Senate parliamentarian rules against Medicaid proposal
BY MARK BALLARD Staff writer
WASHINGTON — As U.S. Sen-
ate leaders struggle to find just enough Republicans to pass the One Big Beautiful Bill, the Senate parliamentarian ruled Thursday that some GOP plans to raise billions by reducing Medicaid spending didn’t adhere to the rules the majority party wants to use to approve the instrument without Democrats.
Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough shot down the Senate Finance Committee’s proposal to lower how much states could tax hospitals, clinics and other health care providers, which budget hawks championed, and centrist senators opposed. That proposal had alarmed many Louisiana health care leaders, who feared it could slash budgets for rural hospitals. The parliamentarian’s decision could delay passage of the bill. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., and President Donald Trump have both said they want it to pass by the weekend. Some Republican hard-liners
demanded MacDonough’s termination. But Louisiana’s two senators, both Republicans, said firing MacDonough isn’t responsible.
“We all have respect for the parliamentarian. I think that she’s very fair and I don’t think that she should be fired nor do I think she will be fired,” Sen. John N. Kennedy, of Madisonville, told reporters.
Sen. Bill Cassidy of Baton Rouge,
BR school buses get new cameras
Technology could curb misbehavior, improve training, officials say
BY CHARLES LUSSIER Staff writer
After going nine years without them, East Baton Rouge Parish public schools are busy installing modern camera systems on almost the entire bus fleet, in time for the Aug 7 start of school.
The cameras will give school officials an important tool in correctly assigning blame when it comes to student fights, poor driving, vandalism and traffic accidents. The hope is that video evidence will result in savings on insurance claims, savings that may partially offset the $3.5 million, five-year price tag
The school system last had operating cameras, on some but not all buses, in 2016.
School leaders have talked for years about buying new cameras but balked at the cost. In the meantime, surveillance cameras have become the norm in many other school bus fleets.
Technicians from Pro-Vision Solutions, the Michigan-based company supplying the technology arrived Monday at the district’s bus depot on North Sherwood Drive to begin installing eight cameras per bus. They are installing them on 500 buses about 20 additional “trail” buses will still lack cameras. The company has set a busy timetable to finish work over the next month. On T hu rs da y af te rnoon, speaking with local
ä See CAMERAS, page 6A
ABOVE: A technician wires in the camera system from Pro-Vision on an East Baton Rouge Parish school bus on Thursday. LEFT: A camera, one of eight on each bus, monitors the exterior of a school bus.
STAFF PHOTOS By MICHAEL JOHNSON
Liberty Lagoon set to open July 4
BREC blames delay on lifeguard shortage, maintenance
BY CHRISTOPHER CARTWRIGHT
Staff writer
The water fountains are spraying. A few employees are positioned at the entrance gates Yet, a month after Memorial Day, Liberty Lagoon Water Park still hasn’t opened for summer
The BREC water park’s opening was delayed last month after the agency announced a shortage of lifeguards.
Now, interim BREC Commissioner Janet Simmons said Liberty Lagoon will officially open July 4 and run through Labor Day, with
limited hours once school resumes in August. She blamed the delay on general maintenance and work on the filtration system, but said she “didn’t know the specifics.”
“We didn’t feel comfortable opening it until we had everything, you know, fixed,” she said.
nage out saying this is not open to the public yet,” she said. “And the reason we’re doing it that way is because we want to make sure everything is working properly and making sure that everything’s safe for everybody.”
“We didn’t feel comfortable opening it until we had everything, you know, fixed.”
Simmons said the lifeguard roles have been filled, and the park system wanted to delay the opening until safety was guaranteed for visitors and staff To that end, Simmons said the facility will have a “soft launch” Saturday with selected people testing the equipment.
JANET SIMMONS, interim BREC commissioner
The Capital Region has been left with few options for swimming this summer The problems began in May, when Blue Bayou Water Park announced it would not open for the 2025 season. Its sister attraction, Dixie Landin’ Theme Park, was open for about a week before closing permanently
“If people see people in Liberty Lagoon, we’re going to have sig-
ä See LIBERTY, page 7A
said: “My position is that cuts, and especially drastic cuts to Medicaid, should be avoided. The Senate bill cuts Medicaid too much I agree with President Trump, the House version is better.” Their comments align with Louisiana’s hospital community, which has been on Capitol Hill lobbying for changes in the Senate Finance version that conservatives say will generate billions of dollars to offset the costs of Trump’s tax breaks
7A
New look at death sentence ordered
BY MATT BRUCE Staff writer
BR man convicted of killing 2 restaurant workers in 1995 Wessinger ä See SENTENCE, page
A man condemned to death for fatally shooting two Baton Rouge restaurant workers during a robbery nearly 30 years ago may soon have a chance to stave off his execution. A federal district judge recently vacated the death sentence of Todd Kelvin Wessinger in a 1995 double murder at Calendar’s Restaurant. An East Baton Rouge Parish jury convicted him of the killings 28 years ago. Now, Wessinger, 57, could have a chance to convince a new jury to spare his life. Wessinger was a former dishwasher at the now-closed diner, which once stood along Perkins Road. He shot and killed restaurant employee David Breakwell, 46, and Stephanie Guzzardo, a 27-year-old manager, during the Nov 19, 1995, robbery He also shot another worker in the back that person survived — and tried to shoot a fourth employee in the head, but his gun jammed, according to federal court records. U.S. District Judge John deGravelles remanded Wessinger’s case
STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON Water sprays at Liberty Lagoon as the park sits empty on Thursday.
BRIEFS FROM WIRE REPORTS
Death toll from Kenya protests rises to 16
NAIROBI, Kenya
The number of Kenyans who died during Wednesday’s nationwide protests over police brutality and bad governance has doubled to 16, according to the state-funded human rights commission.
Property was also destroyed in the protests that attracted thousands of frustrated young Kenyans. At least two police stations were razed down by angry protesters.
Kenyans demonstrated Wednesday in 23 of 47 counties across the country calling for an end to police brutality and better governance. Thousands chanted anti-government slogans, and the protests morphed to calls for President William Ruto to resign.
Many protesters were enraged by the recent death of a blogger in custody and the shooting of a civilian during protests over the blogger’s death.
The country’s interior minister Kipchumba Murkomen on Thursday assessed damage to businesses in the capital, Nairobi, where goods were stolen from multiple stores. He said police would follow up with owners whose CCTV cameras captured the looters to ensure swift arrests.
Minister Murkomen on Thursday defended the conduct of police officers during the protests, saying the “government has your back.”
Guatemala, Honduras, U.S. sign asylum deals
GUATEMALA CITY Guatemala and Honduras have signed agreements with the United States to potentially offer refuge to people from other countries who otherwise would seek asylum in the United States, U.S Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Thursday at the conclusion of her Central America trip.
The agreements expand the Trump administration’s efforts to provide the U.S. government flexibility in returning migrants not only to their own countries, but also to third countries as it attempts to ramp up deportations. Noem described it as a way to offer asylum-seekers options other than coming to the United States She said the agreements had been in the works for months, with the U.S. government applying pressure on Honduras and Guatemala to get them done.
“Honduras and now Guatemala after today will be countries that will take those individuals and give them refugee status as well,” Noem said. “We’ve never believed that the United States should be the only option, that the guarantee for a refugee is that they go somewhere to be safe and to be protected from whatever threat they face in their country It doesn’t necessarily have to be the United States.”
Myanmar burns illegal drugs worth $300M
YANGON, Myanmar Officials in Myanmar’s major cities destroyed about $300 million worth of confiscated illegal drugs
Thursday
The destroyed drugs included opium, heroin, methamphetamine, marijuana, ketamine and the stimulant known as ice, or crystal meth, Yangon Police
Brig. Gen. Sein Lwin said in a speech at a drug-burning ceremony
The drug burnings came nearly a month after U.N. experts warned of unprecedented levels of methamphetamine production and trafficking from Southeast Asia’s Golden Triangle region, where the borders of Myanmar, Laos and Thailand meet.
The production of opium and heroin historically flourished there, largely because of the lawlessness in border areas where Myanmar’s central government has been able to exercise only minimum control over various ethnic minority militias, some of them partners in the drug trade
The U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime said in a May report that the political crisis across the country after the military takeover in 2021 — which led to a civil war — has turbocharged growth of the methamphetamine trade.
Pentagon leaders detail Iran bombing
Officials cite military tactics to show destruction from attacks
BY TARA COPP and LOLITA C. BALDOR Associated Press
WASHINGTON Pentagon leaders laid out new details Thursday about military tactics and explosives to bolster their argument that U.S. attacks had destroyed key Iranian nuclear facilities, but little more emerged on how far back the bombing had set Tehran’s atomic program.
In a rare Pentagon news briefing, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, worked to shift the debate from whether the nuclear targets were “obliterated,” as President Donald Trump has said, to what they portrayed as the heroism of the strikes as well as the extensive research and preparation that went into carrying them out.
“You want to call it destroyed, you want to call it defeated, you want to call it obliterated choose your word. This was an historically successful attack,” Hegseth said in an often combative session with reporters.
It was the latest example of how Trump has marshaled top administration officials to defend his claims about the effectiveness of the U.S. strikes. At stake is the legacy of the Republican president’s intervention in the brief war between Israel and Iran, as well as the future of American foreign policy toward Iran.
Hegseth appeared less confident that the strikes got all of Iran’s highly enriched nuclear material.
Asked repeatedly whether any of it was moved to other locations before the U.S. attack, Hegseth acknowledged that the Pentagon was “looking at all aspects of intelligence and making sure we have a sense of what was where.”
He added, “I’m not aware of any intelligence that says things were not where they were supposed to be” or that they were moved Satellite imagery showed trucks and
bulldozers at Iran’s Fordo uranium enrichment site, the main target of the bombings, days before the strikes, which occurred between 6:40 p.m. and 7:05 p.m.
EDT Saturday Experts said enriched uranium stocks can be moved in small canisters and are hard to find.
“It would be extremely challenging to try and detect locations where Iran may be hiding highly enriched uranium,” said Kelsey Davenport, director of nonproliferation policy at the nonpartisan Arms Control Association.
Trump expressed confidence that uranium was not pulled out before the attack
“Nothing was taken out of facility,” he said on social media. “Would take too long, too dangerous, and very heavy and hard to move!”
U.S. stealth bombers dropped 12 deep penetrator bombs, called “bunker busters,” on Fordo, Caine said. Two others hit Iran’s main Natanz facility
Hegseth and Caine described 15 years of study and planning going into the bombing mission and they showed video of a test explosion of a bunker buster, designed to penetrate deep into mountains.
While Hegseth, a former Fox News anchor, spent the bulk of his time slamming the media coverage and personally insulting reporters who questioned him, Caine stuck to the military details of the bombing.
Caine said the U.S. targeted the ventilation shafts at the Fordo facility as the entry point for the bombs. In the days before the U.S. attack, the Iranians placed large concrete slabs on top of both ventilation routes from the underground facilities to try to protect them, he said.
He said six bombs were available for each of the two shafts that were hit. The first bomb was used to eliminate the concrete slab, then four more were dropped at slightly different angles to take out various parts of the underground facility
The sixth was a fail-safe in case any of the others didn’t work, and it also was dropped, Caine said.
He noted it is not his job to do the assessment of the damage. Asked if he has been pressured to provide a more optimistic view of the results, Caine said no.
Iran’s Khamenei warns against future U.S. attacks
BY FARNOUSH AMIRI and DAVID RISING Associated Press
DUBAI,UnitedArab Emirates Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Thursday that his country had delivered a “slap to America’s face” by striking a U.S. air base in Qatar and warned against further attacks in his first public comments since a ceasefire agreement with Israel.
Khamenei’s prerecorded speech that aired on Iranian state television, his first appearance since June 19, was filled with warnings and threats directed toward the United States and Israel, the Islamic Republic’s longtime adversaries.
on the U.S. air base in Qatar contrasted with U.S. accounts of it as a limited attack with no casualties.
The White House responded to Khamenei’s video, accusing him of trying to “save face.”
“Any commonsense, open-minded person knows the truth about the precision strikes on Saturday night,” press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Thursday “They were wildly successful.”
The 86-year-old, a skilled orator known for his forceful addresses to the country’s more than 90 million people, appeared more tired than he had just a week ago, speaking in a hoarse voice and occasionally stumbling over his words.
The supreme leader downplayed U.S. strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites Sunday using bunker-buster bombs and cruise missiles, saying that U.S. President Donald Trump who said the attack “completely and fully obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program had exaggerated its impact.
“They could not achieve anything significant,” Khamenei said. Missing from his more than 10-minute video message was any mention of Iran’s nuclear program and the status of their facilities and centrifuges after extensive U.S. and Israeli strikes.
His characterization of Monday’s strike
The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog, International Atomic Energy Agency Director Rafael Grossi, reiterated Thursday that the damage done by Israeli and U.S. strikes at Iranian nuclear facilities “is very, very, very considerable” and that he can only assume the centrifuges are not operational.
“I think annihilated is too much, but it suffered enormous damage,” Grossi told French broadcaster RFI The IAEA has not been allowed to visit any of the Iranian facilities to do an independent assessment of the damage.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Esmail Baghaei, also conceded Wednesday that “our nuclear installations have been badly damaged, that’s for sure.”
Khamenei has not been seen in public since taking shelter in a secret location after the outbreak of the war on June 13 when Israel attacked Iranian nuclear facilities and targeted top military commanders and scientists.
After Sunday’s attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, Trump was able to help negotiate a ceasefire that came into effect Tuesday
Feds intend to try Abrego Garcia on smuggling counts
BY BEN FINLEY Associated Press
The Justice Department said Thursday that it intends to try Kilmar Abrego Garcia on federal smuggling charges in Tennessee before it moves to deport him to a country that is not his native El Salvador
“This defendant has been charged with horrific crimes, including trafficking children, and will not walk free in our country again,” DOJ spokesperson Chad Gilmartin told The Associated Press.
Gilmartin made the statement hours after a federal prosecutor told a federal judge in Maryland that the U.S. government plans to deport Abrego Garcia to a “third country” that isn’t El Salvador But Justice Department attorney Jonathan Guynn said there was no timeline for the deportation plans.
Guynn acknowledged the government’s plans during a hastily planned conference call with Abrego Garcia’s attorneys and U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis in Greenbelt, Maryland. Abrego Garcia’s lawyers had filed an emergency request for Xinis to order the government to take Abrego Garcia to Maryland when he is released in Tennessee, an arrangement that would prevent his deportation before he stands trial.
“We have concerns that the government may try to remove Mr Abrego Garcia quickly over the weekend, something like that,” one of his attorneys, Jonathan Coo-
per, told Xinis on the call. Xinis, however, said she could not move as quickly as Abrego Garcia’s attorneys would like. She said she had to consider the Trump administration’s pending motions to dismiss the case before she could rule on the emergency request. The judge scheduled a July 7 court hearing in Maryland to discuss the emergency request and other matters. It was unclear whether the government would seek to deport Abrego Garcia before he stands trial in the U.S. on criminal charges unsealed earlier this month.
Guynn told the judge during Thursday’s call that “there’s no timeline.”
“We do plan to comply with the orders we’ve received from this court and other courts,” he said. “But there’s no timeline for these specific proceedings.”
Deporting Abrego Garcia before his trial would be a reversal for an administration that brought him back from El Salvador just weeks ago to face human smuggling charges, with Attorney General Pam Bondi saying: “This is what American justice looks like.”
Abrego Garcia, a Maryland construction worker became a flashpoint over Trump’s immigration policies after he was mistakenly deported to El Salvador in March. He’s been in jail in Tennessee since he was returned to the U.S. on June 7 to face the human smuggling charges.
theadvocate.com/subscribe E-Edition:
Khamenei
COURTROOM SKETCH By DIEGO FISHBURN Kilmar Abrego Garcia sits Wednesday in court during his detention hearing in Nashville, Tenn.
ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO By KEVIN WOLF
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, left, and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine hold a news conference Thursday at the Pentagon in Washington.
Israelistrikekills 18 Palestinians in centralGaza
Turmoilmounts over food distribution
BY WAFAA SHURAFA, KAREEM CHEHAYEB and SAM METZ Associated Press
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip An Israeli strike hit astreet in central Gaza on Thursday where witnesses saida crowd of people was getting bags of flour from aPalestinian police unit thathad confiscated the goods from gangs looting aid convoys. Hospital officials said 18 people were killed.
The strikewas the latest violence surrounding the distribution of food to Gaza’s population, which has been thrown into turmoil over the past month. Afterblocking all food for 21/2 months, Israel has allowed only atrickle of supplies into the territory since mid-May Efforts by theUnited Nations to distributethe food have been plagued by armed gangs looting trucks and by crowds of desperatepeople offloading supplies from convoys.
The strike in the central townofDeir al-Balah on Thursday appeared to target
members of Sahm, asecurity unit taskedwith stopping looters and cracking down on merchantswho sell stolen aidathigh prices. The unitis part of Gaza’sHamas-ledInterior Ministry,but includes members ofother factions.
Witnesses saidthe Sahm unit was distributing bags of flour and other goods confiscated fromlooters andcorrupt merchants, drawinga crowd when thestrike hit.
Videoof the aftermath showed bodies, several torn, of multiple young men inthe street with blood splattering on the pavementand walls of buildings. The dead included achild and at least seven Sahmt members,according to the nearby Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital wherecasualties were taken There was no immediate commentfrom theIsraeli military.Israelhas accused the militant Hamasgroup of stealing aid and using it to propupits rule in the enclave. Israeliforces have repeatedly struck Gaza’s police,considering them a branchofHamas
An associationofGaza’sinfluential clansand tribes said Wednesday they have started an independent effort to guard aidconvoys to prevent looting. The National Gatheringof PalestinianClans and
Palestinians carry bags Wednesdaycontaining food and humanitarian aidpackages delivered by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, aU.S.-backed organization, in
southernGaza Strip.
Tribes said it helped escort arare shipment of flour that entered northern Gaza that evening.
It was unclear,however,if the association hadcoordinated withthe U.N. or Israeli authorities. The World Food Program did not immediately respond to requestsfor commentbyThe Associated Press.
“Wewill no longer allow thieves to steal from the convoys forthe merchants and
force us to buy them for high prices,” Abu Ahmad al-Gharbawi, afigure involved in the tribaleffort, toldthe AP Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz in ajoint statement Wednesday accused Hamas of stealingaid that is entering northern Gaza, and called on the Israeli military to plan to prevent it.
The National Gathering slammed the statement, say-
ing the accusation of theft was aimed at justifying the Israeli military’s“aggressive practices.” It said aid was “fully secured” by the tribes, which it said were committedtodeliveringthe supplies to the population.
The move by tribes to protect aid convoys brings yetanotherplayer in an aid situation that has become fragmented,confused and violent, evenasGaza’smore than 2million Palestinians
struggle to feed theirfamilies.
Throughout the more than 20-month-old war, the U.N. led the massive aid operation by humanitarian groups providing food,shelter, medicine and other goods to Palestinians even amidthe fighting. U.N. and other aid groups say that when significant amounts of supplies are allowed into Gaza, looting and theft dwindles. Israel, however,seeks to replace the U.N.-ledsystem, saying Hamas has been siphoning offlarge amounts of supplies from it,aclaim the U.N. andotheraid groups deny Israel has backed an American private contractor,the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which has started distributing food boxes at four locations, mainly in the far south of Gazafor the past month.
Thousands of Palestinians walk forhours to reach the hubs, moving through Israeli military zones where witnesses say Israeli troops regularly open fire with heavy barrages to control the crowds. Health officials say hundreds of people have been killed andwounded. TheIsraeli military says it has only fired warning shots.
EU leadersseekbig boostinUkraine military support
Officialsmake little progresson Russia sanctions
BY SAM MCNEIL Associated Press
BRUSSELS European
Unionleaders on Thursday called for even greater efforts to help meet Ukraine’s pressing military needs, and expressed support for the country’squest to join their ranks,but they made little headway with new sanctions against Russia. At asummit in Brussels, the leaders said it was importanttodeliver more “air defense and anti-drone systems, and large-calibre am-
munition, to help Ukraine, as it exercises its inherentright to self-defence,toprotect its citizens and territory against Russia’sintensified dailyattacks.”
They also underlined the need to help support Ukraine’sdefense industry which can make weapons and ammunitionmorequickly and cheaply thanits European counterparts. Ukrainian PresidentVololdymyr Zelenskyy tookpart in the meeting via videolink. Russian forceshavemade slow gains at some points on the roughly 620-mile front line, but it has been costly in terms of troopcasualties and damaged equipment. The outnumbered Ukrainian army has reliedheavily on
drones to keep the Russians back.
Months of U.S.-led international efforts to stop the more than three years of war have failed. As hostilities have ground on,the two sideshave continued to swap prisoners of war
Theleaderssaid thebloc “remains steadfast in its support for Ukraine’spath towards EU membership.”
Thatmessage comes aday after NATO leaders refrained from putting areference to Ukraine’shopes of joining the militaryorganization in their summit statement, dueinlargepart to U.S. resistance.
The EU is working on yet another raft of sanctions againstRussia, butthe lead-
KYIV,Ukraine Ukrainian forceshave halted Russia’s recent advance into the northern Sumy region and have stabilized the front line nearthe border with Russia, Ukraine’s topmilitary commander said Thursday Col. Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, commanderinchief of Ukraine’sarmed forces, said that Ukrainian successes in Sumy have prevented Russia from deployingabout 50,000 Russian troops,including elite airborne and
marine brigades, to otherareas of the front line
His claim couldn’t be independently verified, and Russianofficialsmade no immediate comment. Russianforces have been slowly grindingforward at some pointson the roughly 620-mile front line, though their incremental gains have beencostlyinterms of troop casualties and damaged armor.The outnumbered Ukrainianarmyhas relied heavily on drones to keep the Russians back. Months of U.S.-led internationalefforts to stop the
more thanthreeyears of war have failed. Amid thehostilities, the twosides have continued swaps of prisonersof war agreed on during recent talks between their delegations in Istanbul. Russia’sDefense Ministry andUkrainianauthorities said another exchange took place on Thursday Ukraine’scoordination headquarters for POWs said the swap included injured soldiers and those withhealth complaints.The youngest is 24 andthe oldest is 62,itsaid, adding that more exchanges areexpected soon.
ers madelittle headway.A key aim is to make further progress in blocking Russia’s “shadow fleet” of oiltankers and their operators from earning more revenue for Moscow’swar effort.
The EU has slapped several rounds of sanctionson Russiasince PresidentVladimir Putin ordered his troops into Ukraine in Feb. 24, 2022 More than2,400 officials and entities —usually government agencies,banks and organizations —have been hit
ThestatementonUkraine was agreed by 26 of the 27 member countries. Hungary objected,asithas often done. At aNATOsummit on Wednesday, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said that “NATOhas no business in Ukraine. Ukraine is not member of NATO, neither Russia. My job is to keep it as it is.”
In other developments, the EU leadersdeplored“the direhumanitarian situation in Gaza, the unacceptable
number of civilian casualties andthe levels of starvation.” They called “onIsrael to fully lift its blockade.” They also said that their European Council “takes note”ofa report sayingthat there aresigns that Israel’s actions in Gazaare violating human rights obligations in an agreement governing EU-Israel ties. Thereport was debated by EU foreign ministers on Monday,but the bloc is dividedover what to do about it.
ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTOByABDEL KAREEM HANA
Rafah,
Senators divergeondamagedonebyIranstrikes
Lawmakers receiveclassified briefing
BY JOEY CAPPELLETTI and MARYCLAREJALONICK Associated Press
WASHINGTON Senators emerged from aclassified briefing Thursday with sharply diverging assessments of President Donald Trump’sbombing of three Iranian nuclearsites,with Republicans calling the missiona clear successand Democrats expressing deep skepticism.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. DanCaine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, came to Capitol Hill to give the classified briefings, originally scheduled forTuesday
Many Republicans left satisfied, though their assessments of howmuchIran’s nuclearprogram was set back by the bombingvaried.
Sen. TomCotton said a“major blow” and “catastrophic damage” had beendealt to Iran’sfacilities.
“Their operational capability was obliterated. There is nobody workingthere tonight. It was highly effective There’snoreason to hit those sites anytime soon,”saidSen Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. Democrats remained doubtful and criticized Trump for not giving Congress more information. Senate Democratic leader Chuck
Hegseth said at aPentagon briefing Thursday On Wednesday, DirectorofNational Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and Ratcliffe sentout statements backing Trump’sclaimsthatthe facilities were “completely and fully obliterated.”
Gabbard posted on social media that“new intelligence confirms what @POTUS hasstated numerous times: Iran’snuclear facilities have been destroyed.” She said thatifthe Iranians choose to rebuild the threefacilities,it would “likely takeyears to do.”
be rebuilt over the course of years.”
Most Republicans have defendedTrump andhailed the tentative ceasefire he brokered in the Israel-Iran war.House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-Benton,wentas farastoquestionthe constitutionality of the WarPowers Act, whichisintendedtogive Congress asay in military action.
to reviewthe Constitution, saidSen.RandPaul,R-Ky “AndIthinkthere’s alot of evidence that ourFounding Fathersdid notwantpresidents to unilaterally go to war.”
Schumer, of New York, said thebriefing “raised more questions thanitanswered.”
Sen. ChrisMurphy, DConn., said thestrikeappears to “haveonlyset back the Iranian nuclear programby ahandful of months.”
“There’snodoubt there was damage done to the program,” said Murphy,but “allegationsthatwehave obliterated their program just don’tseemtostand up to reason.”
“I just do not think the president was telling the truth when he saidthis program was obliterated,” he added.
The session came as senators weighed their support for aresolutionaffirming thatTrump should seek authorization from Congress before launching more military actionagainst Iran.A vote onthatresolution could comeassoonasThursday.
Democrats, and some Republicans, have said the
White House overstepped its authoritywhen it failed to seek the advice of Congress. Theyalso wanttoknowmore about theintelligence that Trump relied on when he authorizedthe attacks.
Asimilarbriefing for House memberswill be held
Friday
Apreliminary U.S. intelligence report found that Iran’s nuclear programhad been setback only afew months, contradicting statements from Trumpand IsraeliPrimeMinisterBenjamin Netanyahu about the status of Iran’snuclearfacilities, according to two people familiar with thereport Theywere notauthorizedto discuss the matterpublicly and spoke on condition of anonymity
“You want to call it destroyed, you want to call it defeated, you want tocall it obliterated —chooseyour word. This was an historically successful attack,”
TV journalist Bill Moyers dies at 91
BY FRAZIERMOORE
AP television writer
NEW YORK Bill Moyers,the former White House press secretary who became one of television’smost honored journalists, masterfully using avisual medium to illuminate aworld of ideas,died Thursday at age 91.
Ratcliffe said in astatementfrom the CIA that Iran’snuclear program has been “severely damaged.” He cited new intelligence “fromahistorically reliable and accurate source/method that several keyIranian nuclear facilities weredestroyedand would have to
“The bottom line is the commander in chief is the president,the militaryreports to the president, and the person empowered to act on the nation’s behalf is the president,” Johnson told reporters.
