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Governor Edwards reacts to failed recall attempt of Mayor Cantrell

“I won’t be calling an election,” Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards said. “The threshold was not satisfied.”

NEW ORLEANS — It was the most asked question in New Orleans these past six months. 

Did recall organizers have enough signatures to recall Mayor Latoya Cantrell? 

We now know they didn’t. 

“I won’t be calling an election,” Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards said. “The threshold was not satisfied.” 

Edwards received the recall petitions Tuesday morning in Baton Rouge, one day ahead of the deadline to do so. 

According to the governor, with about 225,000 qualified voters in the city recall organizers needed 20%, which would have been right around 45,000 valid signatures. 

Instead, they got about 27,200 signatures. That’s about 12 percent. 

“I think you’re going to see they disqualified 39,000 signatures,” Edwards said. "That’s the number that I remember. They turned in more signatures than they needed but they had more invalid signatures than valid signatures."

According to the governor, out of about 67,000 handwritten signatures, again only about 27,000 were from qualified electors. 

He said many of the ones that were thrown out were from people who did not live in Orleans Parish. 

Under Louisiana law, it’s very difficult to recall an elected official. 

Gov. Edwards said it should be. 

“If you had an election that was resolved by just a few hundred votes, you don’t want someone to go out there just as soon as that person takes office and start a recall and be able to recall someone with a really low threshold,” Edwards said. 

The governor added he doesn’t believe the court will upend the certification of the recall petitions, given the large number of invalid signatures.

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