By: Jeff Singer

Louisiana will become the first state in the nation to let voters weigh in on a proposal to ban private funding for elections this fall, an effort that comes after years of conservative conspiracy theories about Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg's role in the 2020 presidential election. No one has released any polls of the Oct. 14 contest over Amendment 1, which will take place the same day that the Pelican State holds its all-party primary for governor, but a prominent local voting rights advocate tells Bolts' Alex Burness he's pessimistic about opponents' chances.

By: Alex Burness

Louisiana’s Ascension Parish stores its voting machines in a warehouse without climate control, says Bridget Hanna, the parish’s elected clerk of court and top elections official. This worries her on days like these, when temperatures routinely hit 100 degrees, compounded by extreme humidity.

Louisiana’s voting machines are from 2006—old enough that when they falter, Hanna says, it’s often impossible to locate replacement parts. That’s a common frustration: aging voting equipment poses a projected multi-billion-dollar concern in the United States, amid a general national crisis of underfunding for local election administration.

By: Sam Karlin

Mandie Landry’s recent effort to pass a bill addressing gun violence got off to a rocky start.

One day in January, Landry, a progressive New Orleans Democrat, found herself at the center of a vitriolic online debate. In response to a tweet about the failure of another gun measure she had proposed, she argued for a law holding people who leave guns in cars liable for violence that ensues after their guns are stolen.

By: Melissa Flournoy

Do you want to know why young people are leaving Louisiana and moving to more progressive cities? They want to plan for the future, not cling to the past; they want rights to health care, education and respect for all people and races.

They want good-paying jobs and a high quality of life. They want to embrace the future.

Most people who work on, or follow, civil rights issues in the U.S. woke up on Thursday, June 8, 2023, with a feeling of impending doom. That morning, the U.S. Supreme Court was expected to announce its ruling in the Allen v. Milligan case, which derived from a lawsuit challenging Alabama’s congressional map for diluting the voting power of Black voters in violation of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA), the law’s most critical remaining provision. The Court’s decision would determine whether the VRA, one of the most important laws in U.S. history, remained in place in any meaningful form. Few, if any, thought it would survive.

By: Piper Hutchinson

A Louisiana Senate Committee advanced a controversial bill Tuesday that would allow adults over the age of 21 to carry a concealed firearm without a license or training. 

The Senate Judiciary B Committee signed off on House Bill 131 by Rep. Danny McCormick, R-Oil City, on a 4-1 vote, with committee Chair Sen. Gary Smith, D-Norco, being the sole vote opposed. Sen. Gregory Tarver, D-Shreveport, joined Republicans in supporting the bill. 

By: Jeff Palermo