One of the Republican candidates for Senate in Louisiana has filed a formal complaint with local prosecutors asking them to look into whether Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) meets residency requirements to appear on the ballot in November because she’s registered to vote at her parents’ home in New Orleans.
The complaints were filed by Rob Maness, a longshot candidate who’s been trailing behind Rep. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) and Landrieu in the race for U.S. Senate. Maness’s decision on Friday to ask district attorneys in Orleans, East Baton Rouge, St. Tammany, and Ouachita parishes to investigate Landrieu’s residency follow a Washington Post report a day earlier noting where Landrieu is registered to vote.
“The Constitution, Louisiana law and common-sense says candidates for Senate have to live where when they qualify —all of the evidence shows that Mary Landrieu doesn’t live here,” Maness said in a statement.
Landrieu also owns a residence on Capitol Hill in Washington D.C.
Republicans were quick to capitalize on the initial Washington Post report and argue that the situation is more than a little similar to Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS) whose residency came into question after The New York Times reported that that Roberts, who has a house in Virginia, uses an address of two of his donors when he needs to in Kansas.
The initial Post report did note that Landrieu, also own two plots of undeveloped land nearby.
Louisiana’s “Jungle primary” system means there are no separate primaries for Democrats and Republicans. Instead, if no candidate can get more than 50 percent of the vote on November 4th there is a runoff between the top two candidates. Maness, who is aligned with the tea party and backed by the Senate Conservatives fund has polled well below Cassidy and Landrieu in the race.
The TPM Polltracker average gives Landrieu a 17 point lead over the other Senate candidates.
If you believe she’s not a resident, then you’re pretty well insisting that members of Congress have to be wealthy enough to pay for 2 homes in order to serve. That’s just silly. I treat this just like I would military personel stationed overseas. They’re residents of whatever jurisdiction they were in until they establish residency in another US location. She’s a Lousiana resident until she leaves Congress, in my opinion, unless she establishes a residence outside of the DC area.
This is the kind of self-inflicted wound that has done in many senators and representatives over the years. Landrieu is an idiot to allow this to happen. It ended Santorum’s career, might end several this time. It is not that difficult to keep a place, and I have no sympathy for them if they do not do so.
Se. Roberts Tea Party primary opponent did the exact same thing in Kansas. Roberts opponent posted graphic x-rays of gun-shot fatalities to his facebook page, and said it was to relieve stress. Roberts won pretty easily, but the claim that he did not actually reside in Kansas did strike a nerve. His general election won’t be nearly as easy now. Thanks Tea Party! Another Republican bites the dust.
Hey, Republicans. How does it feel to be a disliked MINORITY???
Millions of people are now living in their parents homes. millions more than before the people who fund the tea party collapsed the economy, College graduates who can’t find a job, middle aged people who lost their jobs and their house, kids who’ve moved back home to take care of a parent who’s dying or suffering from dementia or just not doing well. All of them would be shocked to discover that, by Teanut logic, this means they aren’t residents of their own state.
The irony here, of course, is that teanuts are the same people who insist that college students shouldn’t be deemed citizens of the state where they go to college but, instead, should only be allowed to vote in whatever state their parents live in.
Well, there was another issue. He complained about public schools and endeared himself to wingnuts when he said his children were home-schooled. After the family moved to Virginia, he enrolled them in a PA online school that offered free computers, internet service and classes. It cost $38,000/year, and they were part of the program from 2001-2004. The PA taxpayers picked up the $100,000 tab.