NEW ORLEANS — Early voting ends on November 1st next Tuesday. With the exception of Sunday, polls will be open 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. We are now on the 4th day of early voting and so far, the numbers are not aligning with years past. According to the Sectary of States website, for the last two midterm elections, there was an increase.
Of some 3.1 million registered voters in Louisiana, in 2018 10% of those voters headed to the polls early, while in 2020 30% of registered voters cast their ballot before election day. So far, in 2022, 5.9% of people have voted early. Luckily there is still time to vote if you are still undecided.
There are 8 constitutional amendments on the ballot as well as a number of local races many people are paying attention to. One of those races is the seat for U.S. House of Representative in District 1. Incumbent Steve Scalise laid out his platform on the eyewitness morning news. Congressman Scalise said since 2008 he has fought to be the voice of Louisiana, to ensure representation and funding trickles down from the state level.
"I fight for strong energy policies which we need desperately to lower energy cost," said Scalise. "We talk about coastal restoration; I’ve been able to bring hundreds of millions of dollars into Louisiana to restore our coast by passing bills like the Restore Act. Working with local officials to address flood control to address some of the other issues that we've faced here."
However, his two challengers believe they have not seen the change they would like to see in the district.
Democrat Katie Darling said, "As a constituent in his district I was looking at quality of life and it wasn’t getting better. I was sending my daughter to school, and I was concerned about the quality of education and all my neighbors are concerned about the quality of education in Louisiana. We’re all dealing with storms in struggling, our council has not addressed those issues for us here at home."
Libertarian Howard Kearney said, "We kept seeing the same old thing from the Republicans year of the year he if you just keep us in power. 'We’re going to make things better for you. We’re going to reduce taxes. We’re going to make it safer.' The reality is it’s not them, they’ve just been playing party politics and fighting between each other and not looking for solutions."
If you plan to vote by mail, you have until November 4th to request that ballot, but you have to make sure that ballot is submitted by November 7th, the day before election day.
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