But some Republicans, including some of Trump’s staunchest supporters, are uncomfortable withthe strikes and the potential for U.S.involvement in an extended Middle East conflict.
“I think thespeaker needs
Paul would not say whether he would vote for the resolution by Sen. TimKaine, D-Va., that would require congressional approval for specific military action in Iran. Asimple majority in the Senate is needed to pass the resolution and Republicans hold a53-47 advantage.
“I will have Republican votes, plural,” Kaine said. “But whether it’stwo or 10, Idon’tknow.”
Kaine authored asimilar resolution in 2020 aimed at limiting Trump’sauthority to launchmilitary operations against Iran. At the time eight Republicans joined Democratsinapproving the resolution.
Moyers died in a New York City hospital, according to longtime friend Tom Johnson, the former CEOofCNN andan assistant to Moyers during Lyndon B. Johnson’sadministration. Moyers’ son William said his fatherdied at MemorialSloanKettering in NewYork aftera “longillness.” Moyers’ career ranged from youthful Baptist minister to deputy director of the Peace Corps, from Johnson’s press secretary to newspaper publisher,senior news analyst for “The CBS Evening News” and chief correspondent for “CBS Reports.”
Moyers
But it was for publictelevision that Moyers produced some of TV’smost cerebral and provocative series. In hundreds of hours of PBS programs, he proved at home with subjects ranging from government corruption to modern dance, from drug addiction to media con-
solidation, from religion to environmental abuse. In 1988, Moyers produced “The Secret Government” aboutthe Iran-Contra scandal during the Reagan administration andsimultaneously publishedabookunder the same name. Aroundthat time, he galvanized viewers with “Joseph Campbell and the PowerofMyth,” aseries of sixonehour interviews with theprominent religious scholar. The accompanyingbook became abest-seller. Histelevised chats with poet Robert Bly almost singlehandedly launched the 1990s Men’s Movement,and his1993 series “Healing and theMind” had aprofound impact on themedical community and on medical education In amedium that supposedly abhors “talking heads” —shots of subject and interviewer talking— Moyers came to specialize in just that. He once explained why: “The question is, are the talking heads thinking minds and thinking people? Are they interestingto watch? Ithink the mostfascinating production value is the humanface.”
Demonstrating what someone called “a soft, probing style”inthe native
Texas accent he never lost, Moyers was ahumanistwho investigated the world with acalm, reasoned perspective, whatever the subject From some quarters, he was blasted as aliberal thanks to his links with Johnsonand public television, as well as his no-holdsbarredapproach to investigative journalism. It was a labelhedidn’tnecessarily deny “I’m an old-fashion liberal when it comes to being open andbeing interested in other people’s ideas,” he said during a2004 radio interview.But Moyers preferred to term himselfa “citizen journalist” operatingindependently,outside theestablishment.
Over the years, Moyers wasshowered with honors, including morethan 30 Emmys, 11 George Foster Peabody awards, three George Polks and, twice, theAlfred I. duPont-Columbia University Gold BatonAward for career excellence in broadcast journalism. In 1995, he was inducted intothe Television HallofFame.
Born in Hugo, Oklahoma, on June 5, 1934, Billy Don Moyers was theson of a dirt farmer-truckdriver whosoon moved his family to Marshall, Texas.High schoolled himintojournalism.
ASSOCIATEDPRESS PHOTO By RODLAMKEy CIA Director John Ratcliffe departs aclassified briefing for senators on Thursdayatthe Capitol on Capitol Hill in Washington.
Justices rule against PlannedParenthoodin Medicaid moneycase
SupremeCourt says states can blockfunds
BY LINDSAYWHITEHURST
Associated Press
WASHINGTON Statescan
blockthe country’sbiggest abortion provider,Planned Parenthood, from receiving Medicaid money for health services such as contraception and cancer screenings, the Supreme Court ruled on Thursday
The 6-3 opinion by Justice Neil Gorsuch and joined by the rest of the court’sconservatives was not directly about abortion, but it comes as Republicans back awider push across the country to defund the organization. It closes off Planned Parenthood’sprimary court path to keeping Medicaid funding in place: patient lawsuits.
The justices found that while Medicaid law allows people to choose theirown provider,that doesnot make it aright enforceable in court. The court split along ideological lines, with thethree liberals dissenting in the case from South Carolina.
Public health care money generally cannot be used to pay for abortions, butMedicaid patients go to Planned Parenthood for other needs in part because it can be difficult to find adoctorwho takes the publicly funded insurance, theorganization has said.
South Carolina Gov.Henry McMaster,a Republican, said Planned Parenthood should not get any taxpayer money.The budget bill backed by President Donald Trump in Congress would also cut Medicaid money for thegroup. That could force the closure of about 200 centers, most of them in states where abortion is legal, Planned Parenthood has said.
McMaster first moved to cut off the Medicaid funding in 2018, but he was blocked in court aftera lawsuit from apatient,Julie Edwards, who wanted to keep going to PlannedParenthood forbirthcontrol because herdiabetes makes pregnancy potentially dangerous. Edwards sued undera provision in Medicaid lawthat allows patients to choose their own qualified provider.
SouthCarolina arguedthat patients shouldnot be able filesuchlawsuits. Thestate pointed to lower courts that have been swayed by similar argumentsand allowed states such as Texas to act against Planned Parenthood.
The high courtmajority agreed.
“Deciding whether to permit private enforcement poses delicate policy questions involving competing costs and benefits—decisionsfor electedrepresentatives, not judges,” Gorsuch wrote. He pointed out that patients canappeal through other administrative processes if coverage is denied.
McMaster,inastatement, said hisstate hadtaken “a stand to protect the sanctity of life and defend South Carolina’sauthority and values —and today,we are finally victorious.”
White House spokesperson Harrison Fields called the opinion “a major victory forcommon sense” and said it underscores the Republican president’sposition that states shoulddetermine abortionpolicy.
In adissent joined by her liberal colleagues,Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson saidthe ruling is “likely to result in tangible harm to real people.”
“It will strip those South Carolinians —and countless other Medicaid recipients around thecountry —ofa deeply personal freedom: the ‘ability to decide who treats us at our most vulnerable,’” shewrote
Kennedy’s advisers back fluvaccination
Panelvotes againstshots with rarely-used preservative
BY MIKE STOBBE and LAURAN NEERGAARD
Associated Press
ATLANTA— The Trump administration’snew vaccine advisers on Thursdayendorsedthis fall’sfluvaccinations for just about every American —but only if they use certain shots free of an ingredient anti-vaccine groups have falsely tied to autism.
What is normally aroutine step in preparingfor the upcomingflu season drew intense scrutiny after U.S. HealthSecretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.abruptly fired the influential 17-member Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and hand-picked replacements that include severalvaccine skeptics.
The seven-member panel bucked another norm Thursday as it discussed thesafety of apreservative used in less than 5% of U.S. flu vaccinations: It deliberated based only on apresentation from an anti-vaccine group’sformer leader —without allowing theusualpublic airing of scientific data from theCenters for Disease Control and Prevention.
The preservative, thimerosal, haslongbeenused in certain vaccines that come in multidosevials,toprevent contamination as each dose is withdrawn. But it has been controversial because it contains asmall amount of a particular form of mercury Study after study hasfound no evidence that thimerosal causes autism or other harm. Yetsince 2001, all vaccines routinely used for U.S. childrenage 6yearsoryounger have comeinthimerosal-free formulas —including singledose flu shots thataccount for the vast majorityofinfluenzavaccinations
following itsusualpractice of acting on evidence.
Butheadded that “whether the actual molecule is arisk or not,wehavetorespect the fear of mercury” that might dissuade some people from getting vaccinated.
The ACIPhelps the CDC determine who should be vaccinated against along list of diseases, and when. Those recommendations have abig impact on whether insurance covers vaccinations and wherethey’re available.
Normally theCDC’sdirectorwould decide whether to accept ACIP’srecommendation, but the Senate has not yet confirmed nominee Susan Monarez.Administration officials said Kennedy would make thatdecision.
Medical groups decried the panel’slack of transparency in blocking aCDC analysis of thimerosal that concluded therewas no link between thepreservative and neurodevelopmental disorders, including autism. The data had been postedonthe committee’swebsite Tuesday, but was later removed because, according to ACIP member Dr.Robert Malone, the report hadn’tbeen authorized by Kennedy’soffice. Panelmembers said they had read it
While Thursday’sdebate involved only asmall fraction of flu vaccines,some public health expertscontend the discussion unnecessarily raised doubt about vaccine safety. Already,fewer than halfofAmericans get their yearly flu vaccinations, and mistrust in vaccines overall is growing.
“Selective use of dataand omission of establishedscience undermines public trust andfuels misinformation,” said Dr.Sean O’Leary
Lyn Redwood, anurse practitioner whoonceran the antivaccinegroup that RobertF.KennedyJr. founded,attends ameeting of the AdvisoryCommittee on Immunization Practices on Thursdayatthe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.
of the American Academy of Pediatrics. He said of thenew panelists, “Nothing about their recent actions have been science-basedor transparent.”
The flu votes marked the finalstep of atwo-day meeting
that alarmed pediatricians andotherdoctors’ groups, whopointed to new panelists’ lack of expertise in how to properly track vaccine safety —and ashift in focus to somelongtimemessages of anti-vaccine groups.
BY MARIA CHENG Associated Press
LONDON U.S.Health
Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.says the country is pulling its support from thevaccines allianceGavi, saying the organization has “ignored thescience” and “lost the public trust.” Avideo of Kennedy’s short speech was shown to aGavi meetinginBrussels on Wednesday,where theorganizationthat has paid for more than 1billion childrentobevaccinated through routine immunization programs was hoping to raise at least $9 billion for the next five years. Kennedy,alongtime vaccine skeptic, mentioned
Gavi’s partnershipwith the World Health OrganizationduringCOVID-19, accusing them of silencing “dissenting views” and “legitimate questions” about vaccine safety.
His speechalsocast doubt onthe diphtheria, tetanus and pertussisvaccine —which WHO and other health agencies have long deemed to be safe and effective.
Gavi said in astatement Thursday that its “utmost concern is thehealthand safetyofchildren,” addingthat any decision it makes on vaccines to buy is done in accordance with recommendations issued by WHO’sexpert vaccine group.
The advisory panel first voted, with one abstention, to back the usual U.S. recommendation that nearlyeveryoneage 6monthsand older get an annual flu vaccination. Then theadvisers decided people should only be given thimerosal-free single-dose formulations, voting 5-1 with one abstention.
Thatwould include singledose shotsthat already are the mostcommon type of flu vaccination, as well as the nasalsprayFluMist. It would rule out the subsetoffluvaccine dispensed in multidose vials.
“There is still no demonstrable evidenceofharm,” one panelist, Dr.Joseph Hibbeln, apsychiatrist formerly with theNational Institutes of Health, said in acknowledging the committee wasn’t
CAMERAS
media, Transportation Director
Rob Howle showed off anew bus and its new set of electronic eyes.
“It’sgoing to mean an increase in safety throughout the community,” Howle said.
Five cameras are being installed inside —one adashcam —and three on theexterior.The small black objects are far less visible than the big video cameras of yesteryear Howle highlighted useful featuresofthe new system:ultra
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back to the 19th Judicial DistrictCourt and ordered a new penalty phase to allow apanel of jurors to consider if he should be executed.
Wessinger wastriedinthe 19th JDC and convicted of two countsoffirst-degree murder following an eightdaytrial in June 1997.One day after the convictions, a jury returned death penalty verdicts for both murder counts during the sentencing phase.
Judge deGravelles previously vacated Wessinger’s death sentence in December 2022, when he granted the prisoner’shabeas corpus writ seeking relief from capitalpunishment. The federal judge determined Wessinger’scourt-appointed attorneysprovidedineffective counsel during the sentencing phase of his 1997 trial.
“The inaccurateand incomplete information presented to the jury during the penalty phase deprives this case of the appropriatedegree of reliability that death is the appropriate punishment,” the judge wrote in his 2022 order
In his ruling Friday,deGravelles doubled down on his decisionfrom 21/2 years ago, rejecting amotion by the state to reconsider his prior judgment. Louisiana
high-definition4Kresolution; motion-sensor activation; audio; night vision; live remoteaccess by district staff; built-in GPS;and videobackup, both on boardand viacloud storage. Pro-Visionwillstore video capturedbythe cameras forupto60 days and archive longer footage arisingfrom incidents, at acost of about $200,000a year.The cameras start capturingvideo when they sense motion and cease filming 10 minutes afteritstops.
Howleand otherdistrict staff will be able to watch drivers in real time from the Transportation Office on Choctaw Drive if there is an incident. The old camera sys-
Attorney General LizMurrill quickly responded, filing anotice of the state’sintention to challenge deGravelles’ latest order in the U.S. Fifth Circuit CourtofAppeals. East Baton Rouge Parish District AttorneyHillar Moore also signed the notice of appeal.
“Justice is long past due forTodd Wessinger.Ilook forward to moving thiscase through thefinal federal habeas re having the Fifth Cir view andreverse the court’smisguided Murrillsaidina st Thursday.“When pens, we willber move forward swift seethat justicei out. I’ve made that isetoWayne Guzzardo Stephanie Guzzardo’ —and Iintend to promise.”
The battle over inger’sdeath sentence had severallegalt turns over thepas reaching thehighe thelandatone poin
The Louisiana Court affirmedWess convictionsand in 1999, and he had post-conviction pet nied. Buthemaint innocenceand argue his public defende Romeand the late Hecker,were appointed hiscaselessthans before histrial beg After he exhausted pealsefforts in st
tem required staff to go out tothe bus and retrieve an onboardhard drive before they couldsee what happened, he said.
Oneofthe new cameras sitsatop the main door of the bus, Howle said. That camerawill allowhis officetoget ongoinghead counts of how many students board each morning and afternoon, allowing thedistrict to adjust routes more quickly to ensure fewer buses are operating at low capacity.Underfilledbuseswere flaggedrecently by an outside consultant,which was partially due to drivers not updating their superiors when children stopped riding. Marvin Parks, atrainingsafety
Wessinger turned to the federal court in 2004, filing his first habeas corpus writ in theU.S. MiddleDistrict. In the writ, Wessinger arguedthathis lawyerswere ill-preparedtomount aviable defense and failed to present evidence about his background that couldhave swayedjurors to rejectthe deathpenalty
U.S.DistrictJudge James
officer,said thecameraswill be ahelp in training newdrivers, allowing them to review video after the fact of their actual driving. He recalled arecent accident where adriver failed to check his mirror and ended up hitting acar that made alatedecisiontoturn with him
“If you had been looking in that left mirroryou would have seen that car,” Parks said. Howle agreed thecameraswill greatly improve training.
“Baton Rouge is achallenging place to drive, period, muchless in aschool bus,” he said.
Between 2012 and 2016, the school district relied on free cam-
era systemssupplied by another company, Force MultiplierSolutions. In additiontosurveillance, thecameras wereused to catch motorists violating bus stop safety laws. The money from resultingtraffic tickets —the company collected 70% of each one —was supposed to finance thewhole enterprise.
The company, however, didnot collect nearly as muchasanticipated —there were fewerviolators than expected and even fewer who bothered to paythe tickets. The effort here collapsed in late 2017 after thecompany became embroiled in abribery scandal in Dallas.
he got habeas corpusrelief again in 2022, this time from Judge deGravelles. State prosecutors again turned to the U.S. FifthCircuit and relied on one of thefederal appeals court’srulings in aseparate habeas corpus case involving aMississippi deathrow prisoner Three Fifth Circuit judges initially reviewedthe Mississippi man’s petition and ruled in December 2022 that astate prisoner must show a“colorable claim of factual innocence” to be granted habeas relief. Prosecutors lobbying against Wessinger said that ruling established aprecedent that should have be applied to his death penalty case in Louisiana. But the FifthCircuit’sfull
panelofappellate judges took asecond look at the Mississippi prisoner’swrit in November 2024 anddispensed with the requirement that prisoners show factual innocence to be granted habeas corpus. That upended the state’sargument against Wessinger and set the stage forJudge deGravelles to reinstitute his 2022 ruling.
LeisureSportsand Recreation will assume operations of Blue Bayou, rename the waterparkto Soak’n Fun and open in May2026. TheMandeville-basedcompany operates Gulf IslandsWaterparkin Gulfport, Mississippi.
Alittle more than aweek later, BREC announced Liberty Lagoon wouldn’topen for Memorial Day because of alifeguardshortage.
“This announcementwas delayed as long as possibleinthe hopes of assembling enough certified lifeguards forthe holiday weekend,” BREC officialssaidina news release, adding that the decision was not made lightly
The shutdown and delayed opening of the water parks have left only three public pools in thecity. BREC maintains pools at City-BrooksPark near McKinley MiddleMagnet School, Howell Community Park on Winbourne Avenueand Anna T. Jordan Community Park on Stilt Street. The three pools are open on weekends between noon and 5p.m. andcertain weekdays between 4and
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contained in the bill
“Should the Senate Finance language succeed, Louisiana faces amore than $2 billion cut,” said Ryan Cross, government affairs directorfor the Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System, which runs hospitals in Louisiana and Mississippi, including Our Lady of theLake Regional Medical Center in Baton Rouge.
“Wehavetoprotect longstanding Medicaid financing tools that provide lifesaving access to careacrossLouisiana,” Cross added.
MacDonough’sdecision doesn’tnegate GOP ideas for revamping Medicaid. It just means that instead passing those provisions with 51 of the chamber’s100 votes, atotal of 60 “yes” votes will be needed.
Hitting 60 may prove difficult because even the 53 Republican senators disagree with various facets of the thousand-plus page megabill. All 47 Democratic senators oppose the bill.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which passed the House in May by asingle vote, includes anumber of Trump’s campaign promises, such as continuation of his signature 2017 taxbreaksand anumber of increased reductions and creditsfor businesses and seniors as well as tipped wages and overtime pay
Much of that is paid for with spending reductions to Medicaidand food stamps. But not completely. The bill would add about $3 trillion to the nation’sdebt.
Republican leaders want to pass the measure with a simple majority, rather than the usual 60 votes needed in the Senate. The rules allow policy changes in the bill provided that language hews closely to reaching budget goals.
MacDonough, the arbiter of Senate rules since
7p.m
Thedelayedopening is notthe only BREC-related changeunderway This week, Gov.Jeff Landry signed abilladdingfourseats on the BREC Commission. Baker,Central, St.George andZachary will all have arepresentativeonthe nine-person board, with newrulesrequiring at least twocommissioners from Baton Rougeand one from an unincorporated area of theparish. It also requiresthe commissiontosubmit an annual reportonBREC’sfinances
Rep. Lauren Ventrella, R-Greenwell Springs, sponsored thebill and said it stemmedfrom frustrations about“wastefulspending andexcessive taxation.”
BREC faced accusationsofmismanagement last year,with some critics pointing to late state audits that found misappropriated money
Theimpact is already being felt by the board.Reached for comment Thursday about Liberty Lagoon, BREC CommissionChair Donna Lewis said she couldn’tspeak about it due to theupheaval.
“We’re kind of in limbo in terms of where we are,” she said about the board. “So I’m not going to speak until that’skind of clarified.”
“Shouldthe Senate Financelanguage succeed, Louisianafaces amore than $2 billion cut. We
RyAN CROSS, government affairs director for theFranciscanMissionaries of Our
2012, found in about nine instances that thelanguage contained toomuchpolicy changeand not enoughbudgetwork.
For instance, the 6% cap on the amount of taxes states could charge providers was approved by 60 votes several years ago. Therefore, 60 votes would beneeded to changethat limit to 3.5%, as theSenate Finance Committee proposed. Language in the Senate’s version of the overall bill, which hasn’tbeen drafted yet, couldrevert to theHouse’s version, which temporarily froze provider tax rates at current levels; the provision could bedropped altogether; or Senate Financecould try to tweak the language.
The Senate Agriculture Committee changedsomeof the language in its proposals on theSupplemental Nutrition Assistance Program afterMacDonoughfound the original wording didn’t comply with the reconciliation rules. The agriculture committee was able to reinsert their efforts to shift more of the responsibility to payfor food stampsfrom thefederal government to thestates.
MacDonoughstill hasn’t decided on SenateFinance changes to Medicaid’s statedirected payments. Louisianaand otherstates use part ofthe providertaxes to supplementthe financesof rural hospitals. The Senate changes would strip about $2 billion of that fundingfor
Louisiana’srural hospitals.
Reviving the Senate Finance version to limit provider taxes to raise more money would create friction withmoderateGOP senatorswho already believe the House cut Medicaid too deeply Senate leaders hadforwarded an idea for makingprovider tax limitations more palatabletomoderates. They suggested creating a fund to help rural hospitals, whose patients are often on Medicaid, which rarely pays the actual costs of medical services provided.
Many far-right House members are seething at MacDonough’sdecision and demanded she be fired. As a lawyer,House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-Benton, said he could probably come up a legal argument to rid the Senate of MacDonough, but that’snot ajob for the lower chamber
More important to him is getting the bill through the Senate this weekend, back to the Housefor confirmation of the language changes, thenfinal passageinboth chambers to get the bill on Trump’sdesk by the July 4 self-imposed deadline.
“It doesn’tmakeiteasier,but youknowme, hope springs eternaland we’re going to workaround the clock and try to meet that deadline,because Ithink that’sthe way we should do it,” said Johnson.
Email Mark Ballard at mballard@theadvocate. com.
STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON
Liberty Lagoon water park’sopeningwas delayedlast month after BREC announced ashortageof lifeguards.
Status of LSU doctoral student unknown
Iranian-born man reportedly detained by ICE
BY QUINN COFFMAN Staff writer
The status of an Iranian-born LSU doctoral student remains unknown more than 24 hours after he was reportedly detained by Immigration Customs and Enforcement agents
Pouria Pourhosseinhendabad remained listed as “in custody” Thursday on ICE’s official database, but the website does not indicate where he is being held.
LSU representatives could not be reached for updates on his status or that of a second student who was reportedly detained. ICE has not release an official reason for the detainments. University spokesperson Todd Woodward told The Illuminator that Pourhosseinhendabad’s wife
was also detained by ICE and is another Iranian-born LSU student He confirmed the two had been arrested at their off-campus apartment over the weekend.
Pourhosseinhendabad is a doctoral student studying mechanical engineering at LSU, according to a research article published on May 12. His paper’s research focuses on using different techniques to limit impurities in clays used in industrial and medical applications.
In the paper’s abstract, Pourhosseinhendabad and his coauthor describe how bentonite clay and other “nano-clays” are used in “industries such as medical, water purification, food processing and drilling mud,” but that their applications are limited by impurities regularly found in “low-grade bentonite.”
The paper outlines different “cost effective and efficient” ways to purify this clay for future industrial use.
On Sunday morning, Mandonna “Donna” Kashanian, a 64-year-old Iranian woman who has lived in the U.S. for 47 years, was detained by ICE outside of her home in New Orleans. She in now being held at the South Louisiana ICE Processing Center in Basile. ICE also announced on its website Monday it had arrested 11 Iranian nationals over the weekend, but did not mention any detainees who had been residing in Louisiana.
‘Symbolic of the area’
Parish employee designs first East Baton Rouge Parish flag
Thursday.
BY QUINN COFFMAN Staff writer
Drawing from local history, and meant to unify the parish’s five cities, a flag representing East Baton Rouge Parish waved for the first time Thursday morning outside City Hall.
The flag, featuring a red background divided by a vertical red stripe and a wavy horizontal blue stripe with a central emblem, was designed by Mark
BY DEANNA B NARVESON
LeBlanc, a city-parish employee for over 36 years.
Growing up as a “kid of the ’60s,”
LeBlanc said he had to make his own fun, drawing flags on old diapers given to him by his mother and hoisting them on old broomsticks from his father
The Baton Rouge native lived just down the street from current Mayor
Sid Edwards as a child, then graduated from LSU before becoming an accountant for the city-parish in 1988.
LeBlanc’s design was approved at Wednesday’s Metro Council meeting to be the first flag design for the entire parish. The city of Baton Rouge already has a flag, designed by a committee of city employees in 1995, a committee that included LeBlanc.
“I’m one of those hard-liners that says a flag shouldn’t have words on it,” LeBlanc said. “It should be symbolic of the area and people it represents.”
LeBlanc’s flag draws on both the geography and history of the parish, he said.
n The red stripe with white border and the flag’s red background represent the “red stick” that French settlers found when first reaching the land eventually dubbed “Baton Rouge.”
He lost that fight with the city flag, which is red with the words Baton Rouge.
Former BRPD officer indicted
BY AIDAN McCAHILL Staff writer
A former Baton Rouge police officer with a documented history of sexually coercing women while on duty was formally indicted Wednesday, more than three years after he allegedly assaulted a woman in his apartment, according to records from the
STAFF PHOTO By JAVIER GALLEGOS
Baton Rouge Department of Buildings and Grounds employees Edward Mitchell, on the ladder, and Michael Robinson install the new East Baton Rouge Parish flag outside the City Hall on
Timeline forNew Orleansarchdiocese setbyjudge
Deadlines laid out fornextsteps in bankruptcy
BY STEPHANIE RIEGEL Staff writer
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Meredith Grabill has laid out atimeline for the next steps in the longrunning Archdiocese of New Orleans bankruptcy,aprocess that involves avote of abuse survivors anda trial later this yeartodetermine whether the long-running case can be successfullyresolved. During acourt hearing Thursday,Grabill tentatively scheduled the trial for Nov.12. It could include sworn testimonyfrom Archbishop Gregory Aymond andsomeofhis topadvisers.At issue will be whethera proposed settlement by the archdiocese that would financially compensate hundreds of clergy sex abuse survivors should be confirmed by the court.
Before such atrial can take place,however,more than two-
thirds of abuse survivors in the case,aswellasother groups of creditors, must vote to approve the plan.
Grabillhas seta July15deadlinefor the plan, which hasn’t been finalized, to be filed withthe court If the plan fails to pass muster with abuse survivors, there won’t be any needfor atrial. Grabill wouldlikelydismissthe case,as she has repeatedlythreatened to do in recent months amid frustration over the slow pace of progress aftermorethan five years and nearly$50 million in legal fees.
Such amove would clear the way for abuse survivors to sue the church and its affiliated parishes and charitable organizations in state court.
Want theirday in court
Avocal group of abuse survivors and their lawyers are pushing fordismissal. This group, which comprises as many as 20% or more of the 600 survivors who have filed abuse claims with the bankruptcy court, is at odds with
the official court-appointed committee that represents all survivors and has been negotiating with the RomanCatholic church over asettlement.
The official committee announced in Maya tentative deal with thearchdiocese that would pay survivors at least $180 million over five years and entitle them to additional money from insurers andproperty sales.
Thesettlementwould also contain nonmonetary provisions that establish certainsafeguards and policies to protect children against future incidents of sex abuse by priests, deacons and other church officials.
