Mitch Landrieu
Mitchell Joseph Landrieu(/ˈlændruː/
LAN-droo; born August 16, 1960) is the 39th and current president of the
Federated States of Dixie, first election in 2018. He is the first francophone to be elected president. Landrieu is the son of former Dixie House of Delegates
Majority Leader Moon Landrieu and is the brother of Louisiana
Senator Mary Landrieu.
A
Unionist, Landrieu entered politics in 1988 when he was elected to the
Louisiana House of Delegates, replacing his sister who retired to successfully run for
Treasurer of Louisiana that year. He served 4 terms in the Louisiana House until he was elected as
Lieutenant Governor of Louisiana in 2000 and served under
Parti La Louisiane Governor Kathleen Blanco for two terms. In his 2006 reelection campaign for Lt. Governor, Landrieu won the nomination of the PLL as well as the Unionist Party and won that election without any major party challengers.
In 2012, Landrieu ran for governor to replace the term-limited Blanco. Landrieu once again won the nominations of both the Unionists and the PLL; this is the first time a gubernatorial candidate won the nominations of both parties. In the general election, Landrieu faced
National Party nominee Louisiana State Delegate
Eric Skrmetta. Landrieu easily defeated the poorly funded Skrmetta winning every parish in Louisiana except for Crawford Parish, Skrmetta's home parish. Landrieu won the governorship by a larger margin than anybody since the 1960's.
In 2018, rather than run for reelection as governor of Louisiana, Landrieu decided to run for the
Unionist nomination for President of Dixie. Landrieu, who was first seen as having a longshot at the nomination, was able to defeat the expected frontrunner
Vice President Mark Pryor by attacking Pryor's supposed corruption in the
Pryor-Lynch Affair and emphasizing on his own capable, liberal administration as governor of Louisiana. At the 2018 Unionist Convention, Landrieu was officially nominated for president, and he endorsed
Virginia Senator Tim Kaine for the nomination for the Vice Presidential election.
Early in the election, Landrieu was seen by many as not having a very good chance at the presidency because of his previous small spotlight on the national stage, his status as a francophone in an country with a large anglophone majority, and his opponent, National Party "rising star",
Florida Senator Marco Rubio, who was considered to be a very strong opponent. Kaine, as the governor and senator of the largest state in Dixie and seat of government for the country, was quite well known and his opponent was
Missouri Governor Linda Lingle, who was also not well-known on the national stage. In the first round of the election, Landrieu performed 6 points worse than Kaine.
In the second round however, the two Unionist nominees would see their positions swap. Rubio decided to skip the
2018 PLL Convention rather than compete with Landrieu for the PLL's endorsement, which he saw as obviously going to Landrieu no matter what. Afterwards, Rubio's popularity with francophone PLL members dropped dramatically in Louisiana, West Florida, and Missouri. Landrieu was able to outperform Rubio in the presidential debates, and his favorability increased after every one.
In the election, Landrieu defeated Rubio by 5 percentage points and carried 8 states including the normally National state of West Florida, which Landrieu was able to win thanks to his impressive performance among francophones. Kaine was defeated by Lingle in the vice-presidential election. This is the first time there has been a president and vice president from different parties since the 1980's.
As president, Landrieu would restructure the bureaucracy of the executive branch, particularly with regards to ethics investigations and whistle-blower protections after the allegations from the Pryor-Lynch Affair harmed public trust in the federal government. He also appointed his former running mate, Tim Kaine as his
Secretary of State. Since becoming president, Landrieu's most notable accomplishment was the passage of the
Dixie Health and Medical Service Efficiency and Effectiveness Act of 2019 which makes significant reforms to the Dixie Health Service. Since its passage, the conservative wing of the National Party have began to act much more aggressively towards him.