In great confusion and peculiar circumstances, this city has suddenly found itself in the midst of an unexpected mayoral election campaign. The result may once again upend this city’s old order: a white man might be elected mayor in a city that was, until a few months ago, mostly black.
That outcome would have been undreamed of before the hurricane, but the high probability of one of Louisiana’s most potent political families entering a race that almost didn’t happen could further transform a political calculus that has prevailed here for nearly three decades.
Mitch Landrieu, the state’s lieutenant governor and son of the city’s last white mayor — Moon Landrieu, who left office in 1978 — is expected to announce any day his entry into a race that will help define a radically reshaped city.
Among other opponents, he will face Mayor C. Ray Nagin, whose popularity here and elsewhere has withered under criticism of his performance during Hurricane Katrina and his recent remarks about the future racial makeup of the city.
Business leaders and ordinary citizens here are already following this nascent contest with unusual intensity, but no potential candidacy has generated more conversation than Mr. Landrieu’s. His family has long been popular among both the city’s black voters and the Uptown white liberals.
Moon Landrieu brought blacks into city politics for the first time since Reconstruction. His daughter Mary, the United States senator, a rare white Southern Democrat, was narrowly re-elected in 2002 thanks to support from black voters. Mitch Landrieu himself, in years representing an Uptown New Orleans district in the State Legislature, was an unusual Louisiana politician who straddled the racial divide.
Mercy! Moon’s boy running for Mayor.