Thefaction of survivors pushing fordismissal have alleged in courtdocuments that thecase has been mismanaged from the outset.Somenow saythatno amountofmoney is enoughand that they want to have their day in court so that they can telltheir stories to ajury
Some of those survivors have begun attending routine hearings in thecase. Adozen or so crowded Grabill’ssmall courtroom on
Thursday. Amongthem wasJohnny Krummel, 53, whosaidheisagainst the plan
“I want to go trial.I’m not goingtochange my mind, andI’m going to vote no to any plan,” said Krummel,who said he was abused in the1970s at Hope Haven and Madonna Manor on the West Bank,two of thearchdiocese’smost notorious orphanages at the time.
Aspokespersonfor the archdiocese declined to comment.
Hurdlesand questions
The faction of abuse survivors opposing the planisnot the only roadblockthatattorneys forthe church, itsapostolatesand the official committeeofabuse survivors face as theytry to forge ahead with asettlement.
Agroupofbondholders who lentthe archdiocesemorethan
$40 million in 2017 is also opposing the plan. Earlier this month, they accused the church in court of defaulting on its loan and committing securities fraud. Theaccusationwas notfiledas
Judge: N.O. council’stravelban notlegal
BY BEN MYERS Staff writer
The New Orleans CityCouncil’s efforts to restrict Mayor LaToya Cantrell’sfrequent travel faced another setback this weekwhen a Orleans Parish Civil District judge struck down aban the council passed in April as unconstitutional.
Cantrell’sadministration had already won apreliminary injunction freezing the law that restricted most employee travel, but the ruling issued WednesdaybyJudge Jennifer Medley nullifies the council’saction, which the mayor has characterized as an illegal power grab.
“Wemaintain thatthe constitution does not prohibit the council from regulating publicly funded travel by city employees,”Swensek said.
Thetravel ban spun out of a controversy over aproposed settlement in theOrleansParish School Board’slawsuit against the Cantrell administration over itsfees for collecting school-dedicated property taxes. The $90 million settlement wasannounced in November,but Cantrell nixed it twomonths later, claiming she hadn’tbeen toldabout it and that the city couldn’tafford it.
“This ruling upholds the integrity of the city’sgoverning structure and confirms that thecouncil cannot simply rewrite the rules to expand its power as it sees fit,” saidCharles Rice, aprivate lawyer who represented the Cantrell administration in the case.
The council’slawyer,AdamSwensek, said the council will likely appeal.
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n The blue wavy stripe represents the Mississippi River
n The emblem represents the previous powers that held Baton Rouge: the French fleur-delis, the Spanish castle and the English flag.
District 2council member
Aaron Moak learned about LeBlanc’sdesign and sponsored theresolution to make it the parish’sfirst flag. He said he wanted to have aflag that represented all cities in East Baton Rouge
“I thought now is the time. People are talking about the different cities and splitting up and who’sdoing what,” Moak said “Why not pushthis forward and have this flag to represent the whole parish, that we can all stand under?”
LeBlanc gifted the first copy of the flag, which was raised Thursday morning for the first time.
“I wanted to make this agift,” LeBlanc said. “I’ve workedfor theparish for 36 years. I’m proud to work here. I’m proud to be aresident here.”
led Paul and otherhigh-ranking officials to announce his arrest in September2022. The second-degree kidnapping charges carrybetween five and 40 years in prison in Louisiana, while malfeasance in office can bring up to five years. Aseparate federal lawsuit alleges Hill coerced anotherwom-
Thecity’schief financial officer,Romy Samuel,then issueddire warnings aboutout-ofcontrol spending, drawingire from council members who called it abluff to justify Cantrell’sdecision.Inresponse, thecouncilpassed atemporary banonnonessentialemployee travel on Feb. 27.
The ordinance appliedtoall city employees,but it was adirect shot at Cantrell, who has been heavily criticizedfor a busytravel itinerary during her second term. Cantrell, whotook atrip to Washington, D.C., after theban passed,won atemporary
restraining order and injunction. The mayor has spent about 1in 4daysoutside the city,onaverage, sincethe ban passed, according to her official schedules. They include trips that weren’t announced in advance, or at all, breaking from tradition.
The fight over thetravel ban fitwith other recent court battles over thecouncil’s authority, though none directly involving the mayor.Atissue are ordinances the council passed in 2022 and 2023 giving it theright to approve professional service contracts worthmore than $1 million, as well as alloutsidelegal contracts. Judges in two lawsuits,including one by Rice, have nowsaid those ordinances violate the city charter and wrongly impede the mayor’sexecutive authority
Thecouncil is appealingboth rulings, andthe orders are stayed while the appeals are pending.
The council last refused to sign off on a$75,000 legal contract for Rice that Cantrell endorsed for his work on alawsuit againstthe Municipal Police Employees’ Retirement System
Council President JP Morrell saidatthe time thecontract would send “the wrong message” becauseRicewas theheadof Entergy New Orleans during an
infamous astroturfing scandalin 2018. Rice, who has denied any wrongdoing in that controversy, arguedthe council hadnoright to obstruct the contract and said his past employment was irrelevant. In asimilar landmark case, Judge Paulette Irons overruled a 2022 ordinance giving the council power to approveprofessional servicecontracts over $1 million.
Henry Consulting brought that case after the council declined to approve its $73 millionsanitation contract for the French Quarter andDowntown Development District. Irons’ ruling —like Medley’s in the legal services case —is stayed whilethe council appeals, meaning the council retains its signing poweroncontracts like Henry’swhile the4th Circuit Court of Appeal considers the case.
Cantrell has insisted the Henry contract is lawful and said Henry will begin work on Aug. 1, even without afavorable ruling from the 4th Circuit. Her administration hasnot answeredquestions as to how thecontract is lawful while the stay in Irons’ order is in place.
Email Ben Myers at bmyers@ theadvocate.com.
an official complaint with federal regulators, and attorneys for the archdiocesedeniedthe allegation. One of the archdiocesan insurance companies, Travelers Insurance, also has yet to get on board with the plan.
Adding to the uncertainty are questions about how muchChristopher Homes might fetch if sold later this year.The archdiocese is actively marketing theportfolio of 15 elderly senior apartment complexestogenerateadditional money to pay survivors.
Until asaleisfinalized,however,somesurvivors said Thursday that it’s hard to getbehind even the broad outlines of aplan.
“WithChristopher Homes and too manyother things up in the air,I’d rather take my chances in court and let ajury of my peers decide what’sfair,” said Richard Coon, 58, who said he was abused for several years beginning at age 10.
Email Stephanie Riegel at stephanie.riegel@theadvocate. com
an into sex while on duty in January 2022 during aresponsetoa domesticdisturbance. The suit claims Hill detained the woman as asuspectand, over the course of multiple hours, drove hertovarious locations around Baton Rouge— he appeared to be attemptingtoconvince his supervisor on the phone to allow thewoman to avoid jail time. After bringing her to his precinct, then ahospital, Hill ultimately transported the handcuffed woman to the apartment
complex along Highland Road, the plaintiffsaid. There,hetold thewoman she could get her charges dropped if she had sex with him, the lawsuit says. The plaintiffcomplied. Theattorney who represents both plaintiffs claimed the department failed to properly vet, train or discipline Hill despitehis “extreme misconduct,” andthat thecityand police force lacked asexualharassmentpolicyto protect residentsfromofficer misconduct.
Hill had previously served with thePlaquemine Police Departmentand theWestBaton Rouge Sheriff’s Office. The federallawsuit related to the July 2022 incident is currentlystayed pending the outcome of Hill’scriminal case, while the case regarding the January2022incident was dismissed duetothe statute of limitations.
Email AidanMcCahill at aidan. mccahill@theadvocate.com.
Staff report
Entergy is planning apower outage formore than 50 customers in Denham Springs on July 1. The plannedoutagefor Denham Springs is from7:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.onTuesday,July 1. It will impact 84 customers, according to Entergy Entergy said the planned outage is “tosafely incorporatereliability improvements forour customers.” Denham Springslocations
Impacted streets include: n North River Road n North College Drive n South College Street n Mattie Street n Centerville Street n Allen Drive n Tabernacle Street n Bowman Street.
SHOOTING
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whowas in thearea heard the shots. After arriving at the gunfight, he firedatasuspect armed with arifle, but struck the vehicle the suspect was using for cover, Morse said.
The officer called forbackup, andgunfire stoppedafteradditional authorities arrived.
BatonRouge Emergency Medical Services took one victim to a hospital, while other victimswere driven in private vehicles.
The Big Blue House hasdrawn attentionfromauthorities in recent weeks due to late-night crowds in the surrounding streets, according to police.
Theinvestigation remainsongoing. Anyone with information about the incident is asked to contact theViolent CrimesUnit at (225) 389-4869 or CrimeStoppers at (225) 344-7867.
Cantrell
STAFF PHOTO By JAVIER GALLEGOS
BUSINESS
BRIEFS
FROM STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS
Fewer sought jobless benefits last week
WASHINGTON The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits fell last week, the Labor Department said Thursday, a sign that companies aren’t cutting many jobs.
Jobless claims for the week ended June 21 dropped 10,000 to 236,000, a historically low level. The four-week average of claims, which smooths out weekly volatility dipped 750 to 245,000.
Applications for unemployment aid are a proxy for layoffs, and so the decline is evidence that businesses are mostly holding onto their employees
Yet separate data suggests hiring also remains cool, in what economists are referring to as a “no hire, no fire” job market.
The unemployment rate remains low So far this year, employers have added a solid but unspectacular 124,000 jobs a month, down from an average 168,000 last year Most of the hiring has been concentrated in a few industries, specifically health care, government, and restaurants and hotels. Layoffs have mostly remained low, but hiring has also been weak.
GE Appliances moves washer production
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — GE Appliances announced a nearly half-billiondollar project Thursday that it says will create 800 new jobs and shift production of clothes washers from China to its massive manufacturing complex in Kentucky
The $490 million investment positions the Kentucky home appliances company to rank as the biggest U.S. manufacturer of washing machines, it said.
“We are bringing laundry production to our global headquarters in Louisville because manufacturing in the U.S. is fundamental to our ‘zero-distance’ business strategy to make appliances as close as possible to our customers and consumers,” CEO Kevin Nolan said. “This decision is our most recent product reshoring and aligns with the current economic and policy environment.”
Conagra to phase out artificial colors
Conagra Brands, the parent company of Duncan Hines, Slim Jim and other brands, is the latest big food company to say it’s discontinuing the use of artificial dyes.
In a statement released Wednesday — the same day as a similar statement from Nestle — Chicago-based Conagra said it will remove artificial colors from its frozen foods by the end of this year Conagra’s frozen brands include Marie Callender’s, Healthy Choice and Birds Eye.
Conagra said it won’t offer products containing artificial colors to K-12 schools by the beginning of the 2026-2027 school year, and it will work to discontinue artificial dyes across its entire portfolio by the end of 2027. Kraft Heinz and General Mills made similar pledges earlier this month.
The federal government has stepped up its scrutiny of artificial colors in recent months. In January, days before President Donald Trump took office, the U.S regulators banned the dye called Red 3 from the nation’s food supply, nearly 35 years after it was barred from cosmetics because of potential cancer risk.
In April, Trump’s Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr and FDA Commissioner Marty Makary said the agency would take steps to eliminate synthetic dyes by the end of 2026, largely by relying on voluntary efforts from the food industry
Many of Conagra’s products already make a point of using natural dyes. On a jar of Vlasic kosher pickle spears, Conagra notes that they’re colored with turmeric, not the synthetic Yellow 5. For the cheesy color in its frozen vegetable sides or its Orville Redenbacher popcorn, Conagra uses annatto, a plant extract.
Stocks rise to the brink of a record
Markets recover nearly all their 20% spring drop
BY STAN CHOE AP business writer
NEW YORK
The U.S. stock market ran up to the edge of another record on Thursday.
The S&P 500 climbed 0.8% and is sitting just 0.05% below its alltime closing high, set in February It briefly topped the mark during the afternoon in the latest milestone for the index at the heart of many 401(k) accounts, which had dropped roughly 20% below its record during the spring on worries about President Donald Trump’s tariffs.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rallied 404 points, or 0.9%, and the Nasdaq composite gained 1%.
McCormick, the seller of cooking spices, helped lead the way and jumped 5.3% after delivering a better-than-expected profit report. The company also gave a forecast for profit over its full fiscal year that topped analysts’ expectations including planned efforts to offset increased costs caused by tariffs.
Over the longer term, it’s been big technology stocks that have led the market for years and since the S&P 500 hit a bottom in April.
Chip company Nvidia, which has been the poster child of the frenzy around artificial-intelligence technology, added 0.5%. It’s the most valuable company in the U.S. stock market after rushing 61% higher since April 8 towering over the S&P 500’s gain of 23%. Another AI darling, Super Micro Computer, rose 5.7% to bring its gain since April 8 to 55%.
Micron Technology, which sells computer memory and data storage, swung between gains and losses after reporting stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said it’s seeing growing AI-driven memory demand, and the company gave a forecast for profit in the current quarter that topped analysts’ expectations. Its stock ended the day down 1%.
All told, the S&P 500 rose 48.86 points to 6,141.02. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 404.41 to 43,386.84, and the Nasdaq composite gained 194.36 to 20,167.91.
Wall Street’s worries about Trump’s tariffs have receded since the president shocked the world in April with stiff proposed levies, but they have not disappeared. The wait is still on to see how big the tariffs will ultimately be, whether they
will hurt the economy and whether they will push up inflation. The economy so far seems to be holding up OK, and more reports arrived on Thursday bolstering that. One said that orders for washing machines and other manufactured goods that last at least three years grew by more last month than economists expected. A second said fewer U.S. workers filed for unemployment benefits last week, a potential signal of fewer layoffs.
A third report said the U.S. economy shrank by more during the first three months of 2025 than earlier estimated. But many economists say those numbers got distorted by a surge of purchases of foreign products by U.S. companies hoping to get ahead of tariffs. They’re expecting a better performance in the upcoming months.
La. classifies natural gas as green energy
Backers claim move provides reliable grid
BY JACK BROOK and JENNIFER MCDERMOTT
Associated Press/Report for America
Louisiana is the latest state to redefine natural gas as green energy under a new law the Republican governor signed this week, even though it’s a fossil fuel that emits planet-warming greenhouse gases.
Three other states led by Republicans — Indiana, Ohio and Tennessee — have passed similar legislation. In some Democratic-led states, there have been efforts to phase out natural gas. New York and California cities like San Francisco and Berkeley have moved to ban natural gas hookups in new buildings, though some of these policies have been successfully challenged in court.
President Donald Trump has signed a spate of executive orders promoting oil, gas and coal, which all warm the planet when burned to produce electricity The European Union previously designated natural gas and nuclear as sustainable, a move that Greenpeace and the Austrian government are suing over Gov Jeff Landry, a major booster of the state’s petrochemical industry, says the new law “sets the tone for the future” and will help the state “pursue energy independence and dominance.”
Environmental groups say these new laws are part of a broader push by petrochemical industry-backed groups to rebrand fossil fuel as climate friendly and head off efforts to shift electric grids to renewables, such as solar and wind. It’s “pure Orwellian greenwashing,” said Tim Donaghy, research director of Greenpeace USA.
Globally, the term green energy is used to refer to energy derived from natural sources that do not pollute solar wind, hydropower and geothermal energy Louisiana’s law could enable funds slated for state clean energy initiatives to be used to support natural gas.
Natural gas has been the top source of electricity generation in the United States for about a decade since surpassing coal Coal and natural gas both produce carbon dioxide that warms the planet when burned, but coal produces over twice as much. Switching from coal to natural gas lowers carbon dioxide emissions, but it can increase
emissions of methane. The primary component of natural gas, methane is an extraordinarily powerful greenhouse gas, more potent at trapping heat than carbon dioxide and responsible for about 30% of today’s global warming.
Besides coal, everything else is better than gas for the planet, said Rob Jackson, a Stanford University climate scientist. Building new gas plants locks in fossil fuel emissions for decades, he added.
Louisiana’s law orders state agencies and utilities regulators to “prioritize” natural gas, along with nuclear power on the grounds that it will improve the affordability and reliability of the state’s electricity
The law’s author, Republican Rep. Jacob Landry, runs an oil and gas industry consulting firm.
“I don’t think it’s anything crippling to wind or solar, but you got to realize the wind don’t blow all the time and the sun don’t shine every day,” Landry said. The legislation “is saying we need to prioritize what keeps the grid energized,” he added.
Landry told The Associated Press that he used a model bill by the American Legislative Exchange Council as a template. ALEC is a conservative think tank with ties to the oil and gas industry’s billionaire Koch family
ALEC helped shape Ohio’s 2023 law to legally redefine natural gas as a source of green energy, according to documents obtained by watchdog group Energy and Policy Institute and first reported by The Washington Post. Ohio’s legislation was also heavily influenced by an advocacy group led by Republican donor Tom Rastin, a now-retired gas industry executive.
According to Dave Anderson, policy and communications manager for the Energy and Policy Institute, these laws are part of a long-running disinformation campaign by the gas industry to cast their product as clean to protect their businesses and prevent a shift to renewable energy sources that will address the climate crisis.
Landry and other proponents of the new law said they want to make sure that residents and businesses have a reliable electric grid. Nearly 80% of Louisiana’s grid is already powered by natural gas.
Landry said that businesses will come to Louisiana if they know they can count on the state’s electric grid. He highlighted Meta’s plan to build a massive AI data center powered by three natural gas plants.
Some consumer advocates say states do not need to embrace natural gas at the expense of wind, solar and other technologies to have a reliable grid.
U.S. economy shrank 0.5% in first quarter, worse than earlier estimates
BY PAUL WISEMAN AP economics writer
WASHINGTON The U.S. economy shrank at a 0.5% annual pace from January through March as President Donald Trump’s trade wars disrupted business, the Commerce Department reported Thursday in an unexpected deterioration of earlier estimates.
First-quarter growth was weighed down by a surge of imports as U.S. companies and households rushed to buy foreign goods before Trump could impose tariffs on them. The Commerce Department previously estimated that the economy fell 0.2% in the first quarter Economists had forecast no change in the department’s third and final estimate
The January-March drop in gross domestic product — the nation’s output of goods and services reversed a 2.4% increase in the last
three months of 2024 and marked the first time in three years that the economy contracted. Imports expanded 37.9%, fastest since 2020, and pushed GDP down by nearly 4.7 percentage points. Consumer spending also slowed sharply, expanding just 0.5%, down from a robust 4% in the fourth quarter of last year It is a significant downgrade from the Commerce Department’s previous estimate.
Consumers have turned jittery since Trump started imposing big taxes on imports, anticipating that the tariffs will impact their finances directly And the Conference Board reported this week that Americans’ view of the U.S. economy worsened in June, resuming a downward slide that had dragged consumer confidence in April to its lowest level since the COVID-19 pandemic five years ago.
The Conference Board said Tuesday that its consumer confidence index slid to 93 in June, down 5.4 points from 98.4 last month. A measure of Americans’ short-term expectations for their income, business conditions and the job market fell 4.6 points to 69 That’s well below 80, the marker that can signal a recession ahead.
Former Federal Reserve economist Claudia Sahm said, “the downward revision to consumer spending today is a potential red flag.” Sahm, now chief economist at New Century Advisors, noted that Commerce downgraded spending on recreation services and foreign travel — which could have reflect ”great consumer pessimism and uncertainty.”
A category within the GDP data that measures the economy’s underlying strength rose at a 1.9% annual rate from January through March. It’s a decent number, but
down from 2.9% in the fourth quarter of 2024 and from the Commerce Department’s previous estimate of 2.5% January-March growth. This category includes consumer spending and private investment but excludes volatile items like exports, inventories and government spending. And federal government spending fell at a 4.6% annual pace, the biggest drop since 2022. In another sign that Trump’s policies are disrupting trade, Trade deficits reduce GDP But that’s just a matter of mathematics. GDP is supposed to count only what’s produced domestically, not stuff that comes in from abroad. So imports — which show up in the GDP report as consumer spending or business investment — have to be subtracted out to keep them from artificially inflating domestic production.
ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTO By MARTHA IRVINE
A flare burns at Venture Global LNG in Cameron on April 21, 2022. Louisiana is the latest state to redefine natural gas as green energy under a new law the Republican governor signed this week.
Landry
Ayo, Steve NewRiver BaptistChurch, 45270 LA-429 in St.Amant,at11a.m
Brown, Michael CulpepperVirginiaNational Cemetery at 10 a.m.
Courtney,James TheChapelonthe Campus.3355
Dalrymple Dr BatonRouge,LAat 2pm
Gautreau,Byron Graceworks Church,16131 LA 44 Prairieville,LAat11am.
Griffin, Rosalyn
Ascension of OurLordCatholic Church at 11am
HonoréJr.,Marshall
St.Francis Xavier Catholic Church at 11 a.m.
Iyer,Shyam
ResthavenGardens of Memory & FuneralHomeinBaton Rouge at 5pm.
Kontos,Theresa Holy ComforterEpiscopalChurch of Tallahasseeat10am.
Peters,Joseph
St.PaulBaptist Church,33110 Bowie Street in White Castle,at11a.m
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St.Catherine of Sienna Catholic Church in Donaldsonville at 11 a.m.
Smith,Connie ResthavenFuneralHome, 11817 Jefferson HighwayinBaton Rouge at 10am
Tuminello,Robert OurLadyofMercy Catholic Church 445MarquetteAvenue,at10a.m
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St.Charles BaptistChurch at 11am
Obituaries
Arnold III, Christman 'Harry'
Alongtimeresidentof Kentwood,Harry passed awaypeacefullyon Wednesday,June 25, 2025 athis home in Amite, LA Hewas born January31, 1945 in Brookhaven,MS and was80years of age. Hewas alovinghusband father, grandfatherand great grandfather. He is survivedbyhis wife of 55 years Sandra Simpson Arnold, daughter Becky ArnoldSmith andhusband, GeorgeDewey Smith, 4 grandsons:GeorgeDewey Smith II, ChristianKyle Smith (TaylorJoiner Smith), Hunter Thomas Smith (SierraJones Smith) and TylerAustinSmith,3 great granddaughters Ken‐leigh Kate Smith, Kylie ClaireSmith andAva Hay‐den Smith. Hissister, Shirley Arnold Winstead nephewChristopher Wayne Arnold (Jena).He was preceded in death by his parentsChristman Harry Arnold,Jr. andMadie BellJones Arnold,brother NormanWayne Arnold, nephewWilliam Anthony Tony"Winsteadand great grandsonReidThomas Smith.VisitationatMcK‐neelyFuneralHomein Amite,LAonSaturday, June28, 2025 from 10 am until funeralservicesat1 pmconducted by Rev. Mike Foster. IntermentWood‐landCemeteryinKent‐wood,LA. Foranonline guestbook,visit http:// www.mckneelys.com.
Marjorie Mae Bryant Bosley departed this life on Monday, June 23, 2025,at Legacy Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Plaquemine, LA. She was 83 years old, anative of White Castle, LA and resident of Plaquemine, LA.Public viewing on Friday, June27, 2025 at Roscoe Mortuary from 5:00pm to 7:00pm. Visitation on Saturday, June 28, 2025, at Macedonia Baptist Church, from 9am to religiousservices at 11:00am. Interment at Grace Memorial Park followed by arepast at the McNell Christian Center Professionalservices entrusted to Roscoe Mortuary located at 58635 Meriam Street, Plaquemine, LA 70764.
Chauncey Burns, a beloved young resident of Houma,LA, anda native of Jacksonville, TX,passed awayonFriday, June 6, 2025, at thetenderage of 6 atManningsChildren’s HospitalinNew Orleans, LA. Avisitationwillbeheld onSaturday, June 28,2025, atSt. Augustine Catholic Church,from9:00amto 10:00am,followedbya MassofChristian Burial at 11:00am.Interment will be private.Arrangementsare being handledbyWilliams & Southall FuneralHome, located at 5414 Hwy1, Napoleonville,LA70390 For thosewishing to sign the guest book or offer condolences,pleasevisit their websiteatwww.wil liamsandsouthallfuneralh ome.com.
Chance Burns, Jr., a beloved young resident of Houma,LA, passedaway onFriday, June 6, 2025, at the ageof12atOshsner St Anne Hospital in Raceland, LA. AnativeofFortWorth TX. Visitation will be held onSaturday, June 28,2025 atSt. Augustine Catholic Church,from9:00amto 10:00am,followbyMassof Christian Burial at 11:00am Intermentwillbeprivate Arrangementsare being handled by Williams& SouthallFuneralHome, lo‐cated at 5414 Hwy1 Napoleonville,LA70390 For thosewishing to sign the guest book or offer condolences,pleasevisit their websiteatwww.wil liamsandsouthallfuneralh ome.com.
Depew, Robert Wayne 'Bobby' RobertWayne"Bobby" Depew was born on Sept. 19, 1948 and passed away on June 18, 2025. To view his obituaryand express condolences online, please visitwww.rabenhorst.com.
Falkenheiner, Doris
Doris Falkenheiner, a longtime resident of Baton Rouge, aretiredattorney, an avid genealogist, and conservationist,passed awayonThursday, June5 2025,atThe Carpenter House at the ageof83. She was bornonJune 6, 1941, in Ferridayand grew up in Vidalia.Doris wasa 1959 graduateofVidalia High School.Doris receiveda Bachelor of Science degree from LSUand aJurisDoctor degreefromLSU in 1966.She was among the first 100 women licensed attorneys in Louisiana. Doris was precededin death by her parents, Raymond and DorisFenton FalkenheinerofVidalia. Doris enjoyed reading traveling, birdwatching, counting counties, and genealogy.Her collection of genealogy research records of the Falkenheiner family and herextensive collectionofgenealogical research books weredonated to the Concordia parish libraryand are housed in the DorisFalkenheinerRoom.
with family,traveling,
Doriswas an active member of many genealogy associationsaswellas conservation groups, among them: theSierra Club, theAudubon Society, and Le Comitedes ArchivesdelaLouisiana, Inc. She willbeinurned at Greenlawn Memorial CenterinNatchez, on Saturday, June 28, 2025, at 11 a.m. The family wouldliketo offerspecialthanks to her sitters, Jynell Hurst and Doretha Wright,for their loving care of Doriswhile she was aresident of JeffersonManorNursing Home.They were her angels on earth. In lieu of flowers,pleasemake a contributioninher name to Le Comitedes Archives de la Louisiana, Inc.,PO Box 1547, Baton Rouge, LA 70821-1547 or theLouisiana Societyfor thePrevention of Cruelty to Animals, 1700 MardiGras Blvd, NewOrleans, LA,70114.
