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A federal jury convicted a Louisiana nurse practitioner yesterday for her role in an over $2 million health care fraud scheme. According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, Shanone Chatman-Ashley, 45, of Opelousas, was a nurse practitioner and enrolled provider with Medicare. Chatman-Ashley worked as an independent contractor for companies that purportedly provided telehealth services to Medicare beneficiaries. As part of the scheme, the defendant caused the submission of false and fraudulent claims to Medicare for medically unnecessary durable medical equipment (DME). Chatman-Ashley routinely ordered knee braces, suspension sleeves, and other types of DME for patients who had...

Benny Johnson @bennyjohnson 🚨Epic. Secretary Doug Burgum gets a tour of an oil rig in the Gulf of America: "Biden banned the possibility of even developing acres of the Gulf of America. He banned all of that. Trump unbanned that... we're back in business again." From Rapid Response 47 9:31 AM · May 3, 2025

When Congress passed the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) in March 2021, it allocated $350 billion in assistance to state and local governments – providing the largest infusion of cash to local governments since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. For New Orleans, that money represented a desperately needed lifeline. The city had been hit particularly hard by COVID-19. It was an early hotspot for the virus. And Black residents, who comprise about 60% of the city’s population, were disproportionately impacted, accounting for more than 75% of COVID deaths in the first few months of the pandemic. As...

A West Australian energy company is building a liquified natural gas (LNG) production and export terminal in Louisiana to expand the U.S. liquified natural gas export market. Perth, Australia-based Woodside Energy on Tuesday announced its plan to develop a three-train, 16.5 million ton per annum (Mtpa) liquefied natural gas production and export terminal in Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana, called Louisiana LNG. Gov. Jeff Landry said the company's and a New York company decisions to invest $17.5 billion in the project was because of President Donald Trump’s “commitment to unleash American Energy.” The Biden administration sought to ban new exports of LNG...

Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said on Sunday he does not think the law would allow President Trump to send United States citizens convicted of violent crimes to Salvadoran prisons, despite the president’s suggestion that he might be open to that possibility. “No, ma’am. Nor should it be considered appropriate or moral,” Kennedy told NBC News’s Kristen Welker when asked on “Meet the Press” whether he thinks such a move would be legal. “We have our own laws,” he continued. “We have the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution. We shouldn’t send prisoners to foreign countries in my judgment.” Trump, in a...

A $744 million jury verdict in Louisiana is at the center of a coordinated legal effort to force oil companies to pay billions of dollars to ameliorate the erosion of land in Louisiana, offset climate change and more. Proponents say the payments are overdue, but critics say the lawsuits will hike energy costs for all Americans and are wrongly supplanting the state and federal regulatory framework already in place. In the Louisiana case in question, Plaquemines Parish sued Chevron alleging that oil exploration off the coast decades ago led to the erosion of Louisiana’s coastline. A jury ruled Friday that...

Saunders said the NFL can be very "heterosexual dominant" while announcing his upcoming camp ...Saunders, 28, made the announcement on stage during the 2025 GLAAD Media Awards on Thursday, March 27 and spoke about the initiative during an appearance on NFL Network's "Good Morning Football," where the Super Bowl champion said, "Football is for all."

SHREVEPORT, La. (KTAL/KMSS) – Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry expressed disappointment after voters rejected a constitutional amendment he said would have been a game changer for the state. Although there were four amendments on the ballot, Amendment 2 seems to be the one the governor hoped to pass, as it was the only one his message addressed. Many decried the amendment from the start, and a group of residents filed suit to get it removed from the ballot. The Louisiana Supreme Court dismissed the lawsuit, a move the governor applauded, but then came election day, and a higher-than-expected voter turnout would...

It’s been almost four years since U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy cast the political dice and diverted from Republican group think. He dared to endorse the impeachment of then-recently replaced President Donald Trump for his incitement of the Jan. 6 insurrectionist attack on the Capitol. “Our Constitution and our country is more important than any one person. I voted to convict President Trump because he is guilty,” Cassidy said at the time. Now Louisiana’s senior senator finds himself an unfavored incumbent, although a well-funded one, among hardcore GOP types ahead of his 2026 reelection bid. Despite an otherwise consistent track record...

Former Louisiana Sen. J. Bennett Johnston, a Democrat who chaired the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee and who fought off a surprisingly strong challenge from David Duke in 1990, died Tuesday. He was 92. Johnston, a moderate Democrat who served from 1972 through 1997, was a strong defender of nuclear energy and a mild-mannered lawmaker prone to deal-making in a state often known for populist flamethrowers. His election to the Senate came after he unsuccessfully ran for Louisiana governor in 1971; he lost to Edwin W. Edwards in a Democratic runoff, which nonetheless gave him the name recognition to...

