Why is Louisiana never competetive?

[Adam Griffin]

LA has the second-lowest percentage of whites who vote Democratic in presidential elections of any state in the country, according to exit polls/calculations from 2008, 2012 & 2016. It also has the highest percentage of incarcerated or otherwise disenfranchised adults of any state - which in Deep South terms obviously means it is hyper-targeted toward the exclusion of black citizens from civic participation. Arguably this massive reduction in black participation relative to their share of the population is the only thing that has helped keep a less-than-insignificant segment of whites in LA from voting straight-R up and down the ballot (otherwise, JBE, Landrieu, Dem registration advantage and so forth would be non-existent and/or distant memories for 20 years or more).

When white voters are nearly as Republican as black voters are Democratic and the former outnumbers the latter by 2-to-1 in actual registration, you end up with a state that isn't competitive at all in presidential contests - i.e. the types of contests where pro-civil rights candidates are likely to have the most impact and deviation from the local culture.

Prior to the modern era, it's obvious that voter participation was skewed toward heavily white and rural constituencies in the South, both of which were firmly in the Democratic column then. When this dynamic/coalition began to deteriorate, it deteriorated rapidly. This quick D-to-R transition among the most stalwart voting blocs helped create the inelastic and noncompetitive environment present in many Southern states in presidential elections. LA obviously had some quirks that created a longer time-frame for such that allowed select (i.e. Southern) Democratic presidential candidates to win, but that time has long since passed.