Hebert,SandraOwen McBride'Sandy'
SandyHebert, aloving mother, talented artist and devoted animal lover, passed away peacefully on June 22, 2025, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. She was born on July11, 1940, and grew up in St. Joseph, Louisiana, before making her home in BatonRouge Aproud alumna of Louisiana StateUniversity, she dedicated 30 years of her careertothe State of Louisiana,where she served as head of purchasing Beyond her professional life,Sandywas agifted artist,creating many beautiful paintings that willbe cherished by thosewho knew her. She had akeen eye fordecorating and enjoyed thecamaraderie of supperclubs. An active and spiritedindividual, Sandy was also aproud member of theLSU Golden Girls. Herdeepand enduring love foranimals was truly unsurpassed.
Sandywas marriedfor 37 years to LA Hebert,who proceeded her in death. She wasalso preceded in death by her belovedson, Ross Grand,and her sister, Ellie Zernott. She is survivedbyher stepchildren, Dawn Beasley, Tab Hebert and Shane Hebert;and her brother, Pat McBride
Relatives and friends are invited to attend aservice to celebrate Sandy's life at Resthaven Funeral Home,11817 Jefferson Hwy in BatonRouge on Monday, June 30, 2025, at 11:00 a.m. Avisitationwillbeheldat thefuneral home beginning at 10:00 a.m. Burial willfollow at Resthaven Gardens of Memory. In lieu of flowers,donations may be sent to Ascension Animal Hospital in Sandy's memory.
Family and friends may signthe online guestbook or leave apersonal note to thefamily at www.resthav enbatonrouge.com.
Patricia "Pat"Puderer Decell Irwin passed away peacefully at her homeon Monday, June 23, 2025, at theage of 91. Pat wasborn on August4,1933, in Natchez, Mississippi to Patrick Puderer and Alyce Barland Puderer. It wasin Natchez that she metand married Ralph Clark ("Mickey") Decell in 1953. They welcomed their first 5 children in Natchez before relocating to Baton Rouge, Louisiana in 1960, where they had 4more children AfterMickey'spremature deathin1984, Pat married George Irwinin1992. The Decell family wasblessed to have had George in the family for24years before hispassing in 2016 and will
watching pretty much all sports, particularlyprofessional tennisand golf, and attending live theater and symphony performances. We'renot sure how she found thetimetolearn to cook while raising9 kids but thank God she did. She blessed her family,friends, andthe St. George Church community with her amazingfood, most notablyher famous seafoodgumbo. At one point in her life, she prepared and froze her gumbo and other delicious entrees, and sold them from her home, along with her giftedcalligraphy work, through her business called,"Pat Decell's Pots and Pens". Pat wasa longtime active member of Al-Anon, where she learned to lovingly detach from the potentially cripplinggrasp this disease can have on family members. Many years afterseveral of her family members becamesober, she continued to practicethe principles of Al-Anon in allareas of her life. Thisbrought her much peace and serenity to deal with themany other trials shewould face, includingthe deaths of two husbands and twosons.By practicingher strongfaith in God and theprinciples of Al-Anon, Patwas awonderful exampletosomany of how to livelife with Love, Grace and Acceptance. Pat waspreceded in death by her parents; both of her lovinghusbands;her sons, Ralph C. Decell, Jr. and Drew Decell; adaughter-in-law, Karen ClineDecell; agrandson, Blake Foreman; agreatgrandson, Clark David Decell; and her sister, Mary Estelle ("Stella") Sanguinetti of Natchez. Patis survived by seven children; Don (Kay)Decell, Anne Decell, Steve (Becky) Decell, Keith (Lauri)Decell, Kay(David) Foreman, Louis Decell, and Mary (Richard) Joseph; three daughters-in -law, DarleneWhite Decell, Sherry Furnish Decell and KayRoach Decell; and three stepchildren,Cindy (Terry)Boudreaux,Timothy(Maria) Irwinand Allison(David Keith) Smith She is survived by sixteen grandchildren,Jennifer (Brandon) Istre, Ryan (Melissa) Decell, Heather Decell, Amy Decell, Courtney (Roger) Clement, Lacey(Shaun) Bruce, Matthew (Kristen) Decell, Hunter(Amanda) Decell, Chelsea (Scott) Nichols, Brandon(Amy Lynn) Foreman, Elizabeth(Collin) Webster, Will Foreman, MaxDecell, Mickey Decell, Caroline (Jayme)Taylor, and Rachel Joseph; and eight step-grandchildren, Andre (Megan) Boudreaux, Renee (Robert)Arroyo, Amelia (Kevin) Goding, Gabriella (Jacob) Pugh, Antonina (Kyle) Wilson, Giulia Irwin,David(Lauren) Smith and Christopher Smith. She is also survivedby twenty-three great-grandchildren,eleven step great -grandchildren, and one great-great granddaughter. Pallbearers will be her grandsons. Avisitation will be heldSaturday, June 28, 2025, at St. George CatholicChurch, 7808 St. George Dr Baton Rouge, from 9:00 am until the Mass of Christian Burial at 11:00 am.The Rev. Paul Yi and the Rev. Jon Koehler will officiate. Entombment will be in theSt. George CatholicChurch Mausoleum. Areception will followinthe Kleinpeter Activity Center next door to thesanctuary. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations maybemadetoSt. Joseph Hospice, St. George CatholicChurch, or acharity of your choice. The Decell family wishes to extend their most sincere
thanks to Terri "Dimple" Owens, Lynette Sharper andJulie Jenkins fortheir loving care provided to Pat over thepast year,orso. We also wouldliketo thankSt. Joseph's Hospice forthe wonderful services provided to herand theentire family
Kimble, Richard Leche
Richard LecheKimble, died on Wednesday, June 25, 2025, at the Carpenter's HouseofSt. Joseph's Hospice in Baton Rouge.He was87yearsofage. He wasa native of Simmesport,LAand aresident of Port Allen, LA. He graduated from InnisHighschool andservedinthe United States Army wherehe achievedthe rankofES (Sergeant). In civilian life he workeddoing inside countersales for several companies. He wasanavid fisherman and aformer member of theEast Ascension Sportsman League. He is survived by hisloving wife of 59 years, Willie Marie Kimble and brother Alvin Kimble. He is preceded in death by hisparents, Thomas (T-Bud) Kimble and Bessie Jackson Kimble; threesisters, Vivian Woods, Nellie Bourgeois andViola Daigrepont; two brothers, KellyKimble and Tommy JoeKimble.A privategravesideservice will be held Saturday, June 28, 2025, at 2:00 PM, followed by interment in Prairieville Cemetery to rest but not be forgotten.
Clark La-
passed away on June 25, 2025 in Baton Rouge,LAatthe age of 78. Achild of IreneGoods, she wasraised in Denham Springs, LA anda graduate of Denham Springs High School. Sheisa former employee of DHLand alongtime residentofSpanishTown (home of thePink Flamingo). She was a belovedmother, grandmother,great-grandmother andpartner.She is survivedbyher sons, Kevin LaCombe andBrent LaCombe; grandchildren, Kristine LaCombe Barron (Kevin),Kaitlyn LaCombe, Jordan LaCombe (Lane Harlow); great-grandchildren,Maxwell Ray Baron, Alexander David Baron, Oliver Saint Baron, Rylan Jones, Logan Wren Harlow Kendall Harlow; andher loving partner of 40 years, Debbie Daniel. Shewas preceded in death by her mother, IreneGoods; son, Ray LaCombe; andgrandson, Logan LaCombe. Visitation will be held at Seale Funeral Home, Denham Springs, Saturday, June 28, from 9a.m. untilservice at
12 p.m. Burial will follow at Greenoaks Memorial Park, Baton Rouge.The family wouldliketothankClarity Hospice at TheCrossing for providing thewonderfulcaretoher.And to the KreweofApolloBaton Rouge for theirlove and care.Inlieuofflowers, plants are preferredasshe lovedtohave them around her.
Joseph Long,Sr.,a beloved husband, father, grandfather,and dedicated memberofthe Lutcher community,passedaway peacefully on June 20, 2025 Hewas born on July 30, 1941, to thelateMaryLuke Longand SampsonLong Sr. Joseph wasunitedin marriagetoRoseSteib on June 30, 1964, andtogether theybuilt abeautiful life centeredaround faith, family, andhardwork. He was adevoted father to JosephLongJr. (Terimal), MarkLong(Tracey), Ter‐rance Long (De'Etta), Kevin Long(Shwanda),and Sean Long(Inette). Hislegacy continues throughhis cherished grandchildren: Cayman, Camryn,Jarmal, Geralyn,Julian, Jaelah,Tori, Tevin,Kyesh,Shatira, Shaquan,Shemar, and I’mari;and hisgreatgrandchildren:Synijah, Skylah,Siyanni,and Zoey Josephwas aproud long‐shoremanwho worked at RyanWalsh for30years Heretired at theage of 55 leaving behind alegacyof dedicationand strong workethic that wasad‐mired by allwho knew him. Heisalsosurvivedbyhis siblings: AltonLong (Mary), andDoris LongSteib;and brothers and sisters-in-law: Joseph Steib (Cleaster), John Steib, WilbertSteib,Geneva Steib-Perez (Maurice), and AudreySteib.Hewas pre‐ceded in deathbyhis par‐ents, Mary Luke Long and Sampson Long Sr andhis siblings: AliceLongDiggs (LeroySr.), Rosaline Long Hogan(Willie), Gilliard Long(Georgeann),and Sampson Long Jr (Genevia);brothersand sisters -in-laws ,Charles Steib (Victoria),Raymond Steib (Virginia),Caroline Steib-Gauthier(Terry), ClarvilleSteib,and Hamil‐ton Steib. He wasalsopre‐ceded in deathbyhis grandchild, Shalon Long; nephews andnieces: Leroy Diggs,Jr.,Joe Long,Huey Long, Sr Lois Diggs, May‐ola Cooper, andLatricia Steib-Woods;great nephew: Huey Long,Jr. Josephwillberemembered for hisloveoffamily, his quiet strength,and the warmpresencehebrought intoevery room.Heleaves behinda host of nieces nephews,cousins,and friends who will forever carry hismemoryintheir hearts. Specialthank you toOur Lady of theLake Hospitaland Pinnacle Hos‐pice. Family andfriends are invitedtothe Homego‐ing CelebrationonSatur‐day,June 28, 2025, at 11 a.m.atIsraelite Baptist Church,2192 Alexander Street,Lutcher,LA70071 Viewing will be from 9a.m until servicetime. Services will be presided over by
Long Sr., Joseph
LaCombe, Claudette C.
Claudette
Combe
Bosley, MarjorieMae
Irwin, PatriciaPuderer Decell 'Pat'
Rev. KevinB.FredericksSr. IntermentwillbeSt. JosephCemetery. Viewing willbeheldonFriday, June 27, 2025, from 3p.m.to6 p.m.atBardell’s Mortuary, 3856 LA 44,Mt. Airy,LA 70076. Services entrusted toBardell’sMortuary. In‐formation: (504)487-2193.
Marcantel, Mary Jane Eskew
Mary Jane Marcantel
Born: October 16, 1947
Died: June 21, 2025
Son: Sean Marcantel
Daughter: Michelle Lacour (Patrick)
5Granddaughters: Kristen Marcantel, Zella Aucoin (Tyler), Mary Kate Lacour, Violet Lacour, Josie Lacour, great granddaughter: Farrar Jane Aucoin.
Brother: Thomas Michael "Mike" Eskew (Alexandria)
Preceded in death by parents Thomas Michael Eskew, Jr. andJosephine VancherieEskew and a brother, John Eskew of Alexandria.
Mary Jane graduated BoltonHigh School in 1965, and attended Northwestern State University in Natchitoches, LA.
Mary Jane was amother, grandmother, greatgrandmother, sister,author, mentor and friend to many. She loved Spanish Town, Downtown, and Baton Rouge as awhole. She served on the Historic Spanish Town Civic Association (HSTCA) board for many years and was Board President for most of them. She was the first paralegal in the state of Louisiana and had unusual expertise in working on both criminal and civilcases. Atrailblazer in many ways, Mary Jane worked alongside some of the state's most prominent attorneys and was involved in numerous high-profile criminal defense cases,including the trials of former Governor Edwin Edwards. Mentored by Camille Gravel, ExecutiveCounsel to three Louisiana governors, she was widely respected for her incrediblelegal knowledge and in turn mentored many others throughout her career. She was co-founderof the non-profitWay Home program,which offers free bus tickets to homeless individuals who have averified destination and support waiting for them —a simple yet powerful idea that has changed lives. She deeply respected the Baton Rouge Police Department and collaborated with BRPD on various community-based efforts. She served on the transition teams for three East BatonRouge Parish MayorPresidents, advising on public safety, historic preservation and downtown development. In 2022, the Federation of Greater Baton Rouge Civic Associations honored Mary Jane with aLifetime Achievement Award. The federationcited her legal and law enforcement advocacy, her work to uplift voices in the Historicand Downtown districts, and her tireless push to elevate quality of life for the voiceless. She was amember of the first class of the Police Ambassadors program and was instrumental in bringing the issue of short-term rentals to the attention of both the Federation and the City-Parish. She was acontributor to the national award-winning true crime book Familiar Evil and was interviewed by numerous podcasts and network documentaries about her work on two prominent criminal investigations.
Agathering for family will be held in Alexandria onFriday, June 27. A memorial will be held in Baton Rouge at alater date.The familyasks that in lieu of flowers, donationsbemade in her memory to Behind the Line, P.O. Box 2490, Denham Springs, LA 70727insupport of Sgt. Caleb Eisworth and his family.
Mockler,Rita
G.
Rita G. Mockler passed awaypeacefully on June 23, 2025, at the ageof84. Shewas borninUnion, Missouri to afamily of humble means, in the "little houseonthe hill."She graduated from Brentwood High School in St. Louis, MO and had acouple of jobs, including flight attendant, until meeting her futurehusband, Gary W. Mockler. Garywas in the Marine Corpswhen they met and was soonafter stationedinQuantico, Virginia. Rita and Gary were marriedinthe Chapel on theMarinebasein1962.
AfterGary's time in the Marines, they movedback toSt. Louisand Gary was hired by Anheuser-Busch. They wouldmove sixtimes with his various promotionsand then purchased what wouldbecomeMockler BeverageCompany in Baton Rouge,LAin1987. All told they weretogether for57years,until Gary's passing in 2020, and they lived in Quantico, St. Louis, Kansas City,Baton Rouge, Houston,Dallas, back to St Louis, and thenback to Baton Rouge in 1987. Rita grewupasa tomboy in rural Missouri and loved to fish, apastime she learned from her grandmother.Infact, in Baton Rouge she had a trailer hitch installed on her Cadillac so she could tow her boat allover Louisiana with herdear friend, Joan Kimbrough. In the late2000's, Rita survived cancer and was featured in aMaryBird Perkins CancerCenter TV commercialas"Rita Mockler, the happy, fishing grandmother." (https://w ww.youtube.com/watch?v =4t3AUWZbF_w)
Along with fishing, Rita enjoyedthe simplethings in life: spending time with grandkids, cooking special meals, working on herextensive arrayofplants, and she loved her dogs.In later years, Gary and Rita enjoyed watchingold moviestogether, especially "The Classics". They wouldlaugh and cry together no matterhow many times they had seen aparticular movie. Rita, also known as "Maca" by hergrandchildrenand loved ones, will be forever missedbythose who knew her.She was kind and caring, loving thoughtful, and spiritual .simplyalovely person. Rita Mockler is survived by her two sons,Timothy and wifeKimberly, Patrick and wifeShelley;grandchildren Taylor Scelfoand husband Dominick (their son Sam,and one on the way), Ryan,Shelby (her daughterJuliet andson Roman), Erin,Riley,Sean, Brynn, Patrickand Cooper; Altogether9grandchildren and 3great-grandchildren. Sheisalsosurvivedbyher brother,Kevin Gardner; nephew Dana Wehrle and wifeSusan; nieceLaura Schultz and husband Steve.
Sheisprecededindeath by her husband of 57 years, Gary Mockler;her parentsRay and Jackie Gardner; sisterDixie and husband Don Wehrle; mother-in-law and fatherin-law Peggy and Edward Mockler;sister-in-law and brother-in-law Yvonne and Edward Mockler; niece Beth Poe; and nephew Michael Mockler The Mockler familyextendsspecial thanksto Gary and Rita'swonderful caregiversfor 9years Fay Hunt, Kay Duvall,and LaurieQuebedeaux, we call them "Mockler's Angels" We know with certainty that they livedlonger and better lives and were able tostay in their own home because of you. We can't thankyou enough and we love you! We also want to thank Eucharistic Minister, Stacy Briggs Dille,for her 8years of steadfastservice and friendship. Rita and Gary treasuredyour visits. The Mockler familytruly appreciatesthe outpouring of love,prayers, and support we have received during this most difficulttime, with special thanks to FatherPaul Yi and Father JefferyBayhi.
VisitationwillbeatSt. George CatholicChurch (7808 St. George Dr.,Baton Rouge, LA 70809) on Monday, June 30, 2025,beginningat9:00amwith Mass at 11:00a.m. Immediately followed by aprivate family burial at the St. George Cemetery.
Both Rita and Gary were treated successfully at
Mary Bird Perkins Cancer Center, and both were helped by Audubon Hospice of Baton Rouge. In lieu of flowers,the family requests donations be madetoMary Bird Perkins (https://marybird.org)or Audubon Hospice (225-9246830) in the name of Rita Mockler. "I am made glorious in thesight of theLord, and my Godisnow my strength."
Isaiah 49:5
Larry Murray, passed away on June 17, 2025. Private servicesare being held with Church Funeral Services. He is preceded in death by his mother, Marshelle Murray; and his grandmothers, Nora Holmes Martin and Lorraine Patton. He is survivedbyhis father, Larry Richardson (Tanga); and twobrothers and threesisters.
JuanitaSeal“Nina” Nolan passedawaypeace‐fully on Wednesday, June 25, 2025, at herhomewith her familybyher side.She was 96 yearsold.Ninawas a native of Sicily Island, Louisiana anda longtime residentofBaton Rouge. She is preceded in death byher parents; herbeloved husband,JosephC.Nolan, Jr.;two sistersand two sons-in-law.Ninaissur‐vived by herlovingchil‐dren, includingher three daughters,Kathy N. Primm, BrendaN.Antie (Charles), and Mary Beth N. Coxe;her son,JosephC.Nolan,III (Debbie). Sheisalsosur‐vived by sevengrandchil‐dren, five great-grandchil‐drenand hersister, Car‐olynS.Barbay. Relatives and friendsare invitedto attendthe GravesideSer‐viceat10:30 a.m. on Mon‐day,June 30, 2025, at Resthaven Gardensof Memory, 11817 Jefferson Highway in BatonRouge.A Visitationwillbeheldat Resthaven FuneralHome beginning at 9:00 a.m. Fam‐ily andfriends maysign the online guestbook or leave apersonalnoteto the familyatwww.resthav enbatonrouge.com.
Peters,Joseph
JosephPeters was born on September 7, 1934, he departedthislifeonJune 16, 2025 at Our Ladyofthe Lake HospitalinBaton Rouge, Louisiana. He was a nativeofNew Roadsand a resident of White Castle, Louisiana. Visitation will be held Friday, June 27, 2025 9am until religious services at 11am at St. Paul Baptist Church 33110 BowieSt. White Castle Louisiana 70788. He leaves to cherish his memory ahost of cousins, nieces, nephews, great nieces, greatnephews, otherrelatives, and friends.
Richardson, Donald B. 'Pete'
life beganin Bogalusa on October 6,1941. He died in Baton Rouge on June 20, 2025.
During histime in Bogalusa he excelledatbowling and won many trophies. In the 1960's, he and otherresidents from thearea commuted to NewOrleans to work at Boeing's Michaud plant where they worked on production of theSaturn Vrocketsthatsent astronautstothe moon. He livedinBaton Rougefor 55 years. He retired fromRubiconChemical after 22 years of workthere. He spent his spare time bowling,playing pool,and playing golf with friends and coworkers. The many friends he madewhile working and after his retirementenjoyed his stories,jokes, and lively personality Pete was preceded in death by his parents, H,C. and Margaret Richardson, his brothers, Van and Ray, and his twin sister, Suzie. He is survivedbyhis wife, Cathy. his son, Bruce, daughter-in-law Michelle, granddaughter,Alivia, nieces and nephews. A celebration of Pete'slife willbeheldatRabenhorst Funeral Home,825 Government St. in B.R. on Saturday, June 28thfrom2 -4 p.m. Allwho enjoyed knowing him are invitedto attend
Rouge,Louisiana; Ethan (Mecca) Rose,Sr. of Lafayette, Louisiana; Bancrof (Cicely) Rose of Houston, Texas, andKimberly Rose of Lafayette, Louisiana; grandchildren: Torian, Ethan,Jr., Kayley Kourtney, Jonathan,Jr., TheophilusII, Ephraim, Zakarie, Antonio and Mason; six great grandchildren; siblings: Cordelia (Denis) Broussard, Cornelius Rose, Marcus (Theresa) Rose andAquinetta Rose.Also cherishinghis memory is hisbeloved cousin and best friend, Clifton Cormier;and ahostofother relatives anddevoted friends Hisprayers still surroundus, hispresence lives on in ourhearts, and hislove will continueto guideusfor alifetime Rest in peace, Big Daddy. Youhave foughtthe goodfight,and yourlegacy will live on forever. Visitation Saturday, June 28, 2025, 9am untilreligious servicesat11am at Destiny of FaithChurch, 409 Patterson St., Lafayette, La. IntermentatCalvary Cemetery,Lafayette, La. For full obituaryand livestream funeral service visit www.dessellefuneralh ome.com
mechanic,hekept the family fleet of cars in top shape. Jay lovedfast cars, boats, motorcycles, NASCAR,and hisCorvettes Jay is survivedbyhis sons, Mark Rotolo(Delia), Gregg Rotolo, andBryan Rotolo (Angie);grandchildren, Rachel RotoloDaza, Sara RotoloHadden,Joseph E. Rotolo, Jacob Rotolo, Wade Rotolo, Ian Marchand,Erica Marchand,Evan Marchand,Ryan Rotolo, Mary CatherineRotolo, Zachary Rotolo, JoshuaRotolo, and MatthewRotolo; 22 greatgrandchildren; andlongtime companion, Joan Schuler.Heisprecededin death by hiswife;parents; daughter,Karen Jo Rotolo Marchand; andsisters, BerthaT.Rotoloand Philomene Rotola. The family wouldliketogive specialthanks to his home care attendants, Gloria Hood and Lee Smith. Visitation will takeplace at Resthaven Funeral Home on Saturday, June28, 2025, beginning at 9:00 AM until servicesat11:00 AM.Burial to followatResthavenGardensofMemory. Family andfriends maysignthe onlineguestbook or leave apersonal notetothe family at www.resthavenbaton rouge.com.
It is with deep sorrow that we announce the passing of Theophilus A. Rose, affectionately known as "Big Daddy,"who departed this life peacefully in theearlyhours of June 19, 2025, surrounded by his loving family.Borntothe unionofErnest and Dorothy Rose in Lafayette Louisiana, on July29, 1949, Theophilus liveda life full of love,resilience, and faith. He leaves to cherish his four children, Jonathan (Eboni) Rose, Sr. of Baton See more
Joseph "Jay" PeterRotolo passedawaySaturday, June 21, 2025 at theage of 94. AnativeofBaton Rouge, he was bornOctober27, 1930, to Vincenzo "Charlie" Rotoloand Domina "Maggie" RumfolaRotolo.Jay enlistedat17years oldinthe UnitedStates Marine Corpand served with honorsinthe Korean War. In 1954, he and his sweetheart,Catherine Mae Fisher,married in Natchez, MS and established a home in GreenwellSprings, La. They were happily married for34yearsand raised afamily of 4childrentogether.They lovedtravelingintheirRVand spendingweekends with family at theircamponthe Amite River. He worked as aplant contract maintenance superintendent. As askilled
82, a nativeofBelle Rose, Louisiana,passedaway peacefully on June 20, 2025 She wasprecededindeath byher husband,Leroy Sims. Sheleavestocherish her memory,her children: DennisWilliams, Vandell Williams,Leroy Sims Jr., Ty‐roneSims, PatrickAims, StevenSims, KirbySims, and JasonSims. Funeral services will be held on
aprofessional that can
Murray, Larry
Rotolo, Joseph Peter
Nolan, JuanitaSeal'Nina'
Sims,Loubertha
LouberthaSims,
Rose,Theophilus Augustus
OPINION
NOAA cuts will weaken oilspill response
Iresponded to oil spills for decades. We’re no longer ready for abig one.
Arecent oil and gas spill near New Orleans took more than aweek to contain. Over 70,000 gallons spewed from an old well off Garden Island Bay.Officials are now focused on cleanup and restoration After 33 years responding to spills like this one and catastrophes like the 2010 BP Deepwater Horizon,I was getting ready to retire later this year But with the Trump administration’sdrastic changes at theNational Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, my job became untenable. The agency is being gutted. Teams once nimble are now finding roadblocks thatmake it harder to do the work.
sponse and Restoration. Further reductions in force are expected. Theaverage tenure of those leaving is 27 years. Thinkabout that: Some 27,000 years of experience has just walked out the door. On my farewell, colleagues gave me amap of spills Ihad managed. There are over 700. Our small team responded to about 150 or more spills a year. We’d use NOAA’s resources, technologiesand knowledge to give the Coast Guard technical and scientificsupport for cleanup andrestoration
The Trumpadministration has made changes withoutconsidering the consequences, smashing our capabilities with asledgehammer.
and other natural disasters.
NOAA’s capacities are also critical forother major incidents nationwide. We supported the Coast Guard, forexample, after the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore collapsed.
Events like Deepwater Horizon are rare, but Iworry it could happen again. Ithink about commercial fishermen, shrimpers, oystermen, tourists and people whowork at our beaches, hotels and restaurants. Iremember how that disaster harmed sea turtles, 1,000-year-old corals and fish and whales that swam through toxic oil in the water column.
NOAA’s spill response team has provided scientific support to the Coast Guardfor nearly 50 years —a mission mandated by law.Weused to drop everything to respond. Now,responders have to write memos seeking approval from headquarters offices for emergency travel, just to get to the spill. That can take days. Not exactly the forward-leaning mindset we’ve had.
So when some 1,000 employees, almost 10% of NOAA, took early retirement this month, Ijoined them, departing the Office of Re-
What’sworse, these changes weaken our national preparedness for managing oil spills.
Deepwater took everything we had. At thepeak,close to 1,000 NOAA employees responded. All told,over 45,000 people assisted, from federal and state employees to contractors, cleanup personnel andwell control experts.
The Coast Guard relies on NOAA to analyze where aspill is likely to spread andanswer technical questions. Oil moves quickly.
Our models help responders understand where it will be tomor-
row,and we share information in real timebetween officials on the ground, in boatsand on aircrafts. NOAA’s oceanographic expertise, weather tools, overflights and shoreline surveys help focus on the areas most impacted. We provide expertsonmarine mammals,endangered species and other wildlife. NOAA’s Environmental SensitivityMaps help minimize harm to people by identifying drinking water intakes, for example.
NOAA relies on specialized contractors to manage and share information, train thousands of responders and provide surge capacity for larger incidents.
