Louisiana

A Baton Rouge judge has denied Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry’s request to have the state’s abortion ban go into effect pending his appeal of last week’s loss in court, meaning that abortion will stay legal in Louisiana – for now.

Child welfare advocates say they are extremely concerned about Gov. John Bel Edwards’ decision to temporarily move half of the incarcerated youth in a facility in Jefferson Parish to Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, one of the nation’s largest and most notorious maximum-security adult prisons.

A temporary restraining order blocking the state’s near-absolute ban on abortions will remain in effect until at least one more day pending a ruling from a Baton Rouge judge.

Over the holiday weekend, Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry asked the state Supreme Court to lift a lower court’s temporary restraining order that is blocking the “trigger laws” that would impose a near-absolute ban on the procedure in the state.

Louisiana’s so-called “trigger laws” that criminalized abortion procedures and shuttered the state’s clinics immediately after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade were blocked by a state judge on Monday.

The U.S. Department of Justice announced Thursday that it is opening a civil rights investigation into whether the Louisiana State Police engage in racially discriminatory patterns and practices.

As the Legislature adjourned Monday, Gov. John Bel Edwards expressed his support for the investments in education and infrastructure, including a teacher pay raise of $1,500 and $300 million toward a new Mississippi River bridge. But he also announced that he would acquiesce in one area that he has disagreed with Republican lawmakers saying he would allow a bill that prohibits transgender athletes from competing according to their gender identity to become law without his signature.

Louisiana House members voted overwhelmingly for a pair of abortion restrictions Thursday that would immediately shutter the state’s three abortion clinics and impose stiff criminal penalties for doctors who provide abortions and abortion drugs in person or remotely, if the U.S. Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade later this month.

A controversial abortion bill that would have allowed the state of Louisiana to charge doctors who perform abortions and people who undergo the procedure with murder died on the House floor Thursday after Republican state lawmakers gutted the bill at the request of establishment anti-abortion organizations.

For over half a century, the radio program La Tasse De Café has brought Cajun French to listeners across the country. Now, their contributions to radio are being recognized as “uniquely” Louisianan.