Less than three months from now, New Orleans voters will cast ballots to elect a new mayor and decide a dozen other offices, too. The campaigns are officially underway.
With 14 candidates for mayor in all, voters have a lot more to choose from than the front-runners who have occupied the headlines recently.
City councilmember Helena Moreno has led those front runners, and WWL-TV political analyst Clancy DuBos says the rest of the field has their work cut out.
"The task of the other 13 candidates, specifically Oliver Thomas, Royce Duplessis, a state senator, and former criminal court judge Arthur Hunter, and ten other lesser-known candidates, will be to try to take votes off her and put her into a runoff," DuBos said.
Moreno is polling strong enough she could win outright, said DuBos.
"Jeff Landry did that in the governor's race. It's always possible,” said DuBos. “Her task is to try to solidify and maintain her vote and even build on it a little bit.”
The primary is October 11th. The runoff will be November 15.