In session, stateSenatedid theright thingontax bills
If you find yourself in ahole, stop digging. This is exactly what Louisiana senators did when they rejected two tax-cut bills that would have created abillion-dollar shortfall in the coming fiscal years.
Routinecontracts are now reviewed at thehighest levels of the agency
Ouroffice used new technologies to advance capabilities. Autonomous aircraft can detect oil at sea and on shorelines, and by integrating satellite data and other remote sensing capabilities, we could detect, document and rapidly report on where the oil is.
The agency madethat information available on NOAA’s Environmental Response Management Tool, or ERMA. ERMA also documents marine debris, displaced fuel tanks, hazardous drums, stranded vessels and environmental impacts after hurricanes
The U.S. has been the world’s top producer of oil and gas for morethan adecade. The Trump administration is trying to promoteeven moreoffshore drilling. Members of Congress debated these policies in acongressional hearing where Itestified as an expert witness. The key point Imade, that Ihope resonated across party lines: Expanding offshore drilling while also weakening our oil spill response and recovery capacity is adangerous combination.
Doug Helton is theformer regional operationssupervisor in theNational Ocean Services Office of Responseand Restoration at theNational Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Tenyears of gaymarriage, butthe work continues
House Bill 578 would have reduced the state’s sales tax from 5% to 4.75% costing the State General Fund $266 million ayear by 2028 while HouseBill 667 would have cut the personal income taxfrom 3% to 2.75% and allowed seniors to claim an additional standard deduction, costing the state $378 million ayearby 2028. The Senate also rejected aconstitutional amendment that would have eliminated the state’srainy day fundtohelp fund the cuts. The state was already projecting a$590 million budget shortfall in the coming fiscal years When you add the proposed tax cutstothis, you get acool $1.2 billion deficit by 2028. These tax cuts would have followed major changes passed lastyear that cut taxes forcorporations and traded our state’s tiered personal income tax structure for aflat 3% rate —all while making low- and middleincome households disproportionately foot the billbyincreasing our state sales tax to 5%.
State Sen.Franklin Foil, RBaton Rouge, chairman of the Senate Revenue and Fiscal Affairs Committee, pointed out that the scenario felt too similar to 2008 when Louisiana lawmakers unanimously approved a tax cut at atime when the state was flush with cash duetomany
factors, including windfalls of federal dollarspost-Katrina Backthen, lawmakers were unaware thata few months after theyleftBaton Rouge, the market would crash, leading to skyrocketing unemployment and plummeting staterevenues. Then-Gov. Bobby Jindal and the legislaturechose to cut thebudgettothe bone insteadofraising taxes, leading to huge hikes in tuition at Louisiana’spublic universities, stagnant funding forpublic educationand underfunded public servicesthat are still generating lawsuits to this day.
But unlike 2008,when few people were projecting aglobal market crash, there are clear warningsigns todayshowing howdetrimental these tax cuts couldbe. And these warning signs are inadditiontothe fact that major economists and banks are projecting apossible recession.
The pending federal cuts to Medicaid and the Supplemental NutritionAssistance Program coulddevastateour statefinances as Louisiana’s statebudget is more reliantonfederal dollars than almost any other state in the union. With our paltry $7.25 perhour minimum wage, disinvestment in socialprograms, underfundedpublic schools and poor workforceconditions, we consistently have one of the highest povertyrates of any state This forces asignificant portionofLouisianans to rely on Medicaid and SNAP to make ends meet. Nearly1 in 3Louisianans get their health insurance through Medicaid. And about 1 in 5receive assistancethrough SNAP.These areour neighbors, co-workersand friends. While making Louisianans
sickerand hungrier would undeniably have aripple effect through our state’seconomy, our state lawmakersface other budget threats that make their decision to hold ontoevery dollar we have theright one. Hurricane season began June 1.
The Trump administration has already slashed30% of the Federal Emergency Management Agency’sstaff and has talked about eliminating the agency altogether
The president is also denying disaster aid toboth blue and redstatesafter major weather eventslike tornadoes in Arkansasand flooding in West Virginia and withholding continued Hurricane Helene relief in North Carolina. Louisianans can’tbank on the federal government’s assistancewhen we are inevitably hit with amajor hurricane.
Recent historyshould be our guide. Less than four years ago, when Hurricane Ida hit as a Category 4, our state took $18 billion in insured losses while over 1million households were left without power in thedead of summer Louisianans who have been around awhile know far too well thatrushed and ill-timed taxcuts can quickly result in the decimation of healthcare, education, public safetyand other services Louisianans expect to function when we need them Amid so much fiscal uncertainty, other states should heed the warning from Louisiana lawmakers who know preserving revenue during this time is paramount toweathering whatever comes down theline.
Neva Butkus is asenior analyst at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy and aBaton Rouge resident.
It was ahot, sunny morning on our farm in East Tennessee the morning the Obergefell vs. Hodges decision came down. We had the television on, as we had for several days, knowing thedecision was coming soon. Twice in thepast severalyears, as part of the Campaign for Southern Equality’s “WeDoCampaign,” we had applied for marriage licenses at our local clerk of court’soffice, knowing we would be denied becausewe’regay.When the news finally broke that morning that the Supreme Courthad ruled that same-sex couples had the legal right to marry, we cheered and hugged. Getting married that same day wasn’tabout being first to cross the finish line. It wasabout not letting another day go by that denied what we had known foradecade already: the permanence of our love for each other Afew minutes later,wegot aphone call. It was our local clerk of court, the same one who had twice denied us. She was calling to ask if we wanted to get married —because if we did, she wanted us to be the first same-sex couple she issued alicense to.Anhour or so later,license in hand, we had to find ajudge to marry us. Raymie’sfamily started calling judgesthey knew.One after another said no.But finally,they found one who agreed.
But Obergefell showed us, 10 years ago on June 26, that many of the divisions we imagine,and talk about as given —red vs. blue, rural vs. urban —are illusions stoked by partisan politicians. They are not sufficient to the compassion and kindness that neighbors show one another,that humans show even to people they have never met.
Obergefell showed us that support can comefrom the places you least expect it, and that meaningful political action can happen not only in organizing and protest but in the quiet, everyday ways one person shows up to help another.It’ssomething both ordinary and radical: That community is everywhere, and not so far away as they would have us believe. Matt Griffin and RaymieWolfe live in NewOrleans.
That afternoon, on afarm just a quarter mile down the same road as ours, she married us. Things came together for us that day in away that felt serendipitous and impromptu, but it was actually the work of the people who fought before us and the people around us. That judge dropped all her plans that day to make our marriage happen. What Obergefell did was allow support for marriage equality that had been hidden to finally cometothe surface. It gave people the opportunity and the courage to stand up for whatthey really believed all along. What we found that day wasa community all around us that we hadn’tknown was there, people ready to stand with us —and to take personal and professional risks to do so. It was adesire for more of that kind of community that led us, not long after,toNew Orleans. Here we found what we’d been craving —aplace where people can be fully themselves, and where neighbors take care of each other every day We need that kind of community now more than ever.Wemust continue to support marriage equality as afederally protected right because no one should have to wonderiftheir rights will exist tomorrow simply because of their ZIP code. Equal rights are not forever unless we fight for them. The work that got us here isn’t finished —itisnever finished —and we still need our community to stand with us.
PROVIDED PHOTO By U.S. COAST GUARD
Nearly3 miles of containmentboom corral spilled oily water in coastal marshes near Garden Island Bayasskimmers and other vesselswork to clean up the product on May1
COMMENTARY
ROOM FOR DEBATE CONFLICT WITH IRAN
President Donald Trumpstunned the worldlast week when he ordered the bombing of three nuclear sites in Iran.The questionremains, though, where the long-running effort to prevent that countryfrom developing nuclear weaponsgoesfrom here. Here are twoperspectives.
AfterOperation Midnight Hammer,whatcomes next?
In much of life, but especially in foreign policy,athree-word question is crucial: But then what? That is approximately whatAdm Isoroku Yamamoto said when Japan’s government asked if he could stealthily take afleet across the northern Pacific and deal adevastating blow to the U.S. fleet at Pearl Harbor
Yes, Yamamoto said, if we can design some shallow-running torpedoes of the sort the British hadused afew weeks earlier (Nov.11, 1940) to cripple the Italian navy at Taranto. Then, Yamamoto said, Iwillrange freely in the Pacific for perhaps ayear.But then what?
Thewar should be turned back to Israel
George Will
Having studied at Harvard andserved as a military attaché in Washington, he knewthe United States and knew that his attack would produceanindustrial superpower unifiedby rage.Japan’sdefeat was assured on Dec. 7, 1941, not six months to theday lateratMidway Iran has no comparable capacity forretribution.There are, however,reasonstoworry about Iranian threats to the 40,000U.S. militarypersonnel in theregion, Iran’scapacity fornihilistic attacks on global energy and commerce and the tentacles of Iran’s international terrorism apparatus. It will be amajor surprise if there is only anegligible surprise from Iran.
Possible reasons PresidentDonald Trump decided to join Israel’sattack includethis: He saw the successofIsraeli virtuosityand he hungered to jump in at thehead of theparade. He is less amilitarymaven than adrum major,and his public life of flippancies about serious matters has not earned himthe benefitofany doubts. Were Congress not controlled by Republicans he controls, it mightbestir itself to investigate what U.S. intelligence agencies knew about howclose Iran wastobuilding a useable bomb and missiles capable of delivering it to atarget. Shortly before the U.S. attacks, Tulsi Gabbard, the astonishingly unsuitable amateur confirmed by the Senate as director of national intelligence, said in March that Iran had not decided to produce anuclear weapon.She was either incompetent or theintelligence servicesare. Will RepublicansinCongress seek the president’spermission to inquireas to which it was?
Perhaps the other three(China, Russia, North Korea) members of the axis of disruption will be sobered by thedemonstration of the U.S. ability and willingness to project power globally.Perhaps thepresident will
reconsider his contempt for Ukraine and hisindifference toits fate. Andhis equally obviousinfatuation with Vladimir Putin, who hasreceived substantial material assistance from Iran. Israel has earned America’sunalloyed respect by its recent displays of an audacity commensurate with the dangers of living surrounded by genocidal aspirations. Israel in Iran has delivered amessage to others who threaten itsdestruction: We takeyour words seriously.Soseriously,Israel has departed from past practices.
In Tennessee Williams’splay “A Streetcar Named Desire,” the pathetic Blanche DuBois’slast line is plaintive: “I’ve always depended on thekindness of strangers.” The Jewish state’sfounding in the wake of the Holocaust was adefiant proclamation: “Never again!” Never again would Jews depend on the kindness of others.
In its WarofIndependence (1948), the Six Day War(1967), the YomKippur War(1973) andits unending conflict with non-stateactors (thePalestine Liberation Organization, Hamas, Hezbollah),including thefourth majorwar,which began Oct. 7, 2023, Israel has had material, financial and intelligence assistance from others, but has always done the fighting. Its major departure from this policy,the 1956 British-French-Israeli attempt to seize the Suez Canal that Egypt had nationalized, was adebacle.
By joining Israel against Iran, theUnited Stateshas expanded its commitmentsmore than it can now know.The United States is waging only aproxy war in Ukraine, but its prestige and credibility are fully at risk there. Andnow the United States is aparticipant in awar the likely outcome of which is obscured by thefog of war,and themomentumand direction of which is being set by an ally that has its own agenda. Adolf Hitler reportedly said to one of his private secretaries, “The beginning of every war is like opening the door into adark room. One never knows what is hidden in the darkness.” He supposedly said this as he prepared to do what he did 84 years ago. He launched Operation Barbarossa, theinvasion of Russia that proved his point U.S. Operation Midnight Hammer began June22. Its reverberations are far from over
Email George Will at georgewill@washpost. com
Let me offer some rare praise for President Donald Trump. His attack on Iran’snuclear development sites was carefully executed. Nobody outside a tight circle knew about it in advance. And he was wise in shifting the talk intocalls forpeace. We don’tknow whether the bunker busters reached allthe near-bomb-grade uranium or if other sites for fuel enrichment remain hidden. But analysts believe theIranian nuclear program may have been turned back years.
nal group chat. For the latter reason, somebelieve that Hegseth wasn’t even told much about the impending action.
Israel had been degrading Iran’s nuclear capabilities, but it didn’thave the30,000-pound Massive Ordnance Penetratorsneeded to blast deep inside the mountains housing Iran’s nuclear program.Only the United States had thebombs and the B-2 stealthbombers to deliver them without detection. The action was justified by the signs that Iran was close to obtaining anuclear weapon. It would have raised not only the threat to Israel but also the region by setting anuclear arms race among Sunni Arab nations at odds with Shiite Iran. There have been contradictory reportsonhow far Iran had gone in building abomb. Respectable sources, like CNN’sJohn Miller,persuasively argue that it is on thecusp of having aweapon of mass destruction. Miller had been theNew York City Police Department’sdeputy commissioner of intelligence and counterterrorism. Whether Iran was currentlybuilding abomb was not aprecondition forthe U.S. operation. Miller wrote that “the intelligence estimates suggest Iran’s posture on being readytomakea bombnever looked moreaggressive.” No civilian energy program,headded, “operates facilities buried under remote mountains andstrives forfaster centrifuges and more-highly enriched uranium.”
It would have been comforting had someoneother than Pete Hegseth had been in charge of theDefense Departmentand put in front of the cameras after the U.S. strike. The talking head from Fox News wasshockingly unqualified plus ablabber mouth having spread classified information in aSig-
Israel should lead in prosecuting the war. Iran started it long ago through its employmentofproxy forces —the Houthis, Hamas and Hezbollah. By running the attacks from outside Iran, the ayatollahs spared their own country from counterattack.
Iran shares much blamefor the human tragedy in Gaza. It paid Hamas to build tunnels in Gazato protect its fighters while turning innocent civilians into martyrs exposed to Israeli counterattacks.
Israel’swar against the Iranian regimerightly remains Israel’swar.It’s clear whyIsraelis are dead set against letting Iran get anuclear bomb. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has called forthe “elimination of Israel.” Israel and Iran should be friends. The twopeoples go wayback, to at least since 586 BC, when Jews arrived in Persia after the Babylonian Exile. Many Jews leftwhen the ayatollahs took over,but Tehran remains hometo several synagogues.
Many have questioned the motives behind Trump’sdecision to send the U.S. military after Iran’snuclear program.Some hold that this was basically another distraction against the increasingly controversial immigration raids and his troubled “big, beautiful” tax-and-spending bill.
Others say that Trump, upon observing great admiration forIsrael’s “brilliant” precision strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities and scientists, needed to grab back the spotlight with somespectacular action of his own. He went so far as to take credit forIsraeli successes. America did what was needed. Trump’s“now is the timefor peace” statement was welcome. We should step back unless Iran retaliates. The Israelis have awide intelligence net in Iran. They know what they are doing. As forthe fighting, the U.S. should now step aside.
Email Froma Harrop at fharrop@ gmail.com.
Froma Harrop
FILE PHOTOS
President Donald Trump,left,and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
June 28, 2025, at 10 a.m. at Rose Hill BaptistChurch
Smith, Connie J.
Connie J. Smith passed away on Tuesday, June 17, 2025, at the age of 91. Relatives and friends are invited to attend the Funeral Service at Resthaven Funeral Home, 11817Jefferson Highway in Baton Rouge on Friday, June 27, 2025, at 10:00 a.m. AVisitation will be heldat the funeral home beginningat9:00 a.m. Interment will follow at Resthaven Gardens of Memory Amore detailed and specific obituary where family and friends may signthe online guestbook orleave apersonal noteto the family can be found at www.resthavenbatonroug e.com
Stuart, Annie Jane
DEATHS continued from church.She is survivedby a son, Kevin Stuart,grandson SeanStuart, daughter, DebbieStiltner and grandsons Clarke,Jacob, and Noah Stiltner,brother Joe Watson,sisterGrace WatsonDarville, and many other loving familyand friends. Shewas agraduateofDekalb High School, amember of Woodlawn Baptist Church in Baton Rouge, an avid gardener, homemaker,devotedwife, mother, grandmother,and friend. She served as an election commissioner for many years. Visitationwillbeheld on Saturday,June 28 from 2:00 -3:00 at St. John's United Methodist Church, 230 Renee Drive, Baton Rouge, Louisiana 70810followed by aCelebration of Lifeat 3:00. Streaming is also availableat: https://www. youtube.com/@stjohnsbr/ streams In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Bay Springs Baptist Church Cemetery Fund, 2938 Townsend Road, Porterville,Mississippi 303522938,St. John's United Methodist Church Food Pantry, or the charity of your choice Thankstoall the doctors, therapists, nurses, nurses' aides, homehealth professionals, and Hospice In His Care team who provided her care.
Vu, KieuoanhThi 'Oanh'
their best year after year. As amember of St.Anthony and Le Van Phung Parish, she was an active participant in her prayer group,"Khu ManCoi"and "Hoi Legio."She litupevery room withher singing, her laughter, herjokes, and her love for people Because she didnot havea familyofher ownorchildren,she lovedtobring joy to every child that she met No matterwho aperson was, one couldalways count on Oanh to have fruit to share witheveryone she met. Her absence leavesa deep void in the heartsoffamily, friends, and coworkers—one that can never truly be filled But she can rest in peace, knowing she willliveonin all,forever remembered She is survived by sisters, Kieuhanh Thi Vu, Thanhnhan Thi Vu, Long-Khanh Ai Thi Vu and Toan-Thuong Than Vu; brothers,Hoan Cong Vu and Luan Cong Vu; brothers-in-law, Hoan Quang Dinh and Canh Van Nguyen; and sisters-in-law, Ngoc-Hue Thi Nguyen and Nhung Thi Pham. She is preceded in deathbyher father, Han Van Vu; mother,Nhiem Thi Tran; and brother, An Cong Vu. Visitation willbeatGreenoaks Funeral Home, 9595 Florida Blvd.,Baton Rouge, LA,on Thursday, June 26, 2025, from 6pmto8pm,with a prayer servicefrom7pm to 8pm. Her funeralmass will take place at St.Anthony of Padua &LeVan Phung Catholic Church, 2305 Choctaw Dr., Baton Rouge, LA,onSaturday, June 28, 2025, at 10am, with avisitation from 9am to 9:45am. Interment willimmediately follow at Greenoaks Memorial Park.
Waguespack,Marjorie Mary Ann
Aresident of Baton Rouge, and anative of Vietnam, Kieuoanh was warmlyknown as Oanh. She passed awayonMonday, June 16, 2025,peacefully at her home atthe ageof62. Whenlooking for her, there were always fourplacesyou couldfind her: as aseamstress at School Time, as an aunt at her sibling's homes, adevout Christian at St. Anthony Catholic Church,orasa frequent shopper at alocal Albertsons. Skilled in sewing, Oanh leda 31-year careeratSchool Time, whereshe tirelessly prepared uniforms forstudents across Baton Rouge, ensuring each one looked
Marjorie Waguespack July 6, 1932 –June 26, 2025. Marjorie Mary Ann Waguespack,92, wasborn on July 6, 1932, to thelate EdgarAntoine Waguespack andEmma Landry Wagues‐pack.She passedaway peacefully on June 26, 2025. Margie wasa devotedwife
of 71 years, anda proud mother,grandmother,and greatgrandmother Margie’s greatest joywas herfamily. Awoman of deep faith,she wasa de‐votedparishionerofSt. JulesCatholicChurch where shefound comfort andstrengththroughout herlife. Shecherished time spentwithher daughters andloved to visitwithher grandchildrenand greatgrandchildren. Oneofher favorite pastimes was sewing,and shefound greatjoy in teaching her daughtersand grand‐daughtershow to sew— sharingnot just herskills, butalsoher patience,cre‐ativity, andlovewithevery stitch.She lovingly handstitched many heirloom dressesfor herdaughters andgrandchildren,and the familyisblessedthather great-grandchildrencon‐tinue to wear them today. Margie also hada lifelong love of animals, especially hercats. Shecared for them with thesamegen‐tleness, patience,and compassion sheshowedto herfamilyand friendseach day. Herquiet kindness andnurturing spirit ex‐tended to everyliving thingaround her, andher home wasalwaysa place of warmth,comfort,and unconditionallove. Margie is survived by herfour daughters: Marian Waguespack (Brian Calvit), Donna Donato (Michael Sr.),Sandy Player (John Sr.),and CindyHoover (David Sr.);seven grand‐children:Emily Ward (Corey), Alison Donato DavidHooverJr.,Michael Donato Jr.(Kayla),Amanda Manas(Daniel), SarahGib‐bons (Cody),and John Player Jr.; andseven greatgrandchildren: Cooper Manas, Charlotte Manas, Emma Ward,EloiseManas, Lillian“Lilly” Donato MasonGibbons,and Made‐line “Maddie” Ward.She wasprecededindeath by herhusband,Wilson Waguespack;her parents, Edgarand Emma Wagues‐pack;and herbrother, EdgarWaguespack. Family andfriends are invitedto attend avisitationatSt. JulesCatholicChurch in BelleRoseonSaturday, June 28, 2025, beginningat 9:00 a.m. AMassofChrist‐ianBurialwillfollowat 11:00 a.m. Marjorie will be laid to rest at Ascension Catholic Mausoleum. Pall‐bearerswill be BrianCalvit, MichaelDonatoSr.,David Hoover Sr John Player Sr DavidHooverJr.,Michael Donato Jr John Player Jr CoreyWard, andCodyGib‐bons
Janice C. Williams de‐parted this life on Monday June 16, 2025, at herresi‐denceinDonaldsonville, LA.She was73, anative andresidentofDonald‐sonville.VisitationonFri‐day, June 27, 2025, at Williams &SouthallFuneral Home,101 Loop 945 Don‐aldsonville, LA 4:00 pm to 6:00 pm.VisitationonSat‐urday, June 28, 2025, at GreaterMt. PilgrimBaptist Church from 10:00 am to religious services at 11:00 am.Interment in Mt.Mo‐riah BaptistChurchCeme‐tery.Arrangementsby Williams &SouthallFuneral Home,101 Loop 945, Don‐aldsonville, LA 70346, (225) 473-1900. To sign theguest book or offercondolences, visitour websiteatwww williamsandsouthallfune ralhome.com.
Wirth,great-grandson Liam Petrie,sister Marie Hardy, and brotherBobby Wise (Patti). She wasprecededindeathbyher parents Berniceand Cortez Wise, sister SueKnighten, brothers William Wise and JamesWise,and brothersin-law MerrellKnighten and John Hardy Dotwas on theBoardof Directorsofthe Greater Baton Rouge State Fair Foundation for nearly 30 years, whichhonored her with an endowed scholarship in hername at LSU. Shewas achartermember of theWomen'sCouncil of Greater Baton Rouge and Women'sWeek. Dotwas a graduate of Haynesville High School and attended LSU. Visitation will begin at 1:00 pm on Saturday, June 28th at Greenoaks Funeral Home, 9595 Florida Blvd, Baton Rouge,followed by hermemorial service at 2:00 pm.
Annie "Jane" Watson Stuart, alongtime resident of Baton Rouge, Louisiana and native of Blackwater, Mississippidied on June 18, 2025, in her home surrounded by family. She was 90. She was preceded in death by her husband HowardJ.Stuart, two brothersNewton Watson, and John J. Watson, and sister Mary Watson UpWirth,DorothyWise
Dorothy "Dot" Wise Wirth wasborn March5, 1943 in Thomasville, GA to JamesCortezWise,Jr. and Laura Bernice Andrews Wise. Dotissurvivedby herloving husband of 63 years David Wirth, daughterLaura "Jeanie" Wirth and son William "Billy" Wirth(Debbie King), grandsonsJered Petrie (Carolyn Moss) and Derek
EnolaC.Woods passed away on Wednesday, June 18, 2025, at ThibodauxRe‐gional MedicalCenter. She was87, anativeand resi‐dent of Thibodaux, LA.Visi‐tation on Saturday,June 28, 2025, at Mt.ZionBaptist Church,1117 PresidentSt., Thibodaux, LA from 9:00 am to 11:00 am.Interment private. Arrangements by Williams &SouthallFuneral Home,1204 ClevelandSt. Thibodaux, LA,(985) 4472513. To sign theguest book andoffercondo‐lences,visit ourwebsite at www.williamsandsouthall funeralhome.com.
Ozone
Williams,JaniceC
Woods, EnolaC
Saints QB Shough hasyet to sign rookie contract
Salary-cap expert explains whetherquarterback’s contract issuecould linger into camp
BY MATTHEW PARAS Staff writer
The New Orleans Saints begin training camp in just under amonth, and TylerShough —their potential starting quarterback— has not yet signed his rookiecontract What gives?
The Saints and Shough are negotiating over the guaranteed portion of therookie’s fourth-year salary,asource withknowledge of the situation confirmed.
It’sasimilar situation across theNFL.
In all, as CBSSports reported, 30ofthe league’s32second-rounders haveyet tosign
This is an entry in aprofile series of inductees for the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame Class of 2025. The induction ceremony is set for Saturday in Natchitoches.
When Nick Saban arrived by private plane in Tuscaloosa in earlyJanuary 2007 after agreeing to become Alabama’shead football coach, he was mobbed byadoring fans.
Butwhen he appeared in Baton Rouge in late November 1999 at his introductory news conference announcing him as LSU’s coach, the reception was “Who’sNick Sabanand why is LSU paying him$1.2milliona year?”
“I couldn’tbelieve the response and the attitude people had toward me,” Saban said. “I felt like there were alot of questions, alot of doubts. Youhave to understand. Iwas coming from aplace (Michigan State) where the people were pretty happy over what had been done.
“I was shocked. I was thinking,‘Maybe I ought to go back whereIcame from.’”
Thankfully for LSU, he didn’t, and now he’ll be inducted into the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame —at last. The induction ceremony is set for SaturdayinNatchitoches.
Sabanwas initiallyelected to theLSHOF’s Class of 2020, but that spring’sglobal pandemic postponed the induction.
“It’sanhonor I’m really excited about,” Sabansaid of hisupcoming induction. “I never thought I’d be considered. Iknow there’sa lot of great sportsfolks in Louisiana.”
AllSaban did in five seasonsfrom 2000-04 was save the Tigers’ program withanational championship,two SEC titles, and a48-16 record(.750) before chasing an NFL dream as thehead coach of the Miami Dolphins. He came to Baton Rouge at atime when LSUwas thirstingfor success,stability,and acoach with avision, including the elements required to build and sustain anationalpower After LSU had just two head football coaches (Paul Dietzel and Charles McClendon) in 25 years from 1955-1979, the Tigers hadsix coaches in 20 seasonsfrom 1980-1999
ä See SABAN, page 6C
their rookie contracts. The negotiations have slowed down in partbecausethe Houston Texans and the Cleveland Brownsbecame the first teams thisyear to give fully guaranteed contractsfor their second-round selections,wide receiver Jayden Higgins and linebacker Carson Schwesinger Before this year,first-round draft picks were theonly rookies to earnfully guaranteed deals. Butwiththe now-established precedent, others —including Shough want to see if thedeals trigger awaveof teams agreeing to afully guaranteed fourth year. Or at thevery least,they want to seeif teams start to guaranteeahigherpercentage
of the fourth-year base salary
To understand more, NFL agent and salarycap expert J.I. Halsell spoke about Shough’s chances and whether theissue could linger into camp. Guaranteed deal?
