BATON ROUGE, La., Nov. 6 (UPI) -- A former congressional aide and a state legislator will face off Dec. 7 in a runoff for the one open congressional seat in Louisiana.
Republican Lee Fletcher of Monroe and Democratic state Rep. Rodney Alexander of Quitman received the most votes in Louisiana's open primary race Tuesday. There were seven candidates in the race, but none drew more than 50 percent to win the post outright.
With nearly all the votes counted in District 5 in northeast Louisiana, Alexander had 52,436 votes and Fletcher 44,634 votes. Former Republican Congressman Clyde Holloway came in third with 42,019 votes after being expected to make the runoff.
They were all running for the seat of Rep. John Cooksey, a Republican who resigned to run in the open primary against Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., but he failed to make the final cut there. Landrieu will face state Elections Commissioner Suzanne Haik Terrell in the Dec. 7 runoff.
Fletcher was an aide to Cooksey.
