Republican Julia Letlow won Louisiana’s 5th Congressional District election Saturday in a landslide less than three months after her late husband Congressman-elect Luke Letlow died from COVID complications before he could take office.
Letlow, who lives in rural Richland Parish in northeastern Louisiana, will become the first woman to represent Louisiana in Congress in more than six years.
She will also be the first Republican woman to ever represent Louisiana in Congress.
Luke Letlow had won the seat in a December runoff election against fellow Republican state Rep. Lance Harris of Alexandria.
But Luke Letlow contracted COVID-19 soon after his victory and died Dec. 29.
Julia Letlow, an executive at the University of Louisiana at Monroe, announced on Jan. 14 she would “pick up the torch” and run for the seat.
“Everything in my life and in my marriage has prepared me for this moment,” she said then. “My motivation is the passion Luke and I both shared: to better this region that we called home and to leave it a better place for our children and future generations.”
Tell her to send truckloads of fresh crawdads to our shore from mid April to mid May (in season in LA).