BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Louisiana's 5th District congressional seat will remain firmly in Republican hands, after two GOP contenders advanced to a November runoff and shut out the Democrats in their bid to retake the seat.

State Sen. Neil Riser, a Republican from Columbia, and Vance McAllister, a businessman from Monroe, will compete in the Nov. 16 election.

The real surprise wasn't that two Republicans will meet in the runoff, but that McAllister, a political newcomer, managed to distinguish himself among a pack of 14 candidates, including six elected officials, in only two months of campaigning.

The self-made businessman poured an estimated $400,000 of his own cash into the race and got a sizable attention boost with the support of the highly popular "Duck Dynasty" television series star, Phil Robertson.

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