If there’sone thingtoknow aboutthe NFL, thereare exceptionsalmost always made for quarterbacks. That doesn’tmean the Saints will
See SAINTS, page 6C
QU ’S
Derik Queen walks off the stageafter beingselected 13thbythe Atlanta Hawksinthe first round of the NBAdraft on WednesdayinNew york. Queen waslater traded to the Pelicans. AP
Joe Dumars needed just 90 minutes Wednesday night to show how aggressive he’sgoing to be as the Pelicansexecutive vice president of operations. The night startedwith Dumars selecting Oklahoma guard Jeremiah Fears with theNo. 7pickinthe NBA draft. Fearssported two sparkling chains with pendants around his neck. Oneofthe pendants was azero, the number Fearswore in college. The other displayed his last name. Collectively,the two chains said “no fears,” two words that very well could have also summed up Dumars on this night Thirty minutes after drafting Fears,Dumars madea deal. The Pelicanstraded their No. 23 pick to the Atlanta Hawks to moveuptothe No. 13 spot to select forward Derik Queen from Maryland. “It’s crazy,” Dumars said. “Wefelt like we were going to have to choose between these two guys the whole night.Toend up gettingbothofthem was just really exciting for us.”
“When you have chance to get two lottery picks in one draft, you’re accounting forthe following year,” Dumarssaid. “When you identifya player that you think can be one of the foundations here, you go and get him.That’swhat we did. We targeted Queen. We thought he could be a heckuva addition here and we were really aggressive about going to get Queen in this draft.”
Being aggressive is the only way Dumarsknows.
It’sthe waythe Bad Boy Pistons played in the late 80’sand early 90’swhen Dumarswas in his heyday as a guard on back-to-back NBAchampionship teams. And it’sthe wayheoperated when he wasincharge of the Pistons’ team he built that wonanNBA title in 2004. Andit’sapparently the way he’ll continue to be in his new role with the Pelicans.
The Pelicans paid what many will sayisa hefty price to getQueen.Inaddition to theNo. 23 pick, the Pels surrendered their first-round pick in 2026.
“That’sthe only way I’ve ever had success in this league,” Dumarssaid. “I’ve been around aggressive teamsmyentire life. That has always served well. I thought the two teams in the Finals (the Oklahoma City Thunder and Indiana Pacers) exemplified that. They were aggressive on both ends of the court. They ä See WALKER, page 3C
Rod Walker
PHOTO By ADAM HUNGER
STAFFFILE PHOTO By TRAVIS SPRADLING. LSU coach Nick Saban leads his team
Former Ravens K Tucker gets 10-week suspension
NEW YORK The NFL suspended former Baltimore Ravens kicker Justin Tucker for the first 10 weeks of the season on Thursday for violating its personal conduct policy
LSU’s Godbless quickly found her stride
Sprinter didn’t let late start, ‘housework’ hinder her
BY TOYLOY BROWN III Staff writer
Tima Godbless‘ face said everything.
Disbelief Elation. Gratitude. The LSU sprinter’s jaw dropped, she folded into a crouch and her eyes barely restrained tears. Godbless’ mind raced, trying to grasp what her body did after running a personal-best 10.91 seconds in the women’s 100-meter dash at the NCAA East outdoor regionals.
The May 29 feat became the year’s world top time is currently tied for seventh.
“In the women’s sprint, you re under 11 seconds, you’re special, OK,” LSU track and field coach Dennis Shaver said. “I don’t care who it is.”
The 5-foot-5 Godbless became the fourth-fastest Nigerian woman ever and is fourth all-time in LSU history in the 100, tying Brianna Lyston (2024).
As shocked as she was, the sophomore expected this to happen sooner based on her training She also didn’t think a PR would happen that Thursday She felt pain in her right ankle, which she injured a little more than a week before the SEC Championships
The grit to persevere is what the great ones possess, Shaver said. Earning that regional title at LSU and winning globally is part of what Godbless envisions. She’s off to a strong start crafting that résumé.
The second-team All-SEC sprinter finished her outdoor season finishing third in the 100 at the NCAA Championships. She was also part of the LSU final in the 4x100 relay and a 200 semifinalist.
Godbless, 20, intends to carry her collegiate success into the summer when she returns to Nigeria for national tryouts before competing in the World Athletics Championships in September Track and field wasn’t supposed to be in Godbless’ DNA. Her parents didn’t play sports and she’s the only one of her four siblings in athletics.
People only noticed her speed when she participated in the annual inter-house sports competition, her country’s version of field day Track coach Richard Torugbene attempted to convince the girl from Bebelebiri to run but was
LSU sophomore Tima Godbless qualified for the 100- and
relay at the 2025 outdoor NCAA Championships.
shrugged off. When she finally gave in, she stopped training after a month.
What stood in the way of her destiny: chores.
“I was the only girl around the family, and I was doing the housework,” Godbless said “I couldn’t come back from class and do all the housework, then go to practice in the evening. I couldn’t do it.”
Torugbene persuaded her once more, explaining her elite talent and how it was in her best interest to “endure the pain.” Godbless rejoined the team and hasn’t looked back since 2019.
Her coach didn’t waste time entering her in big meets. The goal was to get her accustomed to those settings to make up for lost time as a 15-year-old.
The early days were rocky Nervousness consumed the softspoken Godbless and anxiety on competition days stole her appetite. That slowly dissipated as she became more experienced.
Starting later in the sport actually benefited her and part of what intrigued Shaver in recruiting her
“Their training age, so to speak,
is younger,” Shaver said of athletes like Godbless who start late, “therefore their chance of improvement is going to be higher than somebody that’s been doing it since they were 6 years old.”
When Godbless was 17, she qualified and went to the Tokyo Olympics. She and nine other Nigerian athletes were disqualified, however, because their country’s athletic officials didn’t perform enough drug tests over several months, according to NPR. She became a two-time U20 African Champion in the 100 and 200 in 2023 and competed in the 100 and 4x100 relay at the 2024 Paris Olympics. Her meteoric rise in the sport is not just a testament to talent She has a winning spirit that has been nurtured in a household where she grew up fighting with three brothers daily Godbless was unhappy with her eighth-place finish in the 100 final of the 2024 outdoor NCAA Championships. It didn’t matter that she was only a freshman, she said.
“Oh my God, eighth position, just no way,” Godbless said to herself.
When she committed to LSU after visiting and seeing the success of
another Nigerian sprinter Favour Ofili, she envisioned early success. The biggest barrier to achieving that was communicating.
An introvert at heart, Godbless prefers to observe in the background rather than make her presence known. Add in that she was still adjusting to Baton Rouge without her family nearby, and she needed time to build that comfort level, specifically speaking with coaches and teammates.
“The first year I don’t know if she said a word to me,” Shaver said.
Communicating, including with the training staff, is major part of the winning formula Shaver has crafted as head coach since 2004.
After a full year, the sprint star of a few words grew to be among the more “talkative girls on the team,” she said.
It’s no accident that finding her voice coincided with Godbless’ upward trajectory as she’s still so new
“She has that desire to be great. That’s just something you can’t coach,” Shaver said. “She’s a great competitor and she’s very willing to learn and easy to coach, which is a blessing.”
Roy, Potgieter shoot Rocket Classic-record
BY LARRY LAGE AP sportswriter
DETROIT Aldrich Potgieter took a peek at the leaderboard before lining up his last putt on a crest of the ninth green, knowing he had to make the 12-footer for birdie to break a tie with Kevin Roy
The putt grazed the left edge, with Potgieter missing an opportunity to cap a record-setting day by taking the outright first-round lead at the Rocket Classic on Thursday
“I was real eager to make that putt,” he said.
Potgieter and Roy each shot 10-under 62 to break the tournament 18-hole record.
Detroit Golf Club has been one of the easiest courses since the PGA Tour made it an annual stop in 2019. A pair of Korn Ferry graduates took full advantage.
Potgieter, the 20-year-old South African who grew up in Australia, started at No. 10 and set a tournament record with a 7-under 29 on the back nine.
Potgieter and the 35-year-old Roy each had an eagle and eight birdies in bogey-free rounds.
On 578-yard, par-5 17th, Roy’s drive went 300 yards, his second shot traveled another 288 yards and his chip from the rough rolled in from 30 feet.
“Just one of those days everything was clicking,” Roy said. “I was shocked my 5-wood went
that far I had 279 pin. I don’t hit a 5-wood that far, but maybe a little adrenaline or something going on.”
As well as Roy and Potgieter played, they can’t get comfortable on a short course with greens that are even more receptive than usual with recent rain.
“It was pretty easy,” Andrew Putnam said after a 64. Min Woo Lee, Max Greyserman and Mark Hubbard were a stroke back after matching the previous tournament record of 63. Two-time major champion
Zach Johnson was in the group of seven players that were two shots back.
Lee enjoyed playing Detroit Golf Club after struggling — along with most of his peers — at Oakmont during the U.S Open and at the Memorial.
“I was really excited for this week,” he said. “I wanted to get to hit in the rough and actually hit onto the green.
“Hopefully, the PGA Tour can have more courses like this. It would be a bit more fun and less stressful.”
While the course is easy as usual, the competition is relatively strong for the tournament that many top players have skipped in the past.
The field includes nine of the top 50 players in the world, led by fifth-ranked Collin Morikawa, who opened with a 69 after parting ways with a caddie for the second
time this year
KK Limbhasut, a teammate of Morikawa’s at California and a Korn Tour Ferry player, is filling in this week as a caddie while Morikawa tries to find what he’s looking for on his bag.
“It’s like asking a 20-year-old or 15-year-old what does your future wife look like, right?” Morikawa asked. “There’s a lot of things you could say, but just because you say it doesn’t mean that’s actually what comes together
“It’s a partnership. We both give and we both take. For me, it’s just being able to be comfortable out
there trusting them and just having a good time.” Ryder Cup captain Keegan Bradley, who rose to No. 7 in the world after winning the Travelers Championship last week in Connecticut, shot a 68. The idea of Bradley playing at Bethpage Black in New York for the Sept. 28-30 matchs against Europe is picking up steam among fellow American players and fans.
“Put yourself on the team!” a man shouted at Bradley, who didn’t react to the suggestion as he walked to sign his card after the opening round.
The suspension takes effect on Aug. 26, roster cutdown day, and Tucker is eligible for reinstatement on Nov 11. Tucker remains free to try out with and sign with a team. If he is signed, he can attend training camp and participate in preseason games.
The 35-year-old became a free agent after the Ravens released him last month in the aftermath of reports that he was accused of inappropriate sexual behavior by massage therapists.
The Baltimore Banner since January has reported over a dozen massage therapists have accused Tucker of inappropriate sexual behavior
Kipyegon falls short in bid for sub-four-minute mile
PARIS Three-time Olympic champion Faith Kipyegon failed in her bid Thursday to become the first woman to run a mile in under four minutes.
Kipyegon, the Olympic 1,500-meter gold medalist from Kenya, ran in 4 minutes, 06.42 seconds the fastest mile in history by a woman at Stade Charléty in Paris. Her time was better than her world record of 4:07.64 but won’t be recognized by the international federation because the Nike-sponsored event dubbed “Breaking4: Faith Kipyegon vs. the 4-Minute Mile” was unofficial. She was supported by pacemakers and equipped with Nike’s latest innovations, from her aerodynamic tracksuit to her spikes.
Buccaneers coach, GM sign multiyear extensions
TAMPA, Fla. — The Buccaneers signed general manager Jason Licht and coach Todd Bowles to multi-year contract extensions on Thursday Bucs owner and co-chairman Joel Glazer said in the team’s announcement the two have been critical to the team’s recent success. The team did not provide terms of the extensions.
Bowles is coming off his third year as coach in which he led the Bucs to a fourth-straight NFC South title. He was promoted in 2022 after Bruce Arians stepped down following the Buccaneers’ Super Bowl LV victory Bowles had previously served as the team’s defensive coordinator for three seasons.
Ronaldo signs new deal to extend Al Nassr stay
With the words “Al Nassr forever” Cristiano Ronaldo ended uncertainty about his future and signed a two-year contract extension with the Saudi Arabian club on Thursday The five-time Ballon d’Or winner’s latest deal means he will play on until at least the age of 42 and gives him the chance to add to his record-breaking career “A new chapter begins. Same passion, same dream Let’s make history together,” Ronaldo said in a social media post along with a picture of him holding up a shirt that said “Ronaldo 2027.”
The contract sees Ronaldo extend his time in Saudi Arabia, having joined Al Nassr at the end of 2022 in one of the most shocking transfers in soccer history after leaving Manchester United.
Bengals take major step toward extending lease
CINCINNATI
The Cincinnati Bengals and local officials have reached a tentative deal to make $470 million in renovations to Paycor Stadium and keep the team there through at least 2036.
The preliminary agreement announced Thursday still needs final approval from the team and Hamilton County commissioners.
The two sides had until June 30 to agree to a new lease or approve the first of five two-year extensions but they’ve agreed to extend the deadline. The Bengals’ original lease expires at the end of next June. The county will contribute $350 million toward the renovations, and the Bengals will pay $120 million. Bengals executive vice president Katie Blackburn said the agreement will secure the team’s future in Cincinnati.
PROVIDED PHOTO By REAGAN COTTEN
200-meter dashes along with the 4x100-meter
ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO By PAUL SANCyA
Aldrich Potgieter, of South Africa, hits from the ninth tee during the first round of the Rocket Classic at the Detroit Golf Club on Thursday in Detroit.
PRO BASKETBALL
New faces of the league
BY MYAH TAYLOR The Dallas Morning News (TNS)
DALLAS When Caitlin Clark became a pro, threetime WNBA champion Diana Taurasi said “reality is coming” for the former Iowa standout. Before Dallas Wings rookie Paige Bueckers made her professional debut, Taurasi said the No. 1 pick in the 2025 WNBA draft will become “the best player in the league, for sure.”
The WNBA legend struck a slightly different tone for the fellow former UConn star But her reaction reflected the general sentiment WNBA players shared about Bueckers’ arrival, which contrasts with the somewhat frosty reception Clark received from some corners of the league. Ahead of Bueckers’ debut for the Wings against the Minnesota Lynx, MVP front-runner Napheesa Collier praised “Paige, her family, the way she plays.” When the Los Angeles Sparks came to town June 6, Bueckers appeared chummy with Kelsey Plum, draping her arm around the two-time WNBA champion.
While Clark, the Indiana Fever’s No 1 pick last season, was beloved by the public (and had the viewership numbers to prove it), Bueckers has been heralded as “the league’s rookie.”
On Friday at American Airlines Center, the two standouts will meet for the first time as professionals as the Wings welcome the Indiana Fever for “A Night in Dallas.” It will showcase the future of the WNBA but also the vastly different perceptions that follow the popular 23-year-olds: Bueckers, the surgical “league rookie” with the UConn pedigree, and Clark, the pure-scorer media darling who willed herself into the national spotlight at Iowa. Despite their differences in style, personality and reception from fans and peers, Bueckers and Clark are the
forces elevating women’s basketball.
“They’re very aware of what they mean to the game right now,” basketball Hall of Famer and Wings broadcaster Nancy Lieberman said. “They’re going to help the veterans lift this league. I mean, we’ve got more millionaires in this league than ever before.”
The league rookie Bueckers hasn’t reached the same level of popularity with the public as Clark, who leads the league in fan voting for the WNBA All-Star Game and has 3.4 million Instagram followers.
But the Wings star, who has 2.6 million Instagram followers, has been a household name for longer She was the top-rated girls basketball prospect in the Class of 2020, ranking higher than Clark and future stars such as former LSU star Angel Reese and Cameron Brink.
Bueckers, who won a national championship at UConn in April, has long been lauded for her efficiency and high basketball IQ. That skill set made her a great fit at UConn, where she joined a sorority of all-time greats that includes Taurasi, Collier, Breanna Stewart and Sue Bird.
But Bueckers was a known quantity before she joined the Huskies. She was the first high school girls basketball player to be featured on the cover of Slam magazine. Her star continued to rise throughout her freshman season in 2021, when she won Naismith National Player of the Year and an ESPY award. Bueckers was the “it” girl in women’s basketball, playing for arguably the biggest brand in the sport.
At the start of this WNBA season, 15 former UConn players appeared on 10 team rosters. And many more have passed through the league. Social media users
Bueckers, Clark differently
have compared Bueckers’ ascendance to the league to that of a younger sibling or friend turning 21.
“Paige is a great person on so many levels of what she does and how she treats people,” Lieberman said. “Maybe they know Paige a little bit better than they know Caitlin when she first came into the league.”
The media darling Bueckers, who struggled with injuries throughout her UConn career, missed the entire 2022-23 season after suffering an ACL tear That was the year Clark broke out. She captured national attention ahead of the 2023 Final Four in Dallas, when her Iowa squad faced LSU for the national championship.
Iowa didn’t win, but the moment Reese pointed to her ring finger seemingly taunting Clark and her teammates, it sparked an on-court rivalry and made Clark a household name.
The following season, Clark cemented her status as a national icon while becoming the NCAA’s all-time leading scorer among men’s and women’s basketball players She willed Iowa, not exactly a women’s basketball blue blood, back to the national championship game, after scoring 21 points in a 71-69 win over Bueckers and UConn in the semifinal.
Iowa lost to South Carolina, but Clark had won the hearts of millions with her entertaining play, hallmarked by her ability to drain logo 3s An average of 18.9 million viewers watched the 2024 national championship game, the most-watched women’s college basketball game ever
South Carolina played for a second consecutive national championship in 2025, but the game drew only 8.5 million viewers. The difference?
The Gamecocks were playing Bueckers’ Huskies instead of Clark’s Hawkeyes.
Celtics’ Stevens: Tatum progressing well, won’t return until ‘fully ready’
When Jayson Tatum ruptured his right Achilles tendon in the Celtics’ conference semifinals loss the the New York Knicks, everything about Boston’s immediate future changed. But what won’t change is the Celtics’ front office’s prudence in making sure he has the space and time to make a full recovery Boston president of basketball operations Brad Stevens said the All-Star is progressing well following surgery last month. But asked about whether the team had put a timeline on Tatum’s return, Stevens was definitive that there would be no rushing the star’s rehabilitation.
“We don’t and we won’t,” Stevens said Wednesday night following the first
round of the NBA draft.
“We won’t put a projected timeline on him for a long, long time. It’s baby steps right now He’s actually progressed great, but I don’t know what that means in regard to projected timelines. But that will be in consultation with him and everybody else to make sure when he hits the court he is fully ready, and fully healthy. And that will be the priority.”
Tatum is expected to miss most, if not all, of next season. It has already had implications for next season, with the team opting to trade Kristaps Porzingis and Jrue Holiday — both key contributors from the 2024 title team in an effort to get the team’s salary under the luxury tax second penalty apron. But Stevens said All-Star Jaylen Brown has already been back to the Celtics’
training facility since he had minimally invasive surgery to clean up his right knee. Brown is doing some light ball handling and work around the rim, Stevens said.
“We said be ready for training camp and I think he’ll probably be going full well ahead of that,” Stevens said.
While Stevens said league rules wouldn’t allow him to address the pending trades of Porzingis or Holiday, he said anything they do this offseason is with an eye toward regaining flexibility after multiple seasons with a high payroll.
“As far as whatever moves that those are a a part of, they’re all separate and hard and things that you’re going to have to do your best to make sure you put yourself in the right positions,” Stevens said.
BY ROD WALKER Staff writer
Micah Peavy calls his journey to the NBA a marathon. Five years of college. Three schools. But now, he’s headed to New Orleans. The Pelicans selected Peavy with the 40th overall pick Thursday night in the second round of the NBA draft.
Peavy played this past season at Georgetown. Before his time at Georgetown, he played three seasons at TCU after playing
his freshman season
Social perceptions
As Clark’s star rose, she found herself at the center of polarizing conversations about race in sports.
Clark became the next “ ‘Great White Hope’ in a league dominated by queer Black athletes,” according to the 2025 Politics in Sports Media report from The University of Texas’ Center for Sports Communication and Media.
She acknowledged the discourse after being named Time magazine’s 2024 Athlete of the Year
“I want to say I’ve earned every single thing, but as a White person, there is privilege,” Clark said.
Bueckers has been vocal about the issue for years, putting her ahead of the curve in a sense and earning the respect of peers. When she accepted her ESPY for Best Female College Athlete in 2021, she dedicated much of her speech to highlighting Black women and their contributions.
Clark and Bueckers alike have received pushback for their comments, but some of Clark’s fans have thrust the Fever star into a narrative from which she has tried to distance herself.
The rhetoric drew criticism from WNBA supporters and veteran players who had long been fighting for exposure and respect.
“We’re talking about a faction of that group that is pushing racist agendas and is pushing hate and creating divisiveness online, acting as fans, acting as Fever fans, acting as Caitlin fans,” Bird, a former Seattle Storm star, said last year on her “A Touch More” podcast.
Clark’s rise put more eyes on a league that has been historically marginalized. It didn’t sit well with current and former players, along with longtime supporters that many new fans — and some of the biggest voices in basketball — have already crowned Clark the best to ever play the game and the savior of the league, which has struggled to generate revenue.
defended like heck. They pushed the ball. Those are the elements that win. So we want to be aggressive at all times.”
And that includes his decision making.
This time a week ago, the Pelicans only had the No. 7 pick in the draft.
But Dumars made a deal with the Pacers to get the No. 23 pick and gave the Pacers back their own 2026 first-round pick. That extra pick ended up being the move Dumars needed to get the chess piece he really wanted: the Queen. Derik Queen.
“When I got here, we had just the seventh pick and I was like ’we don’t have enough assets to move around in the draft,’” Dumars said. “So we had to get that asset. We had to get that asset and put it into this draft and hope that we had a chance to do what we did tonight.”
Once Dumars drafted Fears with the No. 7 pick, he began looking for a trade two picks later
“We started from nine all the way until we got a deal,” Dumars said. “You don’t pull the trigger on the asset next year until you get that deal. Otherwise, you keep it.”
There was a contingency plan if he didn’t find a deal.
“If you get stuck at No. 23, you better have a handful of guys you like,” Dumar said. “And we did.”
There were guys they liked. But Queen is who they really coveted.
“It shows how much they wanted me and how much they believe in me,” Queen said. “I’m just ready to show them they got their money’s worth and ready to put on for the Pelicans.”
If Queen turns out to be the lottery pick type talent that Dumars and his right-hand man Troy Weaver project him to be, the trade to move up and get him will be viewed as brilliant. If he doesn’t pan out, it’ll be a draft night
trade that Dumars will be criticized about for years to come, especially this time next year when the Pelicans are sitting out the first round of the draft. Dumars is banking on Queen living up to expectations.
“I like tough guys,” Dumars said. “And you have to have an IQ. You can’t just be tough and nothing else. I put Queen’s IQ of the game up against anybody in this draft.”
Dumars offers equally high praise for Fears.
“Super confident, but not arrogant and not cocky,” Dumars said. “You need some of that to be good in this league. You’ve got to think ‘I’m him’ and he does. I like that about him. But I (also) like his skill set. Just his ability to get anywhere on the court like that, is a unique ability.” Dumars and the Pelicans drafted Georgetown wing Micah Peavy in the second round of the draft on Thursday That pick was acquired Tuesday in a trade. That pick was acquired Tuesday in a trade that sent CJ McCollum and Kelly Olynyk and a second round pick in 2026 to the Washington Wizards in exchange for Jordan Poole and Saddiq Bey
“One of the things you want to do when you’re building out a team, whenever you have these tempo moments — the draft, free agency, trade deadline — it’s an opportunity to make a statement about who you are as a team and what you’re going to be,” Dumars said. And what exactly are the Pelicans going to be? Aggressive.
“We want to be an aggressive team,” Dumars said. “We are going to be aggressive in this front office. We want our players to be aggressive. We want our approach to be aggressive. We want to show up. We’re going to show up for the run. We have 82 runs. We don’t
WNBA has embraced next-gen pioneers
ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTOS
Dallas Wings rookie guard Paige Bueckers, left photo, and Indiana Fever second-year guard Caitlin Clark will meet for the
first time professionaly when the Fever visits the Wings on Friday night.
TennesseefreshmanLHP Smarttransfers to LSU
BY KOKI RILEY Staff writer
Left-handed pitcher Danny Lachenmayer is transferring from North Dakota StatetoLSU, he announced on social media
Thursday
As afreshman, Lachenmayer posted a2.37 ERA in 38 innings, recording nine saves andstriking out 13.3 batters per nine innings. He’sfrom Eagan,Minnesota, and wasthe No. 9lefthanded pitcherinMinnesota in the 2024 class, according to Perfect Game. He also pitched against LSU on March 4, allowing two
earned runs and striking out three batters in 12/3 innings. He didn’tallowanearned run in 13 of his last 14 appearances and tossed 31/3 scoreless inningsfor the Bison in the Fayetteville regional.
Tennessee freshman left-handed pitcher Ryler Smart also committed to LSU out of the transferportal on Thursday.Smart announced his decisionvia socialmedia Smart redshirted with the Volunteers this season due to an arm injury.Hearrived in Knoxville,Tennessee,asthe No 25 left-handed pitcher in thenation andthe No. 5lefty in Texas, according to Perfect Game.
MLBNOTEBOOK
Smart is the secondlefthanded pitcher and the fourth player to transfer to LSU this summer With Kade Anderson projected to be atop-5 pickinnextmonth’s MLB draft, Lachenmayer and Smart provide depthfor LSU’s pitching staff.The Tigershave no morethan three lefties returning next season in redshirt sophomore DJ Primeaux,junior ConnerWareand freshmanCooper Williams.
Lachenmayer and Smart are the first pitchers LSUhas added out of thetransfer portalthis summer, joining infielders Brayden Simpson and SethDardar
Team USA’sWittready forbiggerrole
The Associated Press
KANSAS CITY,Mo. Kansas City Royals shortstopBobbyWitt Jr is going to againplayfor Team USA in the World Baseball Classic, and next yearcertainly will have abigger role than last time.
Witt announced Thursdaythat he is committed to playing for the United States and manager Mark DeRosa in the2026WBC.Itwill be Witt’ssecond time on theteam. When part of Team USAin2023, Witt was 22 and the youngest player on the roster who was coming off astandout rookie MLBseason. He was abench player who went 1for 2atthe plate, and alsowas apinch-runner in the ninth inning of the championship game won by Shohei Ohtani and Japan.
Yankees slugger Aaron Judge, who will be the U.S. captain, and Pirates ace Paul Skenes havealso committed to play for Team USA next spring.
