By Greg LaRose | Editor-in-Chief
“I’m not going to sit here and allow my intelligence and integrity to be insulted because someone can sit here and say ‘I never considered race.’” – Former New Orleans Marc Morial, now the National Urban League president and CEO, during his testimony against a redistricting map that eliminates one of Louisiana’s majority-Black seats in Congress.
Marc Morial, National Urban League president/CEO and former New Orleans mayor, hugs Judy Reese Morse, leader of the Greater New Orleans Urban League, after he spoke to the Louisiana House and Governmental Affairs Committee. (Greg LaRose/LAI)
By Piper Hutchinson
After hours of testimony in opposition, a Louisiana legislative committee advanced a congressional redistricting plan Thursday evening that adds an additional Republican seat ahead of this year’s midterm elections. Before their vote, lawmakers heard from three former New Orleans leaders, who were also previously legislators, who said the map threatens to reverse decades progress for Black people.
Wes Muller/LAI
By Julie O’Donoghue
Louisiana lawmakers continue to add more money for prisons, law enforcement and other public safety agencies into the state budget plan, while also saying they can’t afford to avoid a teacher pay cut next school year.
Kisatchie National Forest covers nearly 600,000 acres in central Louisiana. (Photo by Stacy Blomquist/U.S. Forest Service)
By Tristan Baurick, Verite
Sen. Bill Cassidy has quietly drafted legislation to transfer about 140,000 acres of the Kisatchie National Forest to Grant Parish. Giving up control of the land would strip federal protections and open critical wildlife habitat to development, according to the Louisiana Wildlife Federation.
By Sofia Resnick
An anti-abortion group is suing seven fertility clinics on one state, claiming their disposal of embryos as part of the in vitro fertilization process violates the state’s wrongful death law. Louisiana and two other states have similar laws that could provide the opportunity for more lawsuits.
COMMENTARY
By Greg LaRose
Rather than work with the Louisiana Legislature to at least give the appearance of caring about teachers, the governor frolicked in the frozen tundra to stay in the fickle favor of President Trump.
D.C. DIGEST
NEWS FROM THE STATES
Utah governor declares drought emergency | UT News Dispatch
Governor defends commutation of election-denier clerk | CO Newsline
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