Free Republic

President Donald Trump has endorsed a Republican representative in Louisiana to challenge GOP Senator Bill Cassidy, who has vowed to fight for his place in the Senate. Writing on Truth Social, the president threw his weight behind Julia Letlow, who currently represents Louisiana's 5th congressional district. "I know Julia well, have seen her tested at the highest and most difficult levels, and she is a TOTAL WINNER!" Trump posted on Saturday. "Should she decide to enter this Race, Julia Letlow has my Complete and Total Endorsement. RUN, JULIA, RUN!!!"

CLINTON — An East Feliciana judge denied an early release for a man who killed seven people in a 2012 drunk driving crash. Brett Gerald pleaded guilty to seven counts of vehicular homicide after he drunkenly drove on La. 67 in Slaughter, causing a head-on collision that killed a family of six and their friend. His blood-alcohol concentration at the time was nearly twice the legal limit, and he has a history of DUI arrests. Gerald was originally sentenced to 10 years of hard labor for each count, a total of 70 years. However, his sentence was cut in half...

Energy Louisiana Trial Lawyers Steered Thousands to Judge Overseeing Their Case Against Oil Companies—Then Won a $744 Million Judgment 'The whole thing is set up as a kangaroo court,' former AG Bill Barr tells Free Beacon L: Offshore oil and gas platform (Mario Tama/Getty Images) R: Chevron logo Thomas Catenacci January 12, 2026 The Louisiana attorneys who helped secure a landmark verdict requiring U.S. oil company Chevron to pay $744 million in environmental damages gave nearly $15,000 to the state judge who presided over the case, ethics filings reviewed by the Washington Free Beacon show. The Baton Rouge-based law firm...

Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry signed extradition paperwork Tuesday to seek the prosecution of a California abortionist accused of illegally shipping abortion pills into the state. Landry is vowing to hold accountable those who undermine Louisiana’s pro-life laws and endanger women and unborn children. “I am signing the extradition paperwork to bring this California doctor to justice,” Landry posted on X, formerly known as Twitter. “Louisiana has a zero tolerance policy for those who subvert our laws, seek to hurt women, and promote abortion.” The Republican governor added: “I know Gavin Newsom supports abortion in all its forms, but that doesn’t...

Some of the Democrats who have been spiking the ball in the end zone after the passage of the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act” probably didn’t read all of the finer details in the bill. They’ve been celebrating its passage along with Joe Biden as the “biggest climate legislation” to ever be passed. They have also been grudgingly thanking West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin for getting the bill over the finish line. But it turns out that Manchin snuck in a few items that haven’t drawn many headlines yet and the climate warriors aren’t going to be very happy about them....

An illegal migrant has been nabbed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Louisiana after she ran a red light and crashed her car into one of the agency's vehicles, officers said. The Honduran national accidentally plowed her car being into one being used by ICE during the Operation Catahoula Crunch raid in Slidell, according to US Border Patrol chief Gregory Bovino. 'Apparently she never learned the lesson that red means stop, not 'accelerate and collide with a government vehicle actively enforcing federal law'.' Bovino, the Commander of Operation At Large in California, said in a Facebook post. No injuries...

Yesterday, the Secretary of War authorized the activation of up to 350 Louisiana National Guard members on Title 32 status through February 28, 2026. These National Guard troops will support federal law enforcement partners, including the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security, as they enforce federal law and counter high rates of violent crime in New Orleans and other metropolitan areas in Louisiana. Operating under Governor Landry's command and control, this mission will directly enhance the safety of Louisiana's residents and the enforcement of federal laws – reaffirming the Department of War's commitment to supporting our interagency...

ALEXANDRIA, La. (KALB/Gray News) - Authorities in Louisiana are investigating a crash involving a semitruck that collided with an interstate bridge. According to the Louisiana State Police, the crash was reported on Friday morning on Interstate 49 near exit 61. State police said fatigue seemed to be a factor in the crash, as the driver fell asleep. There were no injuries in the crash, but the bridge’s structure will have to be evaluated for safety due to damage from the collision, authorities noted. Trucks with oversized loads traveling north on I-49 have been instructed to take a detour on U.S....

More than three dozen missing children were rescued from sex traffickers in North Florida after a massive sting. The rescue effort, named Operation Northern Lights, found 43 missing children across 14 counties with more children found in other states, the US Marshals Service announced Thursday. Federal authorities said the youngest victims were one-year-olds and that one of the young victims had been abducted from Florida and located in Louisiana. Nine people were arrested after the staggering operation, which law enforcement said took two weeks to conduct. Additional charges could include human trafficking, child endangerment and custodial interference. The sting turned...

Federal authorities say they disrupted a credible terrorist threat over the weekend, arresting four alleged members of a radical pro-Palestinian extremist group accused of planning coordinated New Year’s Eve bombings in Los Angeles. The FBI told Fox News Digital that the members self-identified as part of a radical offshoot of the Turtle Island Liberation Front (TILF), an extremist group motivated by pro-Palestinian, anti-law-enforcement, and anti-government ideology. According to the FBI, they were allegedly planning coordinated bombing attacks on New Year’s Eve using improvised explosive devices (IEDs), targeting five separate locations across Los Angeles. The agency said the four were arrested...