“It’struly an honor,” Witt, who turned 25 two weeks ago, told MLB Network. “It’ssomething I’ve kindadreamed about my whole entire life. Just being part of that team acouple years ago was amazing,and now we’regoing to bring home the gold.” Witt was the runner-up to Judge in theAmerican League MVPvoting last season, when theshortstop ledthe majorswitha .332 batting average. Witt hit .285 with 10 home runs and40RBIsin the Royals’ first 80 games this year
DeRosesaidonMLB Network that he approached Witt during spring training about playing in the 2026 WBC, to which the player responded, “100%. I’m starting, right?”
Giants
Bonds to getstatue outside Giants’ ballpark: Barry Bonds will be getting a statue outside the San Francisco Giants’ home stadiumwhere he set baseball’scareer home run record, the team’sCEO said Thursday Giants Presidentand Chief Executive Officer LarryBaer was asked during aradio interview about astatue for Bonds,and he responded that it was “on the radar.” But Baer didn’thaveany details of when that wouldhappen “Barry is certainly deserving of
Gauff,Alcaraz give tennis twosuperstars
BY HOWARD FENDRICH AP tennis writer
LONDON Coco Gauff and Carlos Alcaraz are helping usher in anew era for tennis. With Wimbledonbeginning Monday,t he sport’smostrecentGrand Slam champions are Gauff, a21-year-old American, and Alcaraz, a22-yearold Spaniard,who are both at No. 2 in the rankings and are both coming off French Open titles secured in rivetingfinals againstthe sport’s No. 1players. They are young, they are charismatic as an be on the court and theyare media-friendly offit.
Rivalriesbrewing
Alongwith No. 1Aryna Sabalenka and former No. 1Iga Swiatek in the women’s game, and No. 1 Jannik Sinner in the men’s, Gauff andAlcarazoffer abright future for asport’sfanbase that in recent yearssaw all-time greats Serena Williams,Roger Federerand Rafael Nadal walk away and currently might be pondering how muchlonger Novak Djokovic will contend for thebiggest prizes.
“Tennis is just in such agreat, great place right now. We are so fortunate to have not only Coco, not only Carlos, but adeep bench of youngstars that are justpropellingthe growth of our sport,”U.S Open tournament director Stacey Allaster said. “I’ve been around a long time, and when we have lost great, iconic champions in the past, there’sgenerally been alittle bit of adip. We have had the exact oppositeduring this transition Ialways liketosay thechampions of today are standing on the shoulders of the champions of the past. These champions have jumped offthe shoulders of the past champions.”
One keyfor asport, especially an individual one, to gain attention and grow popularity is to have rivalries that demand buy-in.
Alcaraz vs. Sinner clearly provides that, muchinthe way that Federer vs. Nadal or Nadal vs. Djokovic did.
Alcaraz-Sinner raisingthe bar
Thefive-set,51/2-hourmen’s final at Roland-Garros wasasfull of momentum swings, terrific tennis andathleticism as anything those greatsconjured.
“The level,” two-time reigning
ASSOCIATED PRESS PHTOByNAM y. HUH
Kansas City Royals’ BobbyWitt Jr.celebrates with teammates after hitting atwo-run home runduring the ninth inningofa baseball game against the ChicagoWhite SoxonJune8inChicago.
astatue,and Iwould sayshould be next up,” Baer said during an appearance on San Francisco’s95.7 The Game. “Wedon’t have the exact location and the exact date and the exact timing. It’scoming. All Ican say is it’scoming.” Bondsplayed for San Francisco the last15ofhis 22big league seasons, hitting 586 of his762 homers while with the Giantsfrom19932007. He set the single-season MLB record with 73 homers in 2001, andhit his record-breaking 756th homer to pass Hank Aaron in ahome gameoff Washington’s MikeBacsik on Aug. 7, 2007. There are currentlyfivestatuesoutside Oracle Park,those of Hall of Famers Willie Mays,Willie McCovey,Juan Marichal, Gaylord Perry and Orlando Cepeda. The Giants retired Bonds’No. 25 jersey in 2018.
Tigers
Enns returns to MLB after 1,371 days to pitch 5scorelessinnings: Dietrich Enns probably won’thave to wait another 1,371daysfor another chance to pitch in the major leagues.
Ennsthrew fivescorelessinnings while allowing only one single andtwo walksinastartfor Detroit on Thursday in the Tigers’ 8-0 win over the Athletics. It was
the 34-year-old left-hander’s first bigleaguegamesince Sept.24, 2021.
“He’searned theright to pitch again in some capacity,” Tigers managerA.J.Hinch said.“We’re looking forward to getting him outthereafter we get him his normal rest and see if it’s going to be in thebullpen. Is he goingtobestarting, Idon’t know. Butit’sgoing to be in thebig leagues.”
After pitching the past three years in Japan and Korea, Enns went to spring training this year with the Tigers on aminor league deal.The former CentralMichigan University pitcher got called up from Triple-AToledofor his Detroit debut in theseries finale against theAthletics
“That was always the goal, to get back,” Enns said. “Use those stops along the way,wherever Iwas, to hone the craft and getbetter and try and be as good as Ican when I’m at themajor league level.” Enns’ last big league appearance had been two innings in relief for TampaBay against Miami at the end of the 2021 season. He was with theSeibu Lions in Japanfrom 2022-23 before going 13-6 last year for theLGTwins in SouthKorea.
WimbledonchampionAlcaraz said, “was insane.”
The wayheand Sinner, 23, are currentlydivvying up the biggest prizes —they’ve split thepast six major trophies and eight of the past 11 —iscertainly reminiscent of the BigThree’sdominance, albeit over amuch smaller sample size so far.
“Havingthese twoguysfighting for big trophies —Ithink we have to be very happy about it in the sport of tennis,” said Juan Carlos Ferrero, Alcaraz’smain coach.
“For them,for sure it’ssomething that they raise their level every time that they go on thecourt. They know they have to play unbelievable tennis to beat the other guy, andit’ssomethingthatisgoing to help forsure each player to raise the level even more.”
On andoff thecourt buzz
It sure does seem as though Gauff vs. Sabalenka could provide that sort of dynamic and buzz, too.
Consider that, like Alcaraz and Sinner,they occupy the top two spots in the rankings. And consider that, like those other two, both own multiple major titles. Gauff’s twoSlam triumphs came viathree-set victories over Sabalenka in the finals.
Plus, their latest meeting, at Roland-Garroslessthana month ago, camewith some added spice because of Sabalenka’s post-match comments that were seen as less than fully gracious toward Gauff. It became such athing that Sabalenka felt the need to issueapairof apologies —one privately via writing to Gauff, and one publicly in an interview at her next tournament.
Add thatsort of off-court intrigue to the on-court interest, and if there are rematches at the All EnglandCluba coupleofweeks from now,noone who is invested in tennis will be displeased.
“There’sincredible momentum and wind in our sails as we think about thesport, in total,” said Lew Sherr,who is abouttoleavehis role as the CEO of the U.S. Tennis Association. “We’ve had five consecutive years of participation growth. andthatcertainly is being, in part, fueled by the great talent and inspiring players we have at the professional level, and also is feeding record attendance, record interest, record viewership. Those things go hand in hand. We have notmissed abeat.”
Puchyr agrees to buy Rick Ware Racing
BY JENNA FRYER AP auto racing writer
CHARLOTTE, N.C.— One of the foundersofSpire Motorsports has entered an agreementtopurchase the NASCAR team owned by Rick Ware and is jumping back into the stock car series because he believes the current charters are grossly undervalued.
T.J. Puchyr,who in 2018 alongside JeffDickerson launched the Spire team to take over thecharter that Furniture Row Racingcould not unload, told The Associated Press on Thursday he andRick Ware Racing have adeal for himtotakeover Ware’sorganization next season.
When Puchyr and Dickerson bought the Furniture Row charter, themarket forNASCAR’sversion of franchise models was essentially dead. Their agency had been hired by Furniture Row owner BarneyVisser to sell the charter andwhentheycouldn’tfind a buyer, the two decided to purchase it themselves for $6 million and launch their own team.
That decision jump-started the charter marketand themost recent charters sold —when Stewart-Haas Racing wentout of business at the end of last season —wentfor approximately $30 million.Puchyr and Dickerson are largelycredited with pumpinglife and value into an otherwise dormantcharter system Puchyr last year sold his shares of Spire to Dan Towriss, the CEO of TWG Motorsports and head of the new Cadillac F1 team. Puchyr has spent 2025 consulting withvarious teams,including RWRand Legacy Motor Club. He’s watched themarket closely andhas attended several of the recent court hearings involving NASCAR against 23XI Racingand FrontRow Motorsports, who have filed an antitrust lawsuit over the charteragreement those two teams refused to sign last September
There are only 36 Cup Series charters, whichguarantee ateam entryintoevery NASCARrace and asteady revenue stream. Puchyr believestheyare greatly undervalued and in one of his final deals with Spire, he helped acquire acharter from Live Fast Motorsports for$40 million.
“I am bullish on wanting to build athree-car team. Ibelieve in the France family and the direction of the sport andIwantthe rest of theshareholders and industry to know that Ibelieve the charters are worth $75 million or more,” he told AP
What aboutWare’s2nd charter?
In his deal with Ware, Puchyr will keep Ware on board as apartner,also keep Ware’sson, Cody, in the No. 51 Ford, andretainall of the current RWRemployees. Ware’scurrent second charter is leased to RFK Racing, but Legacy Motor Club made alegal claim thatithad entered an agreement to buy thatcharternext season. Ajudge didnot agreewith Legacy,and said Ware has alease deal with RFK for 2026 on asecond charter.Puchyr believes none of the parties can perform to the Legacy-RWR contract —which he said waswritten by Legacy —and there is no charteravailable from Ware for Legacy for either lease or purchase in 2026. Ware has filed acountersuit against Legacy Legacy,a two-carCup team, is currentlyowned by seven-time NASCAR champion and Hall of Famer JimmieJohnson. He has recently taken on partnership from private equityfirm Knighthead CapitalManagement,which alongside Johnson is exploring expansion intoseveral other motorsportsseries.
“Ifanybody deserves apass it is Jimmie and if he wants to sit down andtalkabout it like men,I’d entertain the conversation,” said Puchyr,who wasoffendedthat Legacy sued Ware.
Wimbledon
STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON
LSU baseball coach JayJohnson thanks the fans during the national championship celebration event on WednesdayatAlex Box Stadium.
Funding of Olympic sports a bargaining chip for NCAA
BY EDDIE PELLS AP national writer
College sports leaders seeking antitrust and other protections from Congress have a potential bargaining chip: School assurances that they will provide funding for their increasingly imperiled Olympic programs, by far the biggest pipeline of talent for Team USA.
Four people familiar with the talks told The Associated Press that lawmakers, mostly from the Democratic side that will need to provide votes to help any legislation pass the Senate, have been approached by college sports experts and policy shapers to explore options in exchange for support of a bill that some Democrats oppose. One of the clearest tradeoffs would be for an idea that enjoys bipartisan support: helping collegiate Olympic sports programs.
Those programs produce around three-quarters of U.S Olympians at a typical Summer Games, but some are on uncertain footing in the wake of the $2.8 billion House settlement that clears the way for schools to begin sharing revenue directly with their athletes as early as next week. Most of that money will go to football and basketball — the moneymakers in this new era of name, image and likeness payments to players.
The people who spoke to AP did so on condition of anonymity because of the still-evolving and uncertain nature of the talks. But it’s no secret that the NCAA and its
SABAN
Continued from page 1C
In that period, LSU won SEC championships in 1986 and 1988, but after the ’88 title, the Tigers had eight losing seasons in 11 years. When LSU fired Gerry DiNardo with one game left in 1999, it already had a list of coaching candidates it wanted to pursue.
But Saban wasn’t on it He was a Bill Belichick disciple who worked as his defensive coordinator for four seasons with the Cleveland Browns Then, he was a college head coach for six seasons, including five at Michigan State, where he was basically a .500 coach in his first four seasons with the Spartans before posting a 9-2 record in 1999.
“One of the other things that piqued my interest was that when I was in the NFL, somebody did a study probably Belichick because he was notorious for this kind of detail,” Saban said. “The study revealed per capita which state had the most players from its colleges playing in the NFL. Louisiana was always ranked third or fourth I always remembered that.”
Saban’s contact with LSU came through his Tennessee-based agent Jimmy Sexton Sexton gauged Saban’s interest, and then had his business partner Sean Tuohy contact then-LSU athletic director Joe Dean.
From that point on, steps toward the Saban-LSU marriage were over-the-top clandestine. He agreed to meet with LSU officials at Sexton’s house in Memphis, Tennessee
“I was getting beat up so bad at Michigan State (by the media) because word was out I might leave,” Saban said. “I felt if I went to Baton Rouge for an interview, I’d have to take the job, and I didn’t know enough about it to know if that was what I really wanted to do.”
So,SabandispatchedhiswifeTerry “on a secret mission” to get a personal look at his potential next coaching stop. It’s something he hadn’t done before and hasn’t done since. She knew she had successfully stayed under a cloak of secrecy when she ate lunch with Emmert’s wife at TJ Ribs. The popular Baton Rouge restaurant had a blackboard on which patrons could vote for who they thought the next LSU coach would be.
Nick Saban’s name wasn’t on the board, so Terry Saban asked the waiter to add the name of “Nick Saban.” The waiter had no clue who Nick Saban was. Meanwhile, Nick was dazzling Emmert and the other LSU officials.
“We liked his attitude toward the student-athlete and his analytical approach to building a program,” Emmert said. “We all came away feeling this was somebody who could do what we wanted.”
Terry Saban did her due diligence, returned home and gave her husband an honest review of the strengths and weaknesses of the LSU situation.
For $1.2 million annually, the most ever paid to an LSU coach in any sport at the time, Saban
biggest conferences are not convinced that the House settlement will end all their problems.
In the halls of Congress
The NCAA is lobbying for a bill that would supersede state laws that set different rules for NIL; ensure athletes do not get employment status; and provide limited antitrust protection. One key issue is the handful of lawsuits challenging the NCAA’s longstanding rule of giving athletes five years to complete four seasons of eligibility
“I get why limited liability is a big ask,” NCAA President Charlie Baker said “But when it comes to limited liability around basic rulemaking, the consequences of this for the next generation of young people if you play this thing out
agreed to become the 31st head football coach in LSU history
It wasn’t long in Baton Rouge — especially at LSU — that Saban became a force of nature.
He changed the program’s culture through “The Process,” his revamped coaching philosophy born Nov 7, 1998, when Saban’s 30-point underdog Spartans scored 19 straight second-half points for a 28-24 win at No. 1-ranked and unbeaten Ohio State.
“That’s when I started,” Saban said, “the whole process-oriented ‘one play at a time, play the next play, don’t worry about what happened on the last play.’ I felt that was the only way we would have a chance in that game. The players actually did it. They played loose, free, they weren’t worried about winning. They just focused on what was in front of them.”
Saban educated the Tigers, but also learned a few things exclusive to college football in the South.
For instance, he didn’t understand why Louisiana state police troopers escorted him to midfield for a postgame handshake with the opposing coach and then flanked him as he left the field.
Saban had never coached below the Mason-Dixon line, where Alabama legend Bear Bryant began the time-honored Southern tradition of state trooper escorts in the late 1950s.
“Why do I need you guys?” Saban asked.
Then in the fifth game of his first LSU season, with the Tigers off to a 2-2 start and reeling from two straight losses, including a home stunner to UAB, LSU faced No. 11 Tennessee.
The Tigers won a 38-31 overtime thriller in Tiger Stadium. When LSU’s Damien James knocked down one last Tennessee fourthdown pass, most of the stadium emptied onto the field to tear down the goalposts. Saban found Tennessee coach Phillip Fulmer for a handshake and looked for an escape route through an ocean of fans back to the Tigers’ dressing room in the north end zone.
“When that happened,” Saban recalled, “I said, ‘Now I know why I have these cops.’ I could have gotten killed without them.”
Saban never won fewer than eight games in all of his LSU seasons. He had three bowl wins, including the BCS national title game victory in the Sugar Bowl over Oklahoma. His SEC championship game victories came against Tennessee and Georgia.
LSU had lost at Tennessee 26-18 earlier in the ’01 regular season.
When the teams met again in December in the Georgia Dome, the No 2-ranked Vols were a win away from advancing to the Rose Bowl and playing for the national championship.
The Tigers roared back from a 17-7 deficit to score a 31-20 upset.
After a pair of superb recruiting classes two seasons later, Saban’s 13-1 Tigers delivered the school’s first national championship since 1958 by beating Oklahoma 21-14.
“When we played Oklahoma in the championship game, they had some incredible stats,” Saban recalled.
“They were scoring like 50 points per game, it was unbelievable. I’m
ing for universities and their sports programs. One idea would be for the bill to include promises of certain levels of funding for college Olympic sports programs — some of which could be raised through federal grants to help the schools offset the cost.
“It would depend upon what they have in mind,” Baker said when asked about the idea. “We’d be open to a conversation about that because those sports are important and they matter.”
are enormous.”
In a sign of the difficulty the NCAA might have in getting legislation passed, Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., who has played a large role in shaping policy for college sports, told AP that athletes “deserve real reform and independent oversight of college sports.”
“Congressional legislation must provide strong and enforceable protections for their health, safety, and economic rights and transparency to protect non-revenuegenerating sports, rather than merely offering a blank check to the NCAA to return to the status quo,” Blumenthal said.
While the U.S. government is forbidden by law from funding Olympic teams, there is no such prohibition on government fund-
saying, ‘How in the hell are we ever going to beat these guys?’
“We just got the players ready to play I remember I told the players, ‘Let’s not think about winning the national championship. Let’s go to work and prepare for this game as if you’re going to play against the best player you’ve ever played against and try to play the best we can play to give us an opportunity to win the game.’
“The 2003 team had so much character that it didn’t need a leader They thought they would win the championship long before I did.”
As a result of winning the national title, Saban landed the nation’s No. 1 recruiting class.
At the end of the 2004 season, a $5 million per year contract and assured he’d have control of player personnel decisions, Saban became head coach of the Miami Dolphins
“I had in the back of my mind that the ultimate success was to be a head coach in college and win a national championship, go to the NFL and have a successful program there,” Saban said. “But I hadn’t planned to leave LSU. I told (Dolphins owner) Wayne Huizenga ‘no’ five times He came to my house on Christmas Eve and talked me into it.”
When Saban returned to the NFL for the first time in 10 years, it was vastly different than when he last coached in the pros as the Cleveland Browns’ defensive coordinator in 1994.
Back then, the NFL had just introduced free agency in 1993, so Saban hadn’t fully experienced the rapidly growing roster instability and volatility of players having the freedom to jump ship.
Saban, who had a 15-17 record in two seasons with the Dolphins, began looking at college vacancies.
“The best job that was available was Alabama, which happened to be a rival to the place (LSU) in which I had a tremendous amount of pride in terms of what we were able to accomplish, what we were able to do and a lot of the relationships we made,” Saban said.
Because of that, Saban became public enemy No 1 to a segment of LSU fans who forgot how he rescued the Tigers’ program from the garbage heap.
It didn’t help Saban’s relationship with the Tigers’ faithful that he won six national titles with the Crimson Tide in 17 seasons and had a 13-5 record vs. LSU. That included an eight-game win streak that started with the Tide blanking the Tigers 21-0 for the 2011 national title in the BCS championship game in New Orleans and ending with a 46-41 loss in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, to LSU’s eventual 2019 national champions.
Upon his retirement, he joined ESPN’s College GameDay before the startofthe2024season.He’salsohad time to reflect on his career move from LSU with a tinge of regret.
“You live and learn, do things, and you find out about yourself,” Saban said. “LSU has a great atmosphere, the people are so supportive, and I have a tremendous amount of respect for that program. It’s one of the greatest places athletically in the country right now.”
The issue is complicated and funding sources are going to be under pressure: Over the next year alone, each D-I school is allowed to share up to $20.5 million in revenue with its athletes and there are extra millions being committed to additional scholarships – for instance, in the case of Michigan, $6.2 million. All those figures are increasing under terms of the settlement and the money has to come from somewhere.
Olympic sports in peril
As of late May, the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee had tallied about 40 Olympic sports programs cut in Division I since the beginning of 2024 (but also 18 programs added) as schools prepare for the new financial realities.
Leaders inside the USOPC are optimistic that schools that generate the most talent – for instance, the 39 medals won by Stanford athletes at last year’s Paris Games would have placed the school 11th on the overall medal table –will retain robust Olympic sports programs and that Congress is on board with helping.
“We have no reason to believe that there’s not real alignment from all the parties, including members of Congress, who have indicated to us a very real concern for Olympic and Paralympic sport,” USOPC CEO Sarah Hirshland said.
Though a strictly partisan bill could pass the narrowly divided House, for it to become law it would need at least seven Democratic votes in the Senate to break a filibuster
In 2023, Blumenthal and Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., teamed with Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., to draft a bill that would have provided some antitrust protection in exchange for a number of guarantees, including the establishment of a health and safety trust fund for athletes who deal with long-term injuries from college sports.
Among the NCAA’s “core guarantees” put in place last year, schools are now required to cover medical costs for athletic-related injuries for at least two years after players leave school.
Only three – the Virginia men’s and women’s diving programs and the Utah beach volleyball program – came from schools among the Power Four conferences that were co-defendants in the House case. Still, countless other teams have been reconfiguring their lineups with roster caps in place alongside unlimited scholarships, a combination that is forcing hard decisions.
SAINTS
Continued from page 1C
automatically meet Shough’s asking price. But Halsell noted that teams tend to get innovative on these sorts of issues when the most important position is involved.
Take Tennessee Titans quarterback Will Levis, for instance. Drafted 33rd overall in 2023, Levis received additional guarantees in the form of roster bonuses for the second, third and fourth year of his rookie deal That was a different structure from how the Titans operated with 2022 second-round cornerback Roger McCreary, whose guarantees were limited to the first three years of his base salary, a tiny portion of his fourthyear salary and his signing bonus.
“The great thing about the Saints is that (assistant general manager and cap guru) Khai Harley, if you’ve looked at the deals he’s done since he’s been there, has shown a willingness to be creative,” Halsell said. “He and Mickey (Loomis) have shown a certain level of creativeness.
“You’re going to need that creativity to find some middle ground (that’s) win-win for both the club and the agent.”
Halsell suggested that middle ground could entail having the fourth year of Shough’s contract be guaranteed for injury only or by triggering the guarantee in terms of a roster bonus. That would be similar to how the Saints guaranteed portions of Derek Carr’s four-year, $150 million contract in 2023. That would allow Shough’s camp to claim they got a “fully guaranteed contract” while not actually making it fully guaranteed, Halsell said.
Complicating matters is also the NFL’s rookie wage scale. The scale determines the player’s specific salary based on when they were drafted, adjusted for the growth of the salary cap each year So, because the salary is non-negotiable, teams and agents typically clash over smaller details such as when bonuses are to be paid and how much of the contract is guaranteed.
Shough was the 40th overall pick, and historically, that doesn’t do the quarterback any favors.
Last year’s 40th selection, Philadelphia Eagles cornerback Cooper DeJean, had only the first two years of his base salary fully guaranteed and gained a partial guarantee in the third year New Orleans edge rusher Isaiah Foksey, picked 40th in 2023, received three years guaranteed but not his fourth year
How are second-round picks approached?
When trying to determine whether the Saints will guarantee all of Shough’s deal, it’s important to examine their history of second-round contracts.
Since 2012, the first year that the league’s rookie wage scale
went into effect, the Saints have drafted 10 other players in Round 2. The first eight only received guaranteed salaries for the first two years of their four-year contract.
But the dynamic shifted over the last two years.
Foskey’s contract was the first time the Saints guaranteed the entire third year of a base salary for a non-first-round, rookie-scale contract. And last year, the Saints even went so far as to guarantee a small portion ($168,700) of KoolAid McKinstry’s fourth-year base salary What changed? Well, blame the Texans, Halsell joked. Halsell pointed out how in 2022, Houston guaranteed safety Jalen Pitre’s third-year base salary, which agents then used as precedent for players in a similar range. Pitre was the fifth pick in the second round that year, 37th overall.
“(It’s) a trickle-down effect,” said Halsell, who works at the same sports agency that represents Foskey “This isn’t just unique to the Saints. It’s really a function of, ‘What are the teams ahead of us and what have they done?’ …The impact of the Jalen Pitre deal helped all the secondround picks the following year get more Year 3 money guaranteed.”
This year, that trickle-down effect started when the Texans set a new standard with Higgins, followed by the Browns with Schwesinger Shough’s leverage could come down to whether the unsigned players ahead of him then blink by agreeing to only a partial guarantee.
When will it be time to worry?
Though precedents can ultimately facilitate deals, they also can slow down negotiations as the two sides go back and forth over whether the terms actually apply Foskey and the Saints, for instance, didn’t announce a completed deal until July 19 — days before the start of training camp. And the year before that, cornerback Alontae Taylor also waited until July 19 to sign his rookie contract.
History suggests that the Saints and Shough will figure something out before camp, which players must report for on July 22. If they don’t, Halsell said it would be common for a player in a similar situation to hold out — though rookie holdouts have become a lot more rare since the wage scale was implemented.
Shough, for his part, participated in the entire offseason program despite not having a contract. Rookies can sign waivers that allow them to practice while negotiations take place and protect the player in the event of an injury
But if the Saints want Shough to be their starting quarterback, and if the rookie wants to win the job, there’s a seeming deadline for a deal to be complete. Who budges to get it done will be fascinating to see.
Email Matthew Paras at matt. paras@theadvocate.com
ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTO By MICHAEL CONROy
The national office of the NCAA in Indianapolis is shown on March 12, 2020.
MAKING CONTACTS
NorthAmerica Amateur Radio Daywill takeplace from 2p.m. to 8p.m.Saturday at the Highland Road Park Observatory, 13800 Highland Roa Learnabout amateur radio and make radio contact with aperson in another state or anoth country using abattery-powered radio and a simple wire antenna. Free and open to the public. www.brarc.org
THINGS
‘American
John Foster is set to play multiple shows, the first being Saturday, July 5, at the ParagonCasino ResortinMarksville.
Tunes on tap
‘Idol’ runner-up John Foster playing nine shows till Halloween
BY JUDYBERGERON Staff writer
Louisiana country singer and recent “American Idol” runnerup John Foster continues to rack up live show engagements in his home state and beyond. Here are nineupcoming appearancesfor the Addis teen, whomade his Grand OleOpry debut on June 7, just three weeks after “Idol” wrapped its 23rdseason: Saturday, July 5: Paragon Casino Resort’sMari Showroom, 711 ParagonPlace, Marksville. Doors open at 7p.m., show beginsat8 p.m. and tickets start at $25. paragoncasinoresort.com.
*Note: Fosteralso will be grand marshal for the Avoyelles Parish city’sFourth of July parade rolling at 10 a.m. along La. 1. Wednesday, July 9: Grand Ole Opry,2804 Opryland Drive, Nashville. Foster will be celebrating his19thbirthdayathis second Opry show.The all-ages show starts at 7p.m. and ticket range is $46-$272. Also scheduledtoperform are Ashley Cooke, The Isaacs and Jonnie W. opry.com.
