats.
Wow. I wanted Jefferson gone but Democrats should have found a way to do that in the primary.
Amen to Rob. If anti-Jefferson Democrats had their act together and were not just looking out for number one (themselves), they could and should have defeated him in the primary. That way we’ve have been spared of two years of representation by an apparently socially-conservative Republican.
Good that Jefferson lost and in 2010 the Dems will pick up the seat, just like the GOP picked up several formerly safe seats they lost in 2006.
The GOP will try and gloat but they have 41/42 Senators, Obama in the White House (soon) and Pelosi has an 80 seat majority in the house - not exactly what the GOP can claim as success. It was a local issue with low turnout - of course they will grope for any good news.
You are right about that Ken, but it is important to know that this district is heavily Democratic and all of the African Americans who ran in in the primary against Jefferson probably didn’t anticpate that Jefferson moving on to the general would translate to a Republican winning, especially when Jefferson was able to win reelection fairly easily against another black Democrat in 2006. Cao will definitly start out as the most endangered incumbent in 2010, as Obama won about 75% in the district: about 22 points better than his nationwide showing. When the Cook updates his PVI for the 111th congress some of the Democrats who won in Districts Bush won easily would probably have the PVI increase, as McCain probably did the same or only slightly worse than Bush, but the fact that his vote total is lower would skew the numbers more to the lean Republican ailse. However, I don’t think there is a seat represented by a Democrat in which Obama only got around 25% of the vote.
If VA-05 holds, up the Democratic gain will be a disappointing 20 seats. I nearly fell out of my chair after the LA-02 call for Cao, but the Democrats were asleep in not getting a quality challenger to Jefferson in the primary.