Louisiana

Lawsuits expected over Louisiana’s Ten Commandments law

Published

2 years ago

June 21, 2024

Lawsuits expected over Louisiana’s Ten Commandments law

NEW ORLEANS (WVUE)—A new Louisiana law requiring public schools to display the Ten Commandments is fueling debate inside the state and around the country, with promises of legal challenges.

Governor Jeff Landry, a Republican, signed House Bill 71 into law this week, but the ACLU of Louisiana plans to sue Landry in federal court over the new law, citing constitutional grounds.

“When children have the Ten Commandments, which are a very sacred Judeo-Christian text within the context of the classroom, we’re certainly suggesting to them, if not, in fact, even endorsing a particular religion in the classroom, and that we find to be violative of both the Constitution and the First Amendment,” said Alanah Odoms, Executive Director of the ACLU of Louisiana.

However, Christian conservatives and others who support the new law strongly support the requirement.

“We’re certainly, at [La.] Family Forum, excited about the possibility of reintroducing authentic history and a little bit of Western civilization in the education system. So, we think it’s a positive move in the right direction, and done appropriately, will have positive effects,” said Gene Mills, President of Louisiana Family Forum.

Odoms said two clauses in the U.S. Constitution apply to problems with the new law.

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“The first is called the free exercise of religion clause and that means that each person has the opportunity and the right to be able to decide what faith they will be, and they also have the opportunity to decide whether they will have a faith at all,” Odoms said. “And so, that actually works in conjunction with another really important clause in the First Amendment called the establishment clause.”

Further, she said, “The government cannot select or prefer one religion over another, and cannot prefer religion over a non-religion. So, it can’t proselytize. it can’t coerce people to choose a certain faith and so what we find with HB 71 is that it actually violates both clauses, the free exercise clause and the establishment clause of the first amendment.”

Mills said in response, “I disagree. I would follow up with a question that’s not a rhetorical question, which religion does it impose?”

Some argue that if opponents do not prevail in court against the new law, it could allow those of other faiths to demand that tenets of their religion be posted in Louisiana’s public school classrooms.

“I think people certainly could make an argument that in order to ensure that the government is not favoring one religion over another, that other religious ideas and other religious texts, perhaps should also be in the classroom,” Odoms said. “But I think the more important thing to think about is the fact that there’s 40 years of longstanding precedent in this country, which was articulated in a case called Stone versus Graham, that says that you cannot pass a law that has a non-secular purpose or a religious purpose. and you cannot essentially validate the government choosing a religion, one religion over another.”

Mills believes the law will withstand legal challenges.

“My sense is this is going to withstand constitutional challenge because it was written in such a way to reflect both the secular and the historical context that the Decalogue has had in both America’s foundation and in Western civilization. There is no censorship, there’s no forced religion, there is no imposing, there’s no public expenses. This is done at not a taxpayer dollar, but with resources that are found outside of taxpayer dollars,” he said.

Decalogue is another term for the Ten Commandments.

Odoms said, “And if we mandate that children go to school, we also have to be really careful that the government is not mandating a certain religion.”

Louisiana Republican Attorney General Liz Murrill issued the following statement:

“The 10 Commandments are pretty simple (don’t kill, steal, cheat on your wife), but they also are important to our country’s foundations. Moses, who you may recall brought the 10 Commandments down from Mount Sinai, appears eight times in carvings that ring the United States Supreme Court Great Hall ceiling. I look forward to defending the law.”

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Louisiana

Louisiana’s health secretary wants AI on the phones and the website

Published

9 hours ago

March 23, 2026

Press Room

Louisiana residents may see changes in calling the state health department or using its website if it turns to artificial intelligence to save money.

The department is examining how it can implement AI over the next few years to make residents’ experiences more efficient and reduce spending, Louisiana Department of Health Secretary Bruce Greenstein said at an AI symposium at LSU.

The first and largest deployment, should the department proceed with it, would be in its call centers. Running the two centers costs over $40 million a year. Greenstein said using AI to answer calls could reduce costs by up to 25%.

That would save the state $10 million a year while still preserving an option to talk to a human employee.

When the department was seeking information about an AI call option, Greenstein said, there was an overwhelming response from possible providers.

Greenstein, who has worked in both the public and private sectors, said he also is interested in using AI to help residents maneuver the department’s website. It houses information on an array of topics from SNAP benefits and Medicaid to oyster harvesting.

“Navigating our web properties becomes challenging if you’re looking for very specific information,” Greenstein said in an interview after the symposium on Friday. “So having chatbots to help people navigate our system is something we’re also considering.”

The department must respect the sensitive clinical information it deals with, Greenstein said, while keeping up with technological advances.

He said he is interested in creating protections in collaborations with health care professionals to codify patients’ rights to privacy.

Some rights would include a consent requirement if patient information was to be run through an AI database. Another would be a notification of changes, especially if a process is losing human interaction entirely.

“So on the AI side, because we’re in kind of the new frontier, what I suspect is that we’ll proceed extra cautiously where the robot takes the place of decision-making for the human,” Greenstein said. “But we’ll have more kind of slack in the system to experiment on the administrative task side.”

Greenstein critiqued other states’ restrictions on AI and said he did not see issues with Louisiana’s implementation yet.

