Gov. Landry calls State Treasurer Fleming 'unfit' amid LA Senate race scheme claims

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Gov. Jeff Landry said state treasurer and U.S. Senate candidate John Fleming "may be unfit to hold either office" after Fleming accused the governor of concocting a scheme to have Congresswoman Julia Letlow elected to the Senate.

"Unlike the treasurer, as governor I am focused on doing the job the people elected me to do," Landry said Feb. 12 in an interview with USA Today Network. "I also intend to finish the job I was elected to do, unlike him."

Letlow, Fleming and incumbent U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy are the major Republicans competing in the May 16 GOP primary election. The seat is considered by analysts to be a safe Republican stronghold.

Letlow has secured President Trump's endorsement.

Landry was responding to Fleming's accusation that Landry planned to orchestrate a Letlow victory as part of a plan that would eventually have Letlow leave the Senate for a university president's job so the governor could appoint himself to the Senate.

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"My response is that the governor never denied being the puppeteer of this gambit to put Julia Letlow into the U.S. Senate by way of manipulating the Trump administration," Fleming said in an interview with USA Today Network.

"Apparently Gov. Landry is not focused on his job as Louisiana's governor because he begged President Trump to be an envoy to Greenland, which has nothing to do with Louisiana. Who's buying that?"

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