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A former one-term Republican Louisiana State Representative,
he was a candidate in the Democratic presidential
primaries in 1988 and the Republican presidential primaries in 1992. Duke
unsuccessfully ran for the Louisiana State Senate, United States Senate, United States House of
Representatives, and Governor of Louisiana. Duke is a felon,
having pleaded guilty to defrauding supporters by falsely claiming to have no
money and being in danger of losing his home in order to solicit emergency
donations; at the time, Duke was financially secure, and used the donations for
recreational gambling.[7]
Duke describes himself as a "racial realist,"
asserting that "all people have a basic human right to preserve their own
heritage."[8] Duke also speaks against what he describes as Jewish control of
the Federal Reserve Bank, the U.S. federal governmentand the media. Duke
supports the preservation of what he considers to be Western culture and traditionalist Christian family values, Constitutionalism, abolition of theInternal Revenue Service, voluntary racial segregation, anti-Communism and white separatism.[9][10][11] He has been accused of supporting Holocaust denial.
1989: Successful run in special election for Louisiana House seat
In December 1988,
Duke changed his political affiliation from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party.[2]
In 1988, Republican
State Representative Charles Cusimano of Metairie resigned his District 81 seat to
become a 24th Judicial District Court judge, and a special election was
called early in 1989 to select a successor. Duke entered the race to succeed
Cusimano and faced several opponents, including fellow Republicans John Spier Treen,
a brother of former Governor David C. Treen;
Delton Charles, a school board member; and Roger F. Villere, Jr., who operates Villere's
Florist in Metairie. Duke finished first in the primary with 3,995 votes
(33.1%).[37] As no one
received a majority of the vote in the first round, a runoff election was
required between Duke and Treen, who polled 2,277 votes (18.9%) in the first
round of balloting. John Treen's candidacy was endorsed by U.S. President George H. W. Bush,
former President Ronald Reagan, and other notable Republicans,[38] as well as
Democrats Victor Bussie (president of the Louisiana AFL-CIO)
and Edward J. Steimel (president of the Louisiana Association of Business and
Industryand former director of the "good government" think tank,
the Public Affairs Research Council). Duke, however, hammered Treen on a
statement the latter had made indicating a willingness to entertain higher property taxes,
anathema in that suburban district.[39]Duke, with 8,459
votes (50.7%) defeated Treen, who polled 8,232 votes (49.3%).[40] He served in
the House from 1989 until 1992.[41]
Freshman legislator Odon Bacqué of Lafayette, a No Party member of the House, stood alone
in 1989 when he attempted to deny seating to Duke on the grounds that the
incoming representative had resided outside his district at the time of his
election. When John Treen failed in a court challenge in regard to Duke's
residency, Duke was seated. Lawmakers who opposed Duke said that they had to
defer to his constituents who narrowly chose Duke as representative.[42]
Duke took his seat
on the same day as Jerry Luke LeBlanc of Lafayette Parish, who won another special
election held on the same day as the Duke-Treen runoff to choose a successor to Kathleen Blanco,
the future governor who was elected to the Louisiana Public Service Commission.
Duke and LeBlanc were sworn in separately.
