NEW ORLEANS — With just about a week left until the Ash Wednesday deadline, the effort to recall Mayor Cantrell says they are nearing their goal. The Nolatoya Recall Instagram page posted Monday night, they were 1,029 signatures away from their goal. They need a little over 53,000 signatures by Wednesday, February 22.
In actuality, according to WWLTV commentator, Clancy Dubos they need a little more than the minimum though to account for some discrepancies.
“They really need to get a cushion above that because some signatures may be declared invalid, so you always want to get more. So really they’re probably aiming for somewhere around 56 or 57 thousand just to give themselves a cushion and really they’d love to get more than that,” Dubos said.
With Fat Tuesday the day before their filing deadline, Dubos says they really just have a few more days. Just a few weeks ago though, in an update the recall organization said they needed 39,000 signatures left to go. Dubos says the mailers sent out to residents really helped.
“You have to recognize they’ve now sent two mailers, essentially mail ballots or petitions and the first time they did it they got back thousands of those almost every day for about a week or so,” Dubos said. “So they recently sent out a second trench of these mailers and I’m told they’re getting at least a thousand or more every day.”
In a statement, Eileen Carter, the Vice Chair of the Nolatoya group says they’re excited to be so close to their goal.
“We are elated to be in striking distance of a recall election and we encourage voters to sign the petition and get them in! Working together we can save New Orleans. The light is at the end of the tunnel,” Carter wrote.
Dubos says even if the recall falls short of the necessary signatures, the effort is impressive and would have likely garnered more signatures than votes the Mayor received in her reelection in 2021.
“Even if they fall slightly short they will have gotten more signatures on the petition than she got votes, so that in itself sends a very strong message about the Mayor's performance," Dubos said. “She should not be gloating if they fall just shy of the goal, it’s not in any way a validation in any way of what she’s been doing in her second term. This is more like an exercise in democracy where people are rising from the grassroots up to say to those in power or to the person most in power in this town we’re not happy.”
WWL reached out to the Mayor’s office for comment. We have not heard back.
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