BATON ROUGE — The Louisiana Democratic Party on Tuesday said it had hired Drew Prestridge as its new executive director. Party chairman Randal Gaines had recommended him for the post.

Prestridge co-founded a group called Blue Reboot that last winter worked to replace Gaines' predecessor, Katie Bernhardt. 

Prestridge previously worked for the party as its finance director and has worked for the campaigns of Vice President Kamala Harris, Sen. Cory Booker, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell and state treasurer candidate Dustin Granger.

"I know what a functional state party looks like, I understand our strengths and weaknesses, and I see the untapped potential of what our party could be," Prestridge said in a statement. 

Gaines, a former state representative from LaPlace, was the only person nominated to lead the party at its meeting in March after Bernhardt failed to get a nomination from the floor. Democrats suffered from catastrophic losses during her tenure, including a failure to have a Democrat reach a runoff against Gov. Jeff Landry in last year's primary.