DONALDSONVILLE — Hyundai is planning a nearly $6 billion investment in Louisiana, Gov. Jeff Landry, President Donald Trump and other officials announced at the White House on Monday. The South Korean car manufacturer will be opening its first North American steel facility in Donaldsonville, the governor said during the afternoon announcement. According to Louisiana Economic Development, the $5.8 billion facility will be located on 1,700 acres of sugarcane fields in the RiverPlex MegaPark industrial center. The facility is expected to create 1,300 direct jobs and 4,100 indirect jobs in the capital region. “Hyundai’s decision to invest nearly $6 billion in...

The Supreme Court is set to hear arguments Monday over the fate of Louisiana’s second Black-majority congressional district, in a pair of cases that could shape how state lawmakers can use race when drawing new congressional maps. Parties in the case have urged the justices to clarify the “breathing room” states get between the statutory and constitutional requirements of drawing district lines, as part of the tangled court fights over the state’s redistricting efforts since the 2020 census. On Louisiana’s first congressional map, a judge found the state violated the discrimination protections in the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and...

Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.) will not run for Sen. Bill Cassidy’s (R-La.) seat next year after raising speculation that he might, he announced Thursday. Higgins noted several polls from the GOP Trafalgar Group that indicated Republicans in the state wanted to see him run for the seat and that he had received encouragement to launch a bid. “Now, it is my considered determination that current engagement in the House being incredibly significant, it may be ultimately more beneficial to the Republic that I remain in service to the MAGA America First agenda as a senior Republican in the House of...

A New York federal judge has denied the Trump administration’s bid to dismiss the legal challenge brought by Mahmoud Khalil, the recent Columbia graduate and Palestinian activist who was detained by immigration enforcement agents earlier this month, and has ordered the case transferred to New Jersey. Khalil, a permanent US resident with a green card who helped lead Columbia University’s pro-Palestinian protests last spring, was arrested in New York on 8 March by federal immigration authorities. He was transferred first to New Jersey and then to Louisiana, where he is currently detained. The Trump administration sought his deportation but two...

The Supreme Court in a 5-4 vote declined to stop Louisiana from carrying out its first execution in 15 years later Tuesday with Justice Neil Gorsuch joining the court’s three liberal justices in agreeing to delay it. Jessie Hoffman, 46, is set to be executed for the 1996 kidnapping, rape and murder of Molly Elliott, making Louisiana the second state to carry out an execution by nitrogen gas. The Supreme Court has also declined to step in since Alabama began employing the method last year. Five of the court’s conservatives — Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel...

This story stinks worse than that which was rotten in Denmark. So, Some Quick Thoughts (SQT) on it. This was and is a planned op. It clearly was expected that the new administration would try to deport him. Hence, his comment to his wife when getting picked up; the huge legal team including several $1,000/hr high-profile litigators; the PR teams at work; etc. They had things ready to go, and I think the only thing that caught them off guard was how fast he was taken to Louisiana. Someone, and I don’t think it purely domestic, wanted to make him...

The Trump administration is wasting no time reversing President Joe Biden's disastrous energy policies and is already opening up new lanes of production less than two months after being sworn into office. Last week Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and Energy Secretary Chris Wright traveled to Louisiana to announce new liquified natural gas exports are back in business. Bergum and Wright were hosted by Venture Global, which committed to $18 billion in new energy investments. "Venture Global announced plans for a brownfield expansion at its Plaquemines LNG facility south of New Orleans, Louisiana. Joining Venture Global for the announcement was Secretary...

The Biden presidency might have been the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the American people. A shocking investigation by the Heritage Foundation's Oversight Project has revealed that virtually every document bearing Joe Biden's signature during his presidency was signed by an autopen — except for one. What makes this revelation particularly damning is that the only document confirmed to have Biden's actual signature was his letter announcing his withdrawal from the 2024 presidential race. Let that sink in for a moment. Remember when House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) revealed his discussion with Biden when Biden couldn't recall signing the...

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) announced that he will vote to confirm Kash Patel, President Trump’s choice to lead the FBI. Cassidy, the chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, said on Tuesday that he talked to “multiple people I respect about Kash Patel this weekend—both for and against.” “The ones who worked closely with Kash vouched for him. I will vote for his confirmation,” he wrote Tuesday on X. Patel’s newfound support from the GOP senator comes as the chamber gets ready to vote on his formal confirmation later this week.

Baton Rouge, LA— At the request of Attorney General Liz Murrill and District Attorney Tony Clayton, Governor Jeff Landry has signed the extradition warrant for New York Doctor Margaret Carpenter. A grand jury in West Baton Rouge Parish indicted Carpenter for the charge of Criminal Abortion by Means of Abortion-Inducing Drugs, a violation of La. R.S. 14:87.9(A) and (B)(1), committed on or about April 5, 2024. Extradition warrant attached here.