BATON ROUGE (AP) — Republican candidate David Vitter isn't taking the state police security detail offered to the two contenders in the Louisiana runoff election for governor.
Vitter's campaign announced Monday that he notified the state police that he won't accept the trooper bodyguards. His opponent, Democrat John Bel Edwards, is using the state police security. The bodyguards were with Edwards at a Sunday press conference.
In a letter, Vitter suggested deploying the security detail planned for him to highly-traveled areas of Interstate 10 in Baton Rouge or on the Atchafalaya Basin to respond quickly to traffic accidents. Or, he suggested adding them to the state police patrol in New Orleans' French Quarter.
Vitter says he'll cut the size of the governor's protective services detail if elected.
The runoff election is Nov. 21.
