Randal Gaines ousted Katie Bernhardt Saturday to become chair of the beleaguered Louisiana Democratic Party.
Gaines was selected as the new chair after a confusing set of procedural moves at a meeting in Baton Rouge ended with him as the only candidate to be nominated for the position.
A motion to reopen the nominations to include Bernhardt was decisively rejected, leaving Gaines as the only candidate.
“It is critical that we use this unifying, watershed moment to rebuild, refocus, and recruit the leaders of tomorrow to address the concerns that are top of mind for residents in every corner of our state,” Gaines, a former state representative, said in a statement afterward.
In an interview, Bernhardt expressed no ill will at Saturday’s result.
“He should have the support of everyone in the Democratic Party,” Bernhardt said of Gaines. “There are elections in November, and we need to keep our eye on electing Democrats and not fighting each other.”
Bernhardt, who been chair for the past four years, has been under sharp criticism since last fall’s elections, when Jeff Landry was elected governor in the primary and Republicans won a super-majority in both the House and the Senate. Republicans now hold all statewide offices and 73-32 advantage in the House and a 28-11 majority in the Senate.
To be sure, the Louisiana Democratic Party’s fortunes have steadily worsened over several decades as part of a realignment throughout the Deep South that has put Republicans in control everywhere. But Democrats in Louisiana have not held so few seats in more than 100 years.
The Democrats’ best hope in the short term is a federal court ruling that the House and Senate maps adopted by the Legislature during a special session on redistricting in 2022 violate the Voting Rights Act. Tossing out those maps could give Democrats extra seats in both chambers.
Going into Saturday’s election for the chair by members of the Democratic State Central Committee, Bernhardt had the support of U.S. Rep. Troy Carter of New Orleans but faced a slate of newly elected members who wanted her out. Gaines and Bogalusa Mayor Tyrin Truong declared their candidacy against her.
The anti-Bernhardt group swung behind Gaines, who was termed out of the House after last year following a 12-year stint representing LaPlace. Gaines, 68, had become known to party activists by spending the past four years as one of the party’s two liaisons with the Democratic National Committee.
In recent days, Gaines faced questions of whether he filed his state taxes in 2020, 2021 and 2022. Gaines, a trial attorney, said he had filed them on Friday, saying he had been trying to settle a dispute related to the coronavirus pandemic.
In an interview, Gaines said he has done well enough professionally that he can afford to devote extensive time to his new position.
“We’re coming from behind,” he said. “We have to excel in all categories: fundraising, messaging, candidate profiling, training, voter engagement and recruiting volunteers.”