Colleague Ron Gomez of
Lafayette stated that Duke, as a short-term legislator, was "so single minded,
he never really became involved in the nuts and bolts of House rules and
parliamentary procedure. It was just that shortcoming that led to the demise of
most of his attempts at lawmaking."[43]
One legislative
issue pushed by Duke was the requirement that welfare recipients
be tested for the use of narcotics. The recipients had to show themselves to be
drug-free to receive state and federal benefits under his proposal.[44]
Gomez, a long-time
journalist, recalls having met and interviewed Duke in the middle 1970s when
Duke was a state senate candidate: "He was still in his mid-20s and very
non-descript. Tall and slimly built, he had a very prominent nose, flat cheek
bones, a slightly receding chin and straight dark brown hair. The interview
turned out to be quite innocuous, and I hadn't thought about it again until
Duke came to my legislative desk, and we shook hands. Who was this guy? Tall
and well-built with a perfect nose, a model's cheek bones, prominent chin, blue
eyes and freshly coiffed blond hair, he looked like a movie star. He obviously
didn't remember from the radio encounter, and I was content to leave it at
that."[45]
Consistent with
Gomez's observation, Duke in the latter 1980s reportedly had his nose thinned
and chin augmented. Following his election to the Louisiana House of
Representatives, he shaved his mustache.[46][47][48]
Gomez, in his 2000
autobiography, wrote about Duke: "He once presented a bill on the floor,
one of the few which he had managed to get out of committee. He finished his
opening presentation and strolled with great self-satisfaction back up the
aisle to his seat. In his mind, he had spoken, made his presentation and that
was that. Before he had even reached his desk and re-focused on the
proceedings, another first-term member had been recognized for the floor and
immediately moved to table the bill. The House voted for the motions
effectively killing the bill. That and similar procedures were used against him
many times."[49] Gomez said
that he recalls Duke obtaining the passage of only a single bill, legislation
which prohibited movie producers or book publishers from compensating jurors
for accounts of their court experiences.[50]
Gomez added that
Duke's "tenure in the House was short and uninspired. Never has anyone
parlayed an election by such a narrow margin to such a minor position to such
international prominence. He has run for numerous other positions without
success but has always had some effect, usually negative, on the outcome."[51]
Gomez continued:
Duke's "new message was that he had left the Klan, shed the Nazi uniform
he had proudly worn in many previous appearances, and only wanted to serve the
people. He eliminated his high-octane anti-Semitic rhetoric. He was
particularly concerned with the plight of 'European-Americans.' He never
blatantly spoke of race as a factor but referred to the 'growing underclass.'
He used the tried and true demagoguery of class envy to
sell his message: excessive taxpayers' money spent on welfare, school busing
practices, affirmative action... and set-aside programs.
He also embraced a subject near and dear to every Jefferson Parish voter,
protection of the homestead exemption."[52]
Duke launched
unsuccessful campaigns for the U.S. Senate in
1990 and governor in 1991. Villere did not again seek office but instead
concentrated his political activity within the Republican organization.[53]
1990 campaign for U.S. Senate
Duke has often
criticized federal policies that he believes discriminate against white people
in favor of racial minorities. To that end he formed the controversial group,
the "National Association for the Advancement of White People", a
play on the African American civil rights group, the National
Association for the Advancement of Colored People.[54]
Though Duke had
first hesitated about entering the Senate race, he made his announcement of
candidacy for the nonpartisan blanket primary held on October 6, 1990. Duke was
the only Republican in competition against three Democrats, including incumbent
U.S. Senator J. Bennett Johnston, Jr., of Shreveport,[55] whom Duke
derided as "J. Benedict Johnston".[56]
Former Governor David Treen,
whose brother, John Treen, Duke had defeated for state representative in 1989,
called Duke's senatorial platform "garbage. ... I think he is bad for our
party because of his espousal of Nazism and racial
superiority."[57]
The Republican
Party officially endorsed state Senator Ben Bagert of
New Orleans in a state convention on January 13, 1990, but national GOP
officials in October, just days before the primary election, concluded that
Bagert could not win. To avoid a runoff between Duke and Johnston, the GOP
decided to surrender the primary to Johnston. Funding for Bagert's campaign was
halted, and after initial protest, Bagert dropped out two days before the
election. With such a late withdrawal, Bagert's name remained on the ballot,
but his votes, most of which were presumably cast as absentee ballots, were not
counted.[58][59] Duke received
43.51 percent (607,391 votes) of the primary vote to Johnston's 53.93 percent
(752,902 votes).[55]
Duke's views
prompted some of his critics, including Republicans such as journalist Quin Hillyer,
to form the Louisiana Coalition Against Racism and Nazism, which directed media
attention to Duke's statements of hostility to blacks and Jews.[60]
In a 2006
editorial, Gideon Rachman (The Economist,
the Financial Times) recalled interviewing
Duke's 1990 campaign manager, who said, "The Jews just aren't a big issue
in Louisiana. We keep telling David, stick to attacking the blacks. There's no
point in going after the Jews, you just piss them off and nobody here cares
about them anyway."[61] Source
