Party affiliation
Up until 2007,Guillory had been a registered Republican [7] and served on the Louisiana Republican state central committee. [8] He became a Democrat in 2007 when he first ran for the state House in the heavily Democratic District 40. [8] [9] [10] During the 2013 regular session of the Louisiana Legislature,Guillory switched his party affiliation back to Republican. [11] Officially,Guillory's party-switch occurred on May 31,when he was presented with the Frederick Douglass Award from the @Large Society.
Before Guillory's switch,the last Republican of African-American ethnicity in the Louisiana Senate had served during the Reconstruction era. [12] In accepting the award,Guillory compared himself to 19th-century abolitionist Frederick Douglass,a Republican who had supported Abraham Lincoln. [13]
Guillory's conservative political philosophy was indicated in his pre-2007 membership in the Republican Party,according to the Daily Kos , [14] Guillory explained his 2013 party switch in a 4-minute 17-second video widely circulated in state and national media outlets,including the radio programs of Rush Limbaugh,Sean Hannity,and Moon Griffon as well as by Neil Cavuto on Fox News. The video was viewed on YouTube within the first three days by nearly 500,000. Filmed in the rear of the Senate chamber,the video calls the Democrats "the party of Jim Crow" and depicts "the party of freedom and progress" as the Republicans. Guillory called his switch "not only right for me,but for all of my brothers and sisters in the black community" as he left the Democrats for the Republicans. [15]
Soon after re-joining the Republican Party,Guillory founded the Free at Last PAC,a political action committee dedicated to electing black conservatives to office.
2015 lieutenant gubernatorial campaign
Within days of Guillory's change of parties, Jim Shannon of KLTV-TV speculated that Guillory would become a candidate for lieutenant governor in the 2015 state elections, when Jay Dardenne stepped down to run unsuccessfully against Democrat John Bel Edwards and fellow Republican U.S. Senator David Vitter for the governorship vacated by the term-limited Bobby Jindal. [18] In the runoff on November 21, 2015, Edwards won the election over David Vitter with 56.1% of the vote, becoming the first Democratic governor elected in the Deep South since the end of Kathleen Blanco's term in 2008. [19]
Guillory ran last in the October 24 four-candidate primary, having finished with 85,460 votes (7.9 percent). Holden with 360,679 votes (33.3 percent) and Nungesser, who polled 324,654 (30 percent), meet in the November 21 runoff election. John Young ran a strong third with 313,183 votes (28.9 percent). [20] In the 2015 general election Nungesser prevailed, 628,864 votes (55.38 percent) to Holden's 506,578 (44.62 percent). [21] Edwards and Nungesser, of opposite parties, assumed office on January 11, 2016.
St. Landry Parish is a parish located in the U.S. state of Louisiana. As of the 2020 Census, the population was 82,540. The parish seat is Opelousas. The parish was established in 1807.
Christopher Charles John is an American politician and lobbyist who from 1997 to 2005 served as a Democratic member of the United States House of Representatives for Louisiana's 7th congressional district, since disbanded and merged into the 3rd district.
James Alison Hayes is an American politician and lawyer. He is a Republican from Louisiana.
Charles William Boustany Jr. is an American politician, physician, and former congressman from Lafayette, Louisiana, who served as the U.S. representative from Louisiana's 3rd congressional district from 2005 to 2017. He is a member of the Republican Party.
Melvin Lee "Kip" Holden, is an American politician who served from 2005 to 2016 as the Democratic Mayor-President of Baton Rouge and East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana. The parish includes the state capital of Baton Rouge and smaller suburban cities such as Baker, Central City, and Zachary.
John Leigh "Jay" Dardenne, Jr. is an American lawyer and politician from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, who served as commissioner of administration for Democratic Governor John Bel Edwards. A Republican, Dardenne previously served as the 53rd lieutenant governor of his state from 2010 to 2016. Dardenne was Louisiana secretary of state. He was previously a member of the Louisiana State Senate for the Baton Rouge suburbs, a position he filled from 1992 until his election as secretary of state on September 30, 2006.