Saturday, July26: Marshland Festival,Lake Charles Event Center,900 Lakeshore Drive. Foster shares the festival’ssecond-day bill with Brooks Drost, Louisiana Expresswith Johnnie Allan, Ryan Foret, Zach Edwards &The Medicine, Watersedge, Jamie Bergeron, Steelshot and Dillon Carmichael. $20. visitlakecharles.org.
Fridayand Saturday, Aug.1-2: The Texas Club, 134 N. Donmoor Ave., Baton Rouge. After sellingout theAug. 2show in less than aday,the Friday show was added.Tickets are$137.Doors open at 7:30 p.m. and the show startsat9 p.m. Both nights also will feature Lauren Lee Band and Connor Martin. Aspecial encore performance with Chase Tyler is plannedfor Friday thetexasclub.com.
Thursday, Aug.21: Grand Ole Opry.6 p.m., doors; 7p.m., show;tickets,$46-$275. Also on the evening’sbill are Jamey Johnson, DeborahAllenand Moe Bandy.opry.com. Friday, Aug.29: Alley Fest Music Festival, Combs Airport, Paintsville,Kentucky. Fostertakesthe stagethe same dayashis former fellow“American Idol” finalist Slater Nalley.Friday tickets are $69, general admission;$350, VIP experience. Thefestruns
PLAY BALL
hours of pickleball or tennis play
Facil for t Jul
ll levels,and it’s free? Check it out om 8a.m. to noon Friday at BREC’s eenwood Community Park Racquet ty,13350 La. 19 in Baker.Sessions hose 18+ runeachFridaythrough 25, and Aug. 1-Dec.19(no session Nov. 28).brec.org
SPEAK YOUR TRUTH
It will be an afternoon of rhythm, raw
Friday, June 27, 2025
BatonRouge Pride Fest kicksoff Saturday with local, international talent andfocus on arts
There’safullday of love, unity and celebration taking place at the RaisingCane’sRiver Center Arena from noon to 7p.m. Saturday
It’sBaton Rouge PrideFest, which this year embraces the theme “I Am aWork of Art.”
The presenters —AIDSHealthcare Foundation and Open Health Care say the theme honors the creativity, strength and diversity of theLGBTQ+ community
“With international talentand local pride, this festival is aliving, breathing canvas of joy,visibility and expression,” according to anews release.
The international talent features headlining artist GFlip,anAustralian pop-rock drummer and singersongwriter described as electrifying.
ä See PRIDE, page 2D
‘American Idol winner weds ex Saints cheerleader
Laine Hardy and Jordan Gautreau became husband and wifeonJune 20.
STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON
Idol’ runner-up
GFlip
Kelsi Creek
Deborah Cox
Remember items with akeyword
Dear Heloise: Going from room to room, then forgetting what Iwent in there for is a common occurrence. My tip for remembering is to recite akeyword in my head as Igofrom one room to the other so that when Iget in there, instead of wondering what Icame in there for,the keyword will remind me. This way,Idon’thave to walk back out to where Istarted in order to remember For example, if I’m going in my bedroom to get my reading glasses, Iwill say “glasses” over and over in my head while going fromone room to the next.Just remember that if there is asignificant decrease in your ability to remember,itmight be time to consult your doctor —Roma, in New York
earth.How can Iget him to sit down and discussa will?
FRIDAY
SHADOWROAD: Toby’s Lounge, Opelousas, 11 a.m.
LIVE MUSIC: Cane River Pie
Bar,New Iberia, 5p.m
PRENTICE JAMES: Prejean’s, Broussard, 6p.m
Hints from Heloise
P.S. Iread your column daily and loveall the hintsyou provide. —Frances A., in Lima,Ohio Frances,I get afair number ofletters from women asking the same question.Here are some facts of life that he should consider:
n He may notsee the importance of awill, estateplanning, or aliving will, so makeanappointmentwith an attorney and have them explainthe need and importance of having awill and aliving will to both of you.
Thanks for writing in, Roma! Well, readers, what do you do to help you remember things?
Heloise
Tomato juiceadd-on
Dear Heloise: Ilove tomato juice, but when Idohave aglass, Iadd asqueeze of fresh lemon juice to it to get more vitamin C. So much of this vitamin is lost in thecanning process. It also adds alittle more tang to the taste.
Edith D.,inShelton,Washington
Thegrimreaper
Dear Heloise: Why do so many men avoid making out awill? My husband of 36 years refuses to make out awill. He keeps saying there’snorush, but we never know when we willleave this
n Some menfear their mortality and avoid any discussion of death.Still, deathisapart of life. Awill merely ensures that your wishes are carried outthe way youwant them tobe. It protects you and your children from otherswho might claimthat they had averbal agreement with your husband to receive money or property.
n Awill spells out who gets what, and he mightbeworried that there will beresentment andfighting over theproperty. Butonthe contrary,a will usually helpsavoid conflict
n He may resent societal pressuretomakeout awill, but remindhim that it’s an act of love andprotection for his family.Yourattorney canadvise you on what you need to do and get the paperwork readyfor him to sign. —Heloise Send ahint to heloise@heloise. com.
TODAYINHISTORY
By The Associated Press
Today is Friday,June 27, the 178th day of 2025. There are 187 days left in the year
Todayinhistory
On June 27, 1957, Hurricane Audrey slammed into coastal Louisiana and Texas as aCategory 4storm, causing as many as 600 deaths.
On this date:
In 1844, Mormon leader Joseph Smith and his brother, Hyrum, were killed by amob in Carthage, Illinois.
In 1950, the U.N. Security Council passed aresolution calling on membernations to help South Korea repel an invasion from the North.
In 1991, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, the first Black jurist to sit on thenation’shighest court, announced his retirement.
In 2005, BTK serial killer DennisRader pleaded guiltyto10 murders that had spread fear across Wichita, Kansas, beginning in the 1970s.
In 2006, aconstitutional amendment to ban desecration of the American flag died in a U.S. Senate cliff-hanger,falling one vote short of the 67 needed to send it to statesfor ratification.
In 2011, former IllinoisGov Rod Blagojevich was convicted by afederaljury in Chicago on a widerangeofcorruption charges, including the allegation that
he’d tried to sell or tradePresidentBarack Obama’sU.S.Senate seat. (Blagojevich was later sentenced to 14 years in prison; hissentence was commuted by President Donald Trumpin February 2020, andhereceived afulland unconditional pardon from Trump in February 2025.)
In 2018, U.S.Supreme Court Justice AnthonyKennedy,whose voteoften decided cases on abortion,gay rights and other contentiousissues, announced hisretirement.
In 2022, in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, theSupreme Court ruled that ahighschool football coach who sought to kneel and pray on thefield after gameswas protected by the First Amendment Today’sBirthdays: Musician Bruce Johnston (TheBeach Boys) is 83. Fashion designerNormaKamali is 80. Fashion designer Vera Wang is 76. Actor Julia Duffy is 74. Actor Isabelle Adjani is 70. Cinematographer Janusz Kaminski is 66. Country singer Lorrie Morgan is 66. Actor Tony Leung Chiu-wai is 63. Writerproducer-director J.J. Abrams is 59. Actor Tobey Maguire is 50. Reality TV star Khloé Kardashianis41. Actor Sam Claflin is 39. Actor Ed Westwick is 38. NFL linebacker Bobby Wagner is 35. Actor Madylin Sweeten (“EverybodyLoves Raymond”) is 34. Singer-songwriter H.E.R. is 28. Actor Chandler Riggs (“The Walking Dead”) is 26.
LIVE MUSIC: Buck & Johnny’s, Breaux Bridge, 6:30 p.m.
ALYSSA MCMURRAY: Charley G’s, Lafayette, 6p.m.
AUSTIN REAUX: Naq’s-nDuson,Duson, 6p.m.
CLIFF BERNARD: Prejean’s, Broussard, 6p.m
MYLES MIGL: Jim Deggy’s, Lafayette, 6p.m
LIVE MUSIC: Whiskey& Vine,Lafayette, 6p.m.
HORACE TRAHAN: Hideaway on Lee, Lafayette, 8p.m
JAMIE BERGERON AND THE
Special guestperformers also includeDeborah Cox,aCanadian rhythm-and-blues singer,songwriter,actress, record producer and LGBTQ+ ally; and rising singer,songwriterand musician Kelsi Creek. Creek is aBaton Rouge nativenow living in Austin, Texas. LatangelaFay,Donovan Jackson
HARDY
Continuedfrom page1D
Fordancing, the bride opted for ashort, white,strapless dress layered withruffles.The groom ditched his jacket and undid afew buttonsonhis white, long-sleeved dressshirt.
KICKIN’ CAJUNS: Lakeview Park, Eunice,8p.m.
NEW NATIVES BRASS BAND: Blue Moon Saloon, Lafayette, 8p.m.
CHUBBYCARRIER &THE
BAYOUSWAMP BAND: La Poussiere, BreauxBridge, 8p.m. 5TH AVENUE: Rock ’n’ Bowl, Lafayette, 9p.m.
CLIFTON BROWN: Cowboys Nightclub, Scott, 10 p.m
SUNDAY
LIVE MUSIC: TanteMarie, BreauxBridge,11a.m. LE BALDUDIMANCHE— KEVIN HUVAL’S CAJUN/ CREOLE DANCE BAND: Vermilionville,Lafayette, 1p.m.
CAJUN JAM: BayouTeche Brewing, Arnaudville, 2p.m.
DIMANCHEMATIN CADIEN —CAJUN FAMILYSUNDAY FUNDAY: La Poussiere, BreauxBridge,2 p.m LEROYTHOMAS: Cypress Cove Landing, Breaux Bridge, 3p.m. SINGER/SONGWRITER OPEN MIC: Adopted Dog Brewing, Lafayette, 4p.m. JUNIOR LACROSSE: Pat’s
and London Manchester will host.
The event will honor grand marshals BrittanyMusso King and Y’zell Williamson for their outstanding contributions to the community.
The festival will also offer:
n “A cast of Louisiana’s finest” dragperformances,led by Nicole Foxx.
n The RainbowExchange,shopping in support of queer-owned businesses, artists and organizations. n Akids’ area witharange of
WEDNESDAY DULCIMERJAM: St. Landry VisitorCenter,Opelousas, 10 a.m. LIVE MUSIC: Park Bistro, Lafayette, 6p.m. LIVE MUSIC: Whiskey& Vine,Lafayette, 6p.m.
THURSDAY
engaging activitiesand entertainmentfor children of all ages. Doorsopen at 11:30 a.m. Baton Rouge Pride Fest is afree and open event, Exclusive ticketed seating will be available forthe musical performances.For details andupdates, visitbatonrougepride.org and follow @brpride on Facebook and Instagram
Email Judy Bergeron at jbergeron@theadvocate.com.
Gautreau,who studied at Southeastern LouisianaUniversity in Hammond, is aformer New OrleansSaintscheerleader andNew OrleansPelicans dancer After winning theABC singing competitionseries“American Idol” in 2019, becoming the state’s first “Idol” titleholder, Hardy signed with Hollywood Records. They parted ways in 2022, with Hardy moving forward as an independentartist.His most recent single,“ThatMan,” was released in January Hardy performed forthe LouisianaCrawfish Festival in Chalmette in March. He is scheduled to headline Chennault Fest 2025 in Monroe in November For more on Hardy,visit lainehardymusic.com
FOSTER
Continuedfrom page1D
through Sunday.alleyfestky.com. Saturday, Oct. 25: Hobart Arena, Troy,Ohio.Foster will be special
guest for the Joe Nichols-headlining concert. Doors, 6:30 p.m.; show, 7:30 p.m. Ticketsare $46-$62. hobartarena.com.
Friday, Oct. 31: Boots on the Bayou Music Festival, Lamar-Dixon Expo Centerfestivalgrounds, 9039 S. St. Landry Ave., Gonzales.
Email Judy Bergeron at jbergeron@theadvocate.com.
Prices start at $99, general admission. Headlining the two-day fest will be Chris Stapleton andCody Johnson. Theschedule is TBA. lamardixonexpocenter.com.
Email Judy Bergeron at jbergeron@theadvocate.com.
FRIDAY ORIGINAL MUSIC GATHERING: La Divina Italian Café, 6 p.m.
WHISKEY BENT: Swamp Chicken Daiquiris, St. Amant, 9 p.m.
SUNDAY
JUSTIN BURDETTE TRIO: Superior Grill MidCity, 11 a.m.
ROBERT CALMES: Cocha, 11 a.m.
LONGNECK LITE: On The Half Shell, Prairieville, 11 a.m.
VICTORIA LEA: Leola’s Café, 11 a.m.
JOVIN WEBB: Red Stick Social, noon
WHISKEY BENT: Fred’s on the River, Prairieville, 3 p.m.
BRENT ARMSTRONG: Brickyard South, 4 p.m.
KEEPIN’ TIME BAND: Floyd’s Morley Marina, Brusly, 4 p.m.
DALE WATSON: Phil Brady’s, 6 p.m.
KAITLYN WALLACE: Fiery Crab-Siegen, 6 p.m. OPEN MIC JAM: Fat Cat Saloon, Prairieville, 7 p.m.
MONDAY
ACOUSTICRATS: Phil Brady’s,
6 p.m.
JEFF BAJON PROJECT: Superior Grill MidCity, 6 p.m.
MIKE ESNEAULT: Stab’s Restaurant, 6 p.m.
TUESDAY
KATIE KENNEY DUO: Superior Grill MidCity, 6 p.m.
EDDIE SMITH: On The Half Shell, Prairieville, 6:30 p.m.
WEDNESDAY
CHRIS ALLEN & DAKOTA
CIVELLO: Galvez Seafood, Prairieville, 5:30 p.m.
SONGWRITERS OPEN MIC: Le Chien Brewing Co., Denham Springs, 6 p.m.
BURRIS: BLDG 5, 6 p.m.
MICAH LIPSMEYER DUO: Superior Grill MidCity, 6 p.m.
KIRK HOLDER: Bin 77, 6:30 p.m.
SONGWRITERS OPEN MIC WITH HEATH RANSONNET: Coop’s on 621, Gonzales, 7 p.m.
ANDY PIZZO TRIO: Hayride Scandal, 7:30 p.m.
DIXIE ROSE’S ACOUSTIC
CIRCLE: Teddy’s Juke Joint, Zachary, 8 p.m.
EDDIE SMITH BAND: La Daiquiris, 8 p.m.
OPEN MIC JAM: O’Hara’s Irish Pub, 8 p.m.
THURSDAY
KYBALION: El Paso-Sherwood, 6 p.m.
OPEN MIC WITH AMANDA JO
HESS: Istrouma Brewing, St. Gabriel, 6 p.m.
CAM PYLE: Tallulah, 6 p.m.
JEFF BAJON PROJECT: Superior Grill MidCity, 6 p.m.
THE BISHOP ELLIS TRIO: Hayride Scandal, 7 p.m.
THE STARDUST BOYS: The Brakes Bar, 7 p.m.
BRITTON MAJOR: O’Haras Irish Pub, 8 p.m.
HENRY TURNER JR. & ALL-
STARS: Henry Turner Jr.’s Listening Room, 8 p.m.
BLUES JAM: Phil Brady’s, 9 p.m.
OUTLYING
FRIDAY
BOB BROWNING: Big J’s Side Porch, Clinton, 7 p.m.
Compiled by Marchaund Jones. Want your venue’s music listed? Email info/ photos to showstowatch@ theadvocate.com. The deadline is noon FRIDAY for the following Friday’s paper
FRIDAY
MOVIES ON THE PLAZA:
7 p.m., Main Library at Goodwood, 7711 Goodwood Blvd. at 7 p.m. Screening of the movie “The Marvels” on the big screen in the outdoor plaza. Bring lawn chair or blanket. Refreshments will be available for purchase. Free admission. ebrpl.com.
CHOIR REHEARSAL WITH FRIENDS: 7 p.m., Chelsea’s Live!, 1010 Nicholson Drive. Hosted by Will Johnson, the event is open to all skill levels ages 18+. $62.74. cheslseaslive.com.
FRIDAY NIGHT LECTURE: 7:30 p.m.-8:30 p.m., BREC’s Highland Road Park Observatory, 13800 Highland Road. Skygazing tips, physics phenomena, space programs and famous events are covered. For ages 14 and older. Free. hrpo.lsu.edu. Also, evening sky viewing from 7:30 p.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday.
SATURDAY
RED STICK FARMERS MARKET: 8 a.m. to noon, Fifth and Main streets, downtown. Farm-fresh produce, goods, cooking demonstrations. breada.org.
DINO DAY: 10 a.m.-5 p.m., Louisiana Art & Science Museum, 100 S. River Road. Visitors can engage with a paleontologist as they are introduced to “Jason,” the 66-million-year-old Triceratops skull on display; also, hands-on activities in collaboration with various community partners and immersive, dinosaur-themed shows in the Irene W. Pennington Planetarium until 5 p.m. Regular admission applies. lasm.org.
FAMILY HOUR STARGAZING: 10 a.m., Irene W. Pennington Planetarium at the Louisiana Art & Science Museum, 100 S. River Road. Learn about the stars and constellations in the local nighttime sky, followed by an all-ages show. lasm.org.
GREATER BATON ROUGE
MODEL RAILROADERS: 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., Republic of West Florida Historical Museum, 3406 College St., Jackson. Electric trains of all sizes will be running on five different layouts. Free admission and parking.
1 p.m. and 3 p.m. Saturday and 1:30 p.m. and 3 p.m. Sunday, Louisiana Art & Science Museum, 100 S. River Road. Explore the science of chemistry during 45-minute hands-on workshops for scientists ages 6-12 and their accompanying adults. This month’s theme: “Rainbow Connection!” lasm.org.
SUNDAY
DRAG BRUNCH: 11 a.m.-2 p.m., Origin Hotel’s Passe All Day Cafe, 101 St. Ferdinand St. $50, advance; $60, at the door. Seating limited. eventbrite. com.
TUESDAY
RED STICK FARMERS MARKET:
3 p.m.-6 p.m., Main Library at Goodwood, 7711 Goodwood Blvd. Farm-fresh produce, goods, cooking demonstrations. breada.org.
TRIVIA NIGHT: 6:30 p.m., Burgersmith, 18303 Perkins Road. Collect your team and jockey for first place. loom. ly/y-CKtQ4.
PHOTO FROM LASM Children, as well as adults, will be amazed as they are introduced to ‘Jason,’ the 66-million-year-old Triceratops skull on display at Dino Day at the Louisiana Art & Museum, 100 S River Road. The event runs 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday and is included in regular museum admission.
and more. www.facebook. com/redstickfarmersmarket.
COSMIC CRAFTS UNDER THE DOME: 1 p.m., Irene W. Pennington Planetarium, Louisiana Art & Science Museum, 100 S. River Road. Watch a planetarium show, then do a themed hands-on craft activity. Part of the LASM’s Beat the Heat Summer Series. Included in paid admission. lasm.org.
TRIVIA NIGHT: 6:30 p.m., Burgersmith, 27350 Crossing Circle, Suite 150, Denham Springs. Collect your team and jockey for first place. loom.ly/y-CKtQ4.
THURSDAY
RED STICK FARMERS MARKET:
8 a.m. to noon, Pennington Biomedical Research Center, 6400 Perkins Road. Farm-fresh produce, goods and more. facebook.com/redstickfarmersmarket.
READ & CREATE: 1:30 p.m., Louisiana Art & Science Museum, 100 S. River Road. Story time followed by a themed craft perfect for little learners. Included with admission; free for members. lasm.org.
WEEKLY SOCIAL BIKE RIDE: 7 p.m., Geaux Ride, 521 N. Third St., Suite A. Free. https://fareharbor.com.
TRIVIA NIGHT: 7 p.m., Jolie Pearl Oyster Bar, 315 North Blvd. Test your trivia skills with your friends and family Free.
ONGOING
BATON ROUGE GALLERY CENTER FOR CONTEMPORARY ART: 1515 Dalrymple Drive. Group exhibit. Free. batonrougegallery.org.
CAPITOL PARK MUSEUM: 660 N. Fourth St. “Billy Cannon: They Called Him Legend,” through Jan. 10. (225) 342-5428 or louisianastatemuseum.org.
CARY SAURAGE COMMUNITY ARTS CENTER SHELL GALLERY: 233 St. Ferdinand St. “PINK. Out is In!,” through Monday, with closing reception 6 p.m.-8 p.m. Friday. Featuring work by local LGBTQIA+ artists. Hours are from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekdays and from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday artsbr.org.
ELIZABETHAN GALLERY: 680 Jefferson Highway. Group show. Call (225) 924-6437 or follow the gallery’s Facebook page.
LOUISIANA ART & SCIENCE
MUSEUM: 100 S. River Road. “Discoveries on the Nile: Exploring King Tut’s Tomb and the Amin Egyptian Collection,” through Oct. 31. (225) 344-5272 or lasm.org.
LSU MUSEUM OF ART: Shaw Center for the Arts, 100 Lafayette St. “Carved and Crafted: The Art of Letterpress,” through Sept. 21. “In Focus: Artwork by LSU Faculty,” through Aug. 3. (225) 389-7200 or lsumoa.org.
LSU TEXTILE & COSTUME MUSEUM: Human Ecology Building, Tower Drive, LSU campus. “Color Me Fashion,” more than 45 looks with related accessories spanning approximately 100 years of fashion history from c. 1890 to 1990. Exhibit runs through Aug. 15. (225) 578-5992 or email textile@lsu.edu.
MAGNOLIA MOUND MUSEUM + HISTORIC SITE: 2161 Nicholson Drive. Guided and selfguided tours. Hours are from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. MondaySaturday and from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday. brec.org/facility/MagnoliaMound.
OLD GOVERNOR’S MANSION: 502 North Blvd. Open for tours. Hours are from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday-Friday. Free admission. oldgovernorsmansion.com.
OLD STATE CAPITOL: 100 North Blvd. “Water/Ways,” traveling Smithsonian exhibit exploring the critical role water plays in all our lives and how to preserve it, through Aug. 9. “America’s Sacred Freedoms in the First Amendment,” yearlong exhibit. Free. louisianaoldstatecapitol.org. USS KIDD VETERANS MUSEUM: 305 S. River Road. Displays of a variety of artifacts that celebrate veteran and naval military history. Note: Vessel is in Houma for dry dock repairs. usskidd.com. WEST BATON ROUGE MUSEUM: 845 N. Jefferson Ave., Port Allen. “Radbwa ê tire tik-layé: The Art of Jonathan Mayers,” through Oct. 12. (225) 3362422 or westbatonrougemuseum.org.
Compiled by Judy Bergeron. Have an open-to-the-public event you’d like to promote? Email details to red@theadvocate.com. Deadline is 5 p.m. Friday for the following Friday’s paper
PROVIDED PHOTO By STEVE ROBERTS
The Paul Thorn Band will perform at 7:30 p.m. Saturday at the Manship Theatre, 100 Lafayette St. Baton Rouge. The show is presented by the Red Dragon Listening Room
CANCER (June 21-July 22) Communication canspare you from taking on too much. Concentrate on saving, security andpeace of mind, and turn frustration andangerintopersonal gain
LEO (July 23-Aug.22) Raise your voice, shareyour thoughts and make adifference. Refusetolet what others think steal your focus or turn your energy into anger. Wisdom andcommonsense are your tickets to success.
VIRGO(Aug. 23-Sept. 22) With change comes choices and decisions that aren't always easy. Investtime andeffort to ensure youmake meaningful decisions that are not disruptive to you or the people youlove.
LIBRA (Sept.23-Oct.23) Align yourself with people who share your objectives. Do your part to gain access to those who have thepower to bring about change Becomepart of thesolution,and you'll encounter someone whostirs your emotions.
SCORPIO (Oct. 24-Nov. 22) Spend more time nurturing what's important to you. Your relationships will suffer if youlack compassion or neglect people vying foryourapproval or attention.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 23-Dec. 21) Takecare of your money, possessions andemotional well-being. Show your desire andinterest in learning and excelling to meet their demands. Secure your personal and professional prospects.
tions and look for options that make you feel comfortable. Do what's best foryou
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 19) Refuse to let others decidefor you. Speak up, share your thoughts and feelings, and be bold with wordsand actions. Don't gamble with your savings,emotions or what you've worked hard to acquire
PISCES (Feb. 20-March 20) Actionsspeak louder than words.Dowhatyou want, and don't apologize for looking out for yourself. Useyour statustomake inroadswith peopleinaposition to help. ARIES (March 21-April19) Wake up, smell the rosesand welcome the weekend with vim and vigor. Today is about socializing, communicating andsharing your feelings andintentionswith thepeople youencounter.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20) Rethink your schedule andhow youwanttorespond to someone close to you. Takeaback seat, give yourself amoment to rethink your response andfind apositiveway to reply.
GEMINI(May 21-June 20) You'llface an explosive situation if youare too aggressive in your approach to beliefs andpolitics. Choose your battles wisely, andyou'll gain ground andmake positive connections.
Celebrity Ciphercryptograms are created from quotations by famous people, past and present.Eachletter in thecipher stands for another.
TODAy'SCLUE: SEQUALS W
CeLebrItY CIpher
Sudoku
InstructIons: Sudoku is anumber-placing puzzle based on a9x9 grid with several given numbers. Theobject is to place the numbers 1to9 in the empty squares so that each row, each column and each 3x3 box contains the same number only once. Thedifficulty level of theSudoku increases from Monday to Sunday.
Yesterday’s Puzzle Answer
THewiZard oF id
BLondie
BaBY BLueS
Hi and LoiS CurTiS
BY PHILLIP ALDER Bridge
We have been looking at transfers into themajors.Iftheresponderhasonlyfive in his major, he makes that suit trumps when he has aweak hand. But when he has game-invitational or better values, he transfers, then offers achoice of contracts in case his sidedoes nothavean eight-card fit in that major.
However, when the responderhas six (ormore)inhismajor,heshouldinsiston that suit being trumps because he knows hissidehas at least an eight-cardfit. But how does he do that over one no-trump?
Ifhehasinvitationalstrength,hetransfers at thetwo-level, thenbidsthreeof hissuit. If he wishes to play in fourof hismajor,hemakes histransfer at the four-level —a Texas transfer, as in today’sdeal. If theresponder has mild slamambition, he transfers at the twolevel, then jumps to four of his major. If he wants to get to aslam,heusesTexas andbidsagain.
Here, North’s insistence on gameis slightly aggressive, but 10 trickscould be laydown opposite the right 15-count. Against four spades, West leads the diamond queen. What should South do?
Declarer must lose two spades and one heart. But dummy also has adiamond loser.Southshould win with his
diamond ace (the honor from theshorter sidefirst), play adiamond to dummy’s king, andruff the last diamondinhis hand. Then, with this layout, South must next lead aheart to driveout East’s ace so that he can make his first trump play fromthe dummy through East.