“We are not seeing something that I’m deeply concerned about thus far,” he said. “And within state government, we’ve been taking a cautious but forceful approach forward in analyzing the opportunities but not making any decisions without having a proper amount of security concerns addressed or just thoughtful analysis.”

Gov. Jeff Landry released an executive order in October mandating governmental AI use to be “responsible, ethical, beneficial and trustworthy.”

The order restricts the state government’s use of AI platforms from “free software, especially those created and operated by nation states like the Communist Chinese Party.” He specifically named China’s DeepSeek AI model.

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Louisiana

UPDATE: Plane found in swamp near Cleco lake, RPSO says

Published

21 hours ago

March 23, 2026

Press Room

UPDATE: Plane found in swamp near Cleco lake, RPSO says

BOYCE, La. (KALB) – UPDATE: Rapides Parish Sheriff’s Office confirmed that officials have located a plane along the west side of Cleco Lake (AKA Lake Rodemacher) at around 5 p.m. on March 22.

RPSO said search and rescue teams have been unable to reach the plane so far as it is in a dense and swampy area of the forest.

No details on the type of plane nor the number of passengers were available from authorities at this time.

RPSO said the National Transportation Safety Board should be on scene by Monday and that all further information will go through them.

The following agencies are all involved in the search at this time:

RPSO
Louisiana State Police
Pineville Fire and Rescue
Alexandria Fire Department
Rapides Fire District-2
Cotile Volunteer Fire
Flatwoods Volunteer Fire
Pafford Ambulance Service
Louisiana State Forestry Service
Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.

PRIOR REPORT:

News Channel 5 was on scene near Boyce at around 3 p.m. after residents reported a possible plane crash around Cotile Lake on Sunday, March 22.

Rapides Parish Sheriff’s Office released details of the search so far.

Red Store Hill Road (Rapides)(KALB)

RPSO said they received reports of a possible plane crash at around 2:30 p.m. on Sunday.

They, alongside Cotile Volunteer Fire Department, Flatwoods Volunteer Fire Department, Taylor Hill Volunteer Fire Department and Louisiana State Police have begun searching the area.

As of 4 p.m., RPSO said they have not found a plane.

RPSO said the Federal Aviation Authority and National Transportation Safety Board have been notified.

More details to come.

This is a developing story.

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Tulane Track & Field Boasts Pair of Winners on Final Day of Louisiana Classics

Published

1 day ago

March 22, 2026

Press Room

Tulane Track & Field Boasts Pair of Winners on Final Day of Louisiana Classics

Tulane closed its opening event of the outdoor track and field season Saturday at Home Bank Soccer and Track Complex with 16 top-10 finishers. Highlighting the Green Wave’s success in the Louisiana Classics were Cara Salsberry and Nahema Dumonteil Cabanas, who each picked up wins Saurday in the hammer throw and 400 meter hurdles, respectively.

TU Field Events Do Well

Salsberry entered the program’s all-time top 10 Friday in the discus, and she followed up with an even better day on Saturday. She opened the day for Tulane with the hammer throw, boasting a mark of 57.97m to win the event and place second in program history. She now trails only the program record of 58.27m, set by Jacqueline Esmay in 2018. Not to be outdone, Dumonteil Cabanas earned a win on the track for the Wave in the 400 meter hurdles. She ran a 1:00.81 to top the field and rank ninth all-time in program history.

They were two of Tulane’s 16 total top-10 finishes across all events. In the field competitions, Dumonteil Cabanas shined again with a personal best of 1.62m in the high jump to place fourth. Camille Cummings notched a pole vault mark of 3.15m to finish sixth, and Sofie Groeninger was also sixth in the long jump with a mark of 5.56m.

Wave Track Leads the Way

Tulane shined brightest on the track. For the women, Eliza Brand and Morgan Matthews each finished in the top 10 of the 1,500m. Brand was second with a time of 4:40.66, and Matthews placed sixth with her clip of 4:48.08. In the men’s 1,500m, the Wave accrued a quartet of top-10 placements. Samuel Cohen and Paul James Pam each ran personal bests to place second and third, respectively. Cohen posted a mark of 4:00.23 with Pam at 4:00.37. Roman Schrader was right behind with a 4:01.39 in fourth, and Jalen St. Fort finished seventh with a clip of 4:02.72, a new personal best.

In the women’s 400 meters, Marissa Gordon recorded a personal best of 56.59 to finish seventh. Zaria Parker was eighth in the 100 meters with her time of 11.76, and Brand secured her second top 10 of the day in the 800 meters with a clip of 2:19.26 to place sixth.

Tulane’s last two top-10 finishes were in a pair of women’s relay races. In the 4×100 meters, the team of Bella Carroll, Parker, Cosette Fleury, and Brianna Brand ran a 47.51 to finish fourth. In the 4×400 meters, Caroll, Groeninger, Parker, and Bryanna Fears placed sixth with a mark of 3:57.09.

With the outdoor season now underway, Tulane returns to action next weekend with a trip to Raleigh, North Carolina, for the Raleigh Relays. The three-day event is hosted by North Carolina State and begins on Thursday, March 26, and runs through Saturday, March 28.

Portions Courtesy Tulane Athletics

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