Incumbent – Jim Fannin (D – Term Limited in 2015)

District Map

House District 13

Vote History

Current District

District 13 is located in the middle of North Louisiana and contains Jackson Parish, the northern fringes of Winn and Bienville Parishes, and four precincts in the western fringe of Ouachita Parish. The district has a 22% black voter registration, which is actually a decrease from 24% when the district lines were last drawn, and is due to strong suburban growth in the Ouachita Parish precincts, where 24% of the voters now live.

Politically, this is a district with a rural Democratic heritage that leans Republican and is seeing its Republican leanings strengthen because of a combination of suburban growth in the Ouachita Parish precincts and dissatisfaction with the Democratic Party label in the rural areas.

While Republicans typically do well here in “top of the ballot” races, Democrats are still dominant at the local level, and this is one of several Republican friendly rural districts that have not yet elected a Republican to the state house. Between 1987 and 2002, Rodney Alexander represented the district with little trouble. He resigned in late 2002 upon his election to the U.S. House of Representatives (he became a Republican in 2004). In the special election to succeed him, four Democrats and a Republican contested the race, with Democrat Jim Fannin winning the runoff with 56% of the vote; in the statewide elections later that year, against the same opponent, Fannin again received 56% of the vote. He was easily re-elected in 2007 and is allowed to serve one more term.

Proposed District

Redistricting in this part of the state was simple for several reasons: (1) the district was 1% under the population of an ideal district, and (2) Rep. Fannin’s position as chairman of the House Appropriations Committee. Accordingly, the district was made even more predominately rural by removing most of the suburban precincts in Ouachita Parish and by adding most of the remainder of Winn Parish to his district. These changes increased the black voter registration from 22 to 28% and made the district more favorable to a rural Democrat like Rep. Fannin. (UPDATED 9/8/2011) Rep. Fannin was re-elected without opposition in 2011, but given Louisiana’s recent Republican trend, it will be interesting to see if the Republicans can pick up this seat when it comes open.