The Republican Party of Louisiana(LAGOP) (French: Parti républicain de Louisiane, Spanish: Partido Republicano de Luisiana) is the affiliate of the Republican Party in the U.S. state of Louisiana. Its chair is Derek Babcock who was elected in 2024. It is currently the dominant party in the state, controlling all but one of Louisiana's six U.S. House seats, both U.S. Senate seats, all statewide executive offices, and both houses of the state legislature.
The 2004 United States presidential election in Louisiana took place on November 2, 2004, and was part of the 2004 United States presidential election. Voters chose nine representatives, or electors to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.
The 2002 United States Senate election in Louisiana was held on November 5, 2002. Incumbent Democratic U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu won re-election to a second term, although she did not earn 50% of the vote in the first round and was therefore forced into a runoff election with Republican Suzanne Haik Terrell, the Louisiana Elections Commissioner.
William Harold Nungesser is an American politician serving as the 54th lieutenant governor of Louisiana since 2016. A member of the Republican Party, Nungesser is also the former president of the Plaquemines Parish Commission, having been re-elected to a second four-year term in the 2010 general election in which he topped two opponents with more than 71 percent of the vote. His second term as parish president began on January 1, 2011, and ended four years later.
Scott Anthony Angelle is an American politician who served as the former director of the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement in Washington, D.C. From 2013 to 2017, he was the District 2 member of the Louisiana Public Service Commission, an elected five-person utility regulatory body.
Fred Henry Mills, Jr., is an American pharmacist, banker, and politician from Parks, Louisiana who served as a Republican member of the Louisiana State Senate, having won a special election on January 22, 2011. Mills had previously represented District 46 in the Louisiana House of Representatives.
The 2014 United States Senate election in Louisiana was held on November 4, 2014, to elect a member of the United States Senate to represent the State of Louisiana.
The 2015 Louisiana gubernatorial election was held on November 21, 2015, to elect the governor of Louisiana. Incumbent Republican governor Bobby Jindal was not eligible to run for re-election to a third term because of term limits established by the Louisiana Constitution.
The 2016 United States Senate election in Louisiana took place on November 8, 2016, to elect a member of the United States Senate to represent the State of Louisiana, concurrently with the 2016 U.S. presidential election, as well as other elections to the United States Senate in other states and elections to the United States House of Representatives and various state and local elections.
The 2015 Louisiana lieutenant gubernatorial election took place on October 24, 2015, to elect the Lieutenant Governor of Louisiana, with a runoff election held on November 21, 2015. Incumbent Republican Lieutenant Governor Jay Dardenne did not run for re-election to a second full term in office. He instead ran for governor. Billy Nungesser won the election defeating Kip Holden, despite a Democratic victory in the gubernatorial election, in which John Bel Edwards defeated David Vitter by a similar margin.
The 2016 United States House of Representatives elections in Louisiana were held on November 8, 2016, to elect the six U.S. representatives from the state of Louisiana, one from each of the state's six congressional districts. The elections coincided with the 2016 U.S. presidential election, as well as other elections to the House of Representatives, elections to the United States Senate and various state and local elections.
The 2023 Louisiana gubernatorial election was held on October 14, 2023, to elect the governor of Louisiana. Incumbent Governor John Bel Edwards was term-limited and could not seek re-election to a third consecutive term in office. This race was one of two Democratic-held governorships up for election in 2023 in a state that voted for Donald Trump in 2020.
The 2024 United States House of Representatives elections in Louisiana were held on November 5, 2024, to elect the six U.S. representatives from the state of Louisiana, one from each of the state's congressional districts. The elections coincided with the U.S. presidential election, as well as other elections to the House of Representatives, elections to the United States Senate, and various state and local elections.
The 2023 Louisiana lieutenant gubernatorial election took place on October 14, 2023, to elect the lieutenant governor of Louisiana. Incumbent Republican Lieutenant Governor Billy Nungesser was re-elected to a third consecutive term in a landslide.