The FBI claims to have thwarted a terrorist plot to carry out coordinated bombings in Los Angeles on New Year’s Eve, arresting five members of a pro-Palestinian extremist group accused of planning attacks in the City of Angels, The Post has learned. The “credible” threat came from radical members of the Turtle Island Liberation Front (TILF), according to a law enforcement source. Four were collared in Lucerne Valley in the Mojave Desert, where the extremists allegedly were testing improvised explosives, while a fifth was apprehended in New Orleans. “After an intense investigation, the Department of Justice, working with our FBI,...

Donald Trump is backing a GOP proposal depositing $1,500 checks into the health care accounts of millions of Americans. The legislation, which is being led by Republican Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy and Idaho Senator Mike Crapo, gives qualifying Affordable Care Act (ACA) enrollees a $1,000 deposit for those aged 18 to 49, as well as recipients aged 50 to 64 for $1,500. While speaking to reporters on board Air Force One on Tuesday, the president

During a meeting in Washington between Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana and U.S. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, a first-of-its-kind global parliamentary initiative was launched: an international effort to recommend former and current U.S. President Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise also participated in the meeting. At its conclusion, Ohana and Johnson signed an official letter to the Nobel Peace Prize Committee calling for Trump to be selected as the 2026 laureate. The initiative follows a plan announced by Ohana during Trump’s recent visit to Israel and a speech Johnson delivered in Congress the...

After successfully holding strong in the face of a Democrat-led government shutdown over Obamacare, a cabal of House Republicans is now waiving the white flag on the issue.On Thursday, nearly three dozen Democrats and Republicans introduced a proposal to extend taxpayer-funded Obamacare subsidies. As Federalist Senior Contributor Christopher Jacobs has regularly reported in these pages, these Biden-era subsidies — which are set to expire at the end of this year — have been a complete and total disaster. Spearheaded by Reps. Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., and Jen Kiggins, R-Va., the measure “would extend and reduce the tax credits in a two-step...

he Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency outsourced its "censorship operation" to a nonprofit it funded following a First Amendment lawsuit by Louisiana and Missouri attorneys general, "implicitly admitting that its censorship activities are unconstitutional," according to an interim staff report by House Judiciary Committee Republicans shared with Just the News. CISA also wanted to use the Center for Internet Security, which operates the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center (MS-ISAC) and Elections Infrastructure Information Sharing and Analysis Center (EI-ISAC), as its "mouthpiece" to obfuscate its own role in censorship, the report says. It cites spring 2022...

Abortion, religion, and race were the three intractable constitutional law conundrums of the second half of the 20th century. Back in the 1960s and ’70s, the justices of the Warren and Burger Supreme Courts felt compelled to step in and resolve them, though their constitutional warrant so to do was anything but clear. As readers of this magazine are well aware, for decades American society has been roiled by what we are slowly coming to see as the Supreme Court’s unwarranted judicial audacity—if not impudence, arrogance, and illegitimacy. Since Richard Nixon’s campaign in 1968, Republicans have been seeking to...

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced Thursday that it had made dozens of arrests in New Orleans just one day after launching Operation Catahoula Crunch, the latest federal immigration operation cracking down on criminal illegal immigrants. "Americans should be able to live without fear of violent criminal illegal aliens harming them, their families or their neighbors," Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement. "In just 24 hours on the ground, our law enforcement officers have arrested violent criminals with rap sheets that include homicide, kidnapping, child abuse, robbery, theft and assault." [snip] The men, all with criminal histories,...

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Trump administration officials overseeing the immigration crackdown launched this week in New Orleans are aiming to make 5,000 arrests, a target that some city leaders who oppose the operation say is unrealistic and would require detainining more than just violent offenders. It’s an ambitious goal that would surpass the number of arrests during a two-month enforcement blitz this fall around Chicago, a region with a much bigger immigrant population than New Orleans. Records tracking the first weeks of the Chicago operation also showed most arrestees didn’t have a violent criminal record. Alejandra Vasquez, who runs a...

Jimmie “Chris” Duncan walked out of the Ouachita Parish Correctional Center and into the arms of his parents last week after spending the past 27 years on death row. Seven months ago, a Louisiana district court judge vacated his murder conviction for killing his former girlfriend’s toddler, citing doubts about the evidence used to convict him. The judge granted bail after multiple legal delays, including an unsuccessful request by prosecutors to the Louisiana Supreme Court to stop his release. Now free, Duncan spent Thanksgiving with his family — then celebrated his 57th birthday the next day. “We thank God for...

Outgoing New York City New York City Mayor Eric Adams signed two executive orders Wednesday aimed at countering antisemitism and preventing city funds from supporting the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement. The New York Post reported that Adams barred city business or pension investment decisions that discriminate against Israel, a move that could be viewed as a challenge to Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, who supports the BDS movement. While speaking at a conference in New Orleans sponsored by the North American Mayors Summit Against Antisemitism, Adams said his administration “recognizes the benefit of maintaining a strong relationship between the...