Gov. Jeff Landry taunted a member of his own party during a press conference Monday, accusing the Republican senator of killing a bill that Landry claims would have helped lower insurance rates.
Landry invited members of the press to a ceremony Monday in which he signed into law a group of bills, including eight different measures aimed at lowering the cost of auto and homeowner insurance. The governor took turns listing and explaining each of the new laws while thanking the legislators who authored them, most of whom stood behind Landry as he spoke.
Absent from that list was House Bill 677, a measure that would have regulated attorney advertising, prohibiting lawyers from making or including any kind of misleading or deceptive claims in advertisements about the amount of money a client received from a lawsuit.
Insurance companies have faulted personal-injury attorneys for Louisiana’s auto insurance crisis. Landry supported the bill as an effort to tamp down what some see as a litigious environment perpetuated by a group of trial lawyers well-known for their constant barrage of commercials and billboards.
There are several questions about whether such restrictions on attorney advertising would be constitutional. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled lawyers had a right to advertise based on First Amendment grounds in a 1977 Arizona case which opened the floodgates for so-called “billboard lawyers” media buys.
Nevertheless, the governor claimed the attorney advertising bill would have passed but for a single lawmaker — Republican Sen. Alan Seabaugh of Shreveport.
“We tried to rein in lawyer advertising,” Landry said to the room of journalists and spectators. “Senator Seabaugh seemed to not be able to come to work that day, and that bill died. I want you to know we tried. Last time we tried that bill, the [former] governor vetoed it. This time a senator couldn’t show up for work. Maybe we’ll get it done next year.”
The governor was referring to Seabaugh’s two-week absence, from May 19-29, during which the bill came up for a committee vote. Seabaugh, a lawyer, said he was stuck in a jury trial defending a nursing home being accused of wrongful death in Bossier Parish — a case he ended up winning.
The advertising bill, which was sponsored by Rep. Kim Carver, R-Mandeville, had cleared the House in mid-May on a 75-25 vote and advanced to the Senate Judiciary A Committee, of which Seabaugh is a member.
Carver, who did not return a request for comment Monday, brought his bill to the committee on May 28 where it failed to advance in a 3-1 party-line vote with Democrats holding an advantage due in part — but not entirely — to Seabaugh’s absence.
“I don’t know where he’s coming from throwing shade on me for missing a vote that wouldn’t have mattered,” Seabaugh said in a phone interview Monday. “It was a 3 to 1 vote, so me not being there never affected the outcome.”
The other Republican who missed the vote was Sen. Rick Edmonds of Baton Rouge. Edmonds, who is a church pastor, said he attended every day of the session but was presenting a separate bill in a House committee at the same time as the Judiciary A members were voting on Carver’s proposal.
Seabaugh said the governor is blaming him out of spite for having voted against a different bill that Landry helped write and shepherd through the Legislature — House Bill 148, a controversial measure that Landry signed into law following an ongoing public feud with another Republican elected official, Insurance Commissioner Tim Temple.
“He’s mad at me for voting against House Bill 148,” Seabaugh said, noting that his vote on the proposal, like with the Carver bill, made no difference to its outcome.
Seabaugh cited the same grudge as the reason why Landry vetoed one of his insurance bills on the last day of the regular session. In an interview that day, the senator said he felt blindsided by the veto because he thought he had the governor’s support. He contrasted Landry with former Gov. John Bel Edwards, a Democrat.
“John Bel would call and tell me when he vetoed a bill,” Seabaugh said at the time. “Jeff didn’t.”
After fielding only a few questions from the press at Monday’s bill signing, the governor did not answer further questions on the matter later in the day.