ISSUES & PRIORITIES

Advocating For a Louisiana Democratic Party We Can Be Proud Of

As the Democratic State Central Committee (DSCC) member-elect for seat 78A and an At-Large candidate for the Jefferson Parish Democratic Executive Committee (JPDEC), I am focused on building a Democratic Party on the local and state levels that we can take pride in- one that improves the quality of life for all people in Louisiana. Below are the priorities I commit to focusing on as a DSCC and DPEC member:

1. Recruit and Train Candidates: Having multiple offices go uncontested during election cycles is unacceptable. Our community deserves ongoing recruitment and training programs for people interested in running for office or interested in political leadership development. These can be facilitated by our local DPECs and our state party in partneship with community organizations. This will allow our local areas and state party to strategically build a diverse pool of candidates who are ready to be activated when regular and special elections happen.

2. Improve Voter Access, Engagement, and Education: Our local DPECs and state party should make concerted efforts to increase voter engagement through measures like registration drives and educational campaigns about election dates, what is on voters' ballots, and how those ballot items impact our community and state. It is important that we demystify our political processes for voters and increase access and touchpoints to voting, candidates, and election information. Additionally, we need better voter contact during our elections and our state party database of voter information desperately needs major updating, overhaul, and pruning. 

3. Elect More Progressives & Democrats: As a former Democratic candidate who ran for both local and state school boards, I experienced difficulties with the support and responsiveness I received on a state-level. Through my experiences as a candidate, I want to ensure our candidates running for office receive the best assistance possible. While local DPECs and the state party should not be responsible for managing a candidate's campaign, they should be a go-to resource rather than a hindrance when it comes to helping progressive and Democratic candidates run strong, winning campaigns. Our local and state party infrastructure should focus efforts on electing more Democrats to office and/or improving margin of victory/defeat for offices where Democrats are on the ballot.

4. Establish Accountability for Party Leadership: I commit to electing a new party chair and leadership who have the background, skills, and progressive values and mindsets to build a better Louisiana Democratic party. As a DSCC member, I believe we should have an effective way of evaluating party leadership both qualitatively and quantitatively. Evaluating the state party's effectiveness should cover areas such as its ability to communicate transparently with the public, set and meet fundraising goals, sustain candidate recruitment and training programs, register and engage voters, and adopt an outlined vision with goals/benchmarks focused on issues that will help unify voters. These issues include but are not limited to a living wage, affordable housing, healthcare, homeowners insurance, reproductive rights, public education, eradication of poverty, climate change, and civil rights protections.