News
Reports: Emails reveal extent of Saints’ aid in Catholic church scandal response
Expanding clergy sexual abuse probe targets New Orleans Catholic church leaders
The search signaled a new phase of the investigation that will seek to determine what church leaders knew about claims of sexual assault.
Scripps News
A 2020 lawsuit first revealed the New Orleans Saints’ involvement in the New Orleans Archdiocese’s crisis management response to a sex-abuse scandal. At the time, the team stated its collaboration was “minimal” and that the archdiocese had reached out to request PR assistance.
New emails revealed that the Saints were not only more involved than what was previously believed, but that people in the organization were the initiators of the correspondence and resulting collaboration.
Investigations by the New York Times and Associated Press uncovered more than 300 emails related to the Saints’ involvement in the church’s response to sexual abuse accusations against the New Orleans Archdiocese. The emails, which were revealed in a 2019 subpoena, and their contents had remained private until now.
Saints’ emails reveal different story than their initial claims
Among the first of those emails, according to the Times, was from Saints senior vice president of communications Greg Bensel to team owner Gayle Benson.
Bensel had seen a story in local New Orleans newspaper The Advocate that revealed that a “disgraced” former deacon, who had been accused of sexual abuse multiple times and removed from the ministry in 1988, was still involved with a different New Orleans church.
In the story, Archbishop Gregory Aymond was quoted as saying he was “utterly surprised and embarrassed” to hear the news.
Bensel reached out to Benson, who is a close friend of Aymond’s, after reading the story. After a back-and-forth exchange, Bensel suggested he reach out to the New Orleans Archdiocese to offer his aid in “crisis communications” as the number of similar accusations of sexual abuse against the archdiocese continued to grow.
“I like … (Aymond’s) PR person a lot,” Bensel wrote to Benson, “but if he ever wants to chat crisis communications … we have been through enough at Saints to be a help or sounding board- but I don’t want to overstep!”
So began the Saints’ involvement in the Catholic church’s management and response to the growing scandal.
Bensel went on to leverage his connections with the local papers: The Advocate, as well as The Times-Picayune (the two merged in May 2019). He implored the local papers to stay positive in their coverage of Aymond’s public response.
“I am asking that YOU as the most influential newspaper in our state, please get behind him and work with him,” he wrote.
Saints were involved with release of list of accused clergymen
One of the biggest bombshells from the newly revealed emails is that executives within the Saints’ organization were privy to – and may have helped put together – a list of names the archdiocese was set to release in November 2018 that included names of dozens of accused sexual abusers within the church.
“Had a cc w (then-New Orleans District Attorney) Leon Cannizzaro last night that allowed us to take certain people off the list,” Bensel wrote in an email to team president Dennis Lauscha.
The New York Times reported that it’s unclear whether any names were actually removed. What is certain is that the list, which generally was intended to be a “transparent public accounting that could help victims find closure and seek justice,” according to the New York Times, was criticized after its release for its lack of completeness.
Initially, the list included 57 names. It has since expanded to include 79, though an August 2023 report from The Guardian said that there have been 310 clergymen credibly accused of sexual abuse in New Orleans.
What is also clear from the emails is that Bensel played a huge hand in preparing the archbishop in his public response to the list’s release. The New York Times reported that the emails reveal Bensel’s personal consultation with Aymond included specific talking points for media appearances, help editing a letter to parishioners the archbishop planned to send upon the list’s release and pre-written questions for the Saints’ flagship radio station to ask Aymond in an interview.
According to the New York Times’ investigation, Bensel also “accompanied Archbishop Aymond on local media interviews” the day the list was first released.
NFL did not initially investigate Saints in 2020
When the team’s involvement with the church’s response to the scandal first became public in 2020, the NFL declined to pursue its own investigation even though the bulk of the emails came from an nfl.com address.
At the time, a league source told the New York Times that the NFL would not investigate the Saints until the emails, which were kept private at the time, were publicly disclosed.
The NFL did not immediately respond to USA TODAY Sports’ request for comment.
NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell is set to speak to the media in New Orleans on Monday at 4 p.m. ET ahead of Super Bowl 59, which is set to take place in New Orleans on Sunday.
(This story was updated to add a video.)
The museums, designed by conservative nonprofits and Trump appointees, tell the story of early America, from colonization to revolution. The one exhibition looking beyond the early years is the “Wall of American Heroes.” It is a list of 51 people, chosen to illustrate 250 years of American history.
A White House spokesman said they were “individuals who shaped this nation’s history, culture and spirit across generations.”
The people pictured on this national honor roll — and the people left out — help illustrate what this administration sees as the highlights of American history.
Amid the administration’s efforts to reshape the nation’s relationship with its past, Trump appointees heavily weighted the list toward a single era of American history — and a few specific kinds of hero.
The other exhibitions in the Freedom Trucks were crafted by a pair of conservative nonprofits, PragerU and Hillsdale College. But the “Wall of American Heroes” was created by Freedom 250, a nonprofit effort whose leaders were chosen by President Trump and that was created to lead the planning of celebrations of the nation’s 250th birthday, overshadowing a bipartisan congressional commission.
A spokeswoman for Freedom 250 said Mr. Trump was not directly involved in the selection of those featured.
But the list clearly tracks Mr. Trump’s own lifetime and the heroes of the conservative political movement.
The wall’s tilt toward heroes of the baby boomer generation, for instance, extends beyond Hollywood stars and musicians. Of the four religious leaders on the list, two — Archbishop Fulton Sheen and the Rev. Billy Graham — also appeared on TV regularly in the 1950s and 1960s. The only painter on the list is Norman Rockwell, known for his idealized depictions of American life in that period.
By contrast, there is only a handful of figures from the first decades of American independence.
“That’s a disservice, if your intention is to present the last 250 years,” said Sarah Weicksel, the executive director of the American Historical Association. “Because all of the people on this list are building on the work and struggles and progress that was made by the people in the 150 years prior.”
The “Wall of American Heroes” was inspired by a similar display in a traveling museum created by the State of Virginia. But Virginia’s display celebrates little-known historical figures.
Mr. Trump’s, by and large, celebrates people who are already well-known — and, often, people who were famous in their own time. For example, it praises P.T. Barnum, a circus impresario who used hoaxes and freak shows to draw crowds. The wall calls him an “icon of American sensationalism.”
The spokeswoman for Freedom 250 said that many of the names on the wall were drawn from a list of 250 people that Mr. Trump wants to include in a “Garden of American Heroes” in Washington.
The spokeswoman declined to say what criteria were used to narrow down the list.
The only president whose name appears on the wall — not on the list of heroes, but alongside his quotation — is Mr. Trump himself.
Explore the Wall of Heroes
Navigate the display by dragging from side to side.
Washington — Republican Rep. Tom Kean Jr. of New Jersey will return to Congress on June 30, his spokesperson said, after being away since March in an unexplained absence that has confounded Capitol Hill.
“Congressman Kean is eager to return to in person work on June 30 and resume a full schedule,” Kean’s spokesperson, Harrison Neely, told CBS News on Thursday. The New Jersey Globe first reported on his return date.
Kean’s whereabouts since he last voted on March 5 have not been disclosed. When he first made a statement about the absence in late April, the New Jersey Republican said he was addressing a “personal medical issue.”
Kean said earlier this month that he would return to Washington within a matter of weeks, at which point he would provide more details about his health.
“Right now I am focused on my recovery and under the advice of healthcare professionals, I will transition from virtual work to in person work within a matter of weeks. At that time I will be completely transparent as to the nature of my medical condition,” Kean said in a June 2 statement released by his campaign.
The statement came hours before polls closed in New Jersey’s GOP primary for his seat, in which he ran unopposed.
He has missed more than 130 votes during his absence.
House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters earlier this month that he had recently spoken with Kean. Johnson said he was aware of the health issue, but would not disclose the details.
“What he’s dealing with is not very common and not a big thing,” Johnson said.
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