2012 Elections Are Finally Over: Boustany Defeats Landry in Louisiana Runoff - East Idaho News
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2012 Elections Are Finally Over: Boustany Defeats Landry in Louisiana Runoff

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GETTY P 041412 ELEPHANT1?  SQUARESPACE CACHEVERSION=1355077231561iStockphoto/Thinkstock(NEW YORK) — The 2012 elections are finally over.

GOP Rep. Charles Boustany defeated his GOP rival, freshman tea-partier Rep. Jeff Landry, in a runoff in Louisiana’s 3rd Congressional District Saturday night.

Fittingly, the last race of 2012 was a redistricting battle between two members of the same party — one that ended in a runoff more than a month after Election Day. It did not affect Democrats’ net gain of eight House seats in 2012.

The four-term congressman Boustany was expected to win, having topped the multi-way field on Nov. 6 with just less than 45 percent of the vote. Landry collected 30 percent, while Democrat Ron Richard collected 22 percent. Richard later endorsed Boustany.

Landry, a member of the House Tea Party Caucus who voted against last year’s deal to raise the debt limit, was supported by conservative Sen. Jim DeMint and the tea-party group FreedomWorks.

The two congressmen had split southern Louisiana for one term before the state lost one seat in 2010′s redistricting, but the new 3rd District included far more of Boustany’s old 7th District than Landry’s old 3rd.

Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio

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