With the Senate still in Republican hands, the House soon to be run by Democrats and the 2020 presidential election season about to kick off in earnest, the general consensus is the next Congress won’t be able to get much of anything done. Based o…
We’ve had plenty of politicians, even presidents, who’ve served under clouds. But a court-appointed Zulu King? That’s too much.
Louisiana’s looming gubernatorial race came into sharper focus this week when Attorney Jeff Landry said he would not be a candidate in 2019, but instead run for reelection to his current job. Yet the bigger news came not from Baton Rouge but Washi…
Nobody appears to relish the idea of going head to head with Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards more than Attorney General Jeff Landry, who has battled with the administration over health care, the death penalty, LGBTQ rights and more.
It looks like newly re-elected U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise is going to keep at least one election season promise. After watching his party lose its House majority in a slow-motion but ultimately decisive defeat, he reiterated his pledge to stay in Was…
The writers for HBO’s satirical show “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” might want to get a weekend place in Louisiana. They’ve certainly figured out that there’s plenty of good material here.
Enjoy the Thanksgiving break, Louisiana voters. Maybe try to talk about something other than politics over dinner, if your family dynamics allow for that. Then watch the Saints (hopefully) make a second meal of the Atlanta Falcons on national television.
There’s no longer any suspense over what role U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise will play in the next Congress. With control now firmly in Democratic hands, the current majority whip will not be eligible to move up to majority leader or even House speaker, …
The first question after every big election is who’s up and who’s down — or to borrow a term from my Gambit colleague Clancy DuBos, “Da Winnas and Da Loozas.” An equally compelling level of analysis is less about who than about what.
As expected, U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise had an early night. And as expected, he probably won’t get a great night’s sleep.
Hopefully most people in Louisianans aren’t having too much trouble voting today, or didn’t if they decided to cast their ballots early.
No matter what voters in all those states with hotly contested elections in other states decide Tuesday, the larger political world will look different once the votes are counted.
Attorney General Jeff Landry has something of an m.o.: Throw out some position on some red meat issue and see if it sticks.
With the 2018 election season down to its final days, some of Louisiana’s six incumbents in Congress are making a big last push. They’re not knocking on every door and chasing each possible vote in their own districts, though. Instead, they’re foc…
Here’s the thing that got me about the newly released list of priests who’ve been credibly accused of sexual abuse.
The secret to plausible deniability is right there in the beginning of the short phrase. Anyone can deny anything. The key is to make the denial plausible.
Sometimes old political operatives don’t fade away, they just move on to a different state. Such is the case with the crew that once tried to mold ex-Gov. Bobby Jindal into national material, according to The Kansas City Star.
There’s lots of talk about sports betting these days. That’s because the U.S. Supreme Court recently legalized the practice nationwide, and Mississippi has, as usual, been more aggressive than Louisiana in pursuing this new, potentially lucrative …
U.S. Sen. John Kennedy hasn’t yet said that he’ll be a candidate for governor next fall, but some of his fellow Republicans aren’t waiting to line up for him — or against.
I’m betting that most Americans of good will are heartsick at the past week’s news. First came the rash of bombs sent to high-profile Democrats and CNN, which thankfully did not go off, although it’s not clear whether that was by design or incompe…
Support for Medicaid expansion in Louisiana was a winning issue for Gov. John Bel Edwards in 2015. It was a such a no-brainer that Edwards, the race’s lone Democrat, was joined by his three major Republicans in promising to implement this section …
With so much going wrong in politics, so many issues on which the two sides are not only at odds but utterly unwilling to even acknowledge potential common ground, criminal justice reform stands out as a rare exception.
Tom Schedler was low-profile, until he wasn’t.
There have always been two competing theories as to why Democrat John Bel Edwards was able to win the 2015 governor’s race so handily, Louisiana’s Republican leanings notwithstanding.
For members of Congress who are expected to return to Washington next year — a category that includes all six of Louisiana’s House members — the period immediately after Election Day will be something akin to a game of musical chairs.
It’s been a long-running open secret that New Orleans City Councilman Jason Williams is eying a run for district attorney in 2020.
There are so many potential candidates for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination that it’s probably easiest to divide them into categories.
The most charitable explanation for the Louisiana political establishment’s indifference to alarming signs of climate change is that politicians think in the short term.
The best campaign ads make people sit up and take notice. So give U.S Rep. Garret Graves credit for achieving that much when he released a new reelection ad in which he speaks from busy Interstate 10.
The New Orleans City Council that was elected last year alongside Mayor LaToya Cantrell is an aggressive, ambitious bunch.
Many people have made strong arguments for eliminating Louisiana’s nearly unique law allowing criminal convictions by non-unanimous juries, but a judge in Sabine Parish has now offered the most powerful case yet: The law doesn’t pass constitutiona…
Just about a year after now-New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell's runoff opponent for the job accused her of improperly using her city credit card, the matter is now settled. Attorney General Jeff Landry announced this week that his investigation ha…
If anyone has a selfish interest in opposing the constitutional amendment that would require jury convictions in Louisiana to be unanimous, it’s the state’s prosecutors. The current system, in which they must convince just 10 of 12 of a defendant’…
When my colleague Faimon Roberts interviewed former Jefferson Parish president John Young about his future political intentions over the summer, Young said he’s definitely planning to seek his old job next year, when damaged incumbent Mike Yenni m…
Politicians bask in the reflected glory of winning teams all the time, but U.S. Rep. Garret Graves is taking things a step further.
I was a little surprised to see that the Council for a Better Louisiana is recommending “yes” votes on all six constitutional amendments on the Nov. 6 ballot. I gave Barry Erwin, CABL’s longtime leader, a call, and he confirmed that the group’s po…
Kyle Ardoin, who stepped into the secretary of state’s job when former boss Tom Schedler was forced to resign amid a sexual harassment scandal, is a Republican.
Like his former boss before him, interim Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin is casting himself to voters as basically indispensable.
Constitutional amendments nearly always elicit yawns, but this November’s ballot is shaping up as an exception. In fact, the second ballot question, the one that asks whether voters want to change a nearly unique Louisiana law that requires only 1…
The first step in promising to fix something — a public office, say — is to identify what’s broken. That’s led to an unusual challenge for candidates seeking to replace Tom Schedler as Louisiana’s next secretary of state.
I don’t know Eddie Rispone, the first Republican to declare a challenge to Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards in next year’s gubernatorial race. That surely puts me in the same boat as most Louisianans. Rispone is founder of an industrial contractin…
“Seriously, Hillary?” U.S. Rep. and House Majority Whip Steve Scalise asked the other day on Twitter, as he linked to a clip of former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton saying of Republicans: "You cannot be civil with a political par…
Once U.S. Sen. John Kennedy became a darling of the national political media and regular target of late night talk show hosts, could “Saturday Night Live” be far behind?
Dear Justice Kavanaugh:
There are nine candidates on next month’s ballot for Louisiana's secretary of state, including four current or former elected officials, each with his or her own natural constituency. One major candidate who has not run before has a niche too, bot…
Watching Congress in action is downright demoralizing these days. Is there anyone on either side who has emerged from the Senate fight over Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination with faith in the system — or without wanting to take a shower?
Journalists seeking to assess President Donald Trump personal and corporate finances have had to work around his refusal to release his tax returns, and this week, The Washington Post got some insight from records provided to investors in some Tru…
If you purchase your own health insurance, you’ve now got some new options, thanks to a Trump administration rule relaxing certain aspects of the Affordable Care Act.
Amazingly enough, U.S. Sen. John Kennedy may be on to something that people on both sides of the gaping, deeply partisan divide over Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination could actually agree upon.
