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Article snippet: Louisiana's Democratic governor will run against a wealthy Republican businessman who has already spent eight figures on his own campaign in a November runoff after narrowly missing out on winning re-election outright. Gov. John Bel Edwards (D) easily led Saturday's all-party primary election. With 90 percent of the precincts reporting, Edwards held 46.2 percent of the vote. The Associated Press called the runoff late Saturday evening. But Edwards needed 50 percent of the vote to win re-election without a November 16 runoff. In a sign of Louisiana’s Republican bent — and of Edwards’s cross-party appeal — voters easily re-elected the top two Republican incumbents on the ballot on Saturday. Both Lt. Gov. Billy Nungesser (R) and Attorney General Jeff Landry (R) won re-election outright, with about two-thirds of the vote. Edwards will face off against Eddie Rispone, a wealthy Baton Rouge businessman making his first run for public office. Rispone held 27.3 percent of the vote, outpacing Rep. Ralph Abraham (R), who finished third with 24.2 percent of the vote. History argues that Edwards will face a more difficult path to re-election than he did against a divided field. No sitting Louisiana governor has ever won re-election after being forced into a runoff. But the most recent polls show Edwards has a better shot. A Mason-Dixon poll conducted earlier this week found Edwards leading Rispone by a 51 percent to 42 percent margin. That margin is likely to narrow as Abraha... Link to the full article to read more