Louisiana is no longer defending a congressional map signed by Gov. Jeff Landry that includes two majority-minority districts. Instead, state leaders are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to rule a key provision of the federal Voting Rights Act unconstitutional. This move would allow the termination of the political boundaries the Legislature created in 2024 – and could affect how political boundaries are drawn nationwide. The Times-Picayune | Baton Rouge Advocate’s Mark Ballard reports:
“It’s a breathtaking, wholesale attack on the Voting Rights Act, which just turned 60 this month,” said Michael Li, a redistricting authority with the Brennan Center for Justice, which is affiliated with the New York University Law School. “It’s also completely unfounded,” he said, arguing that for four decades the courts were able to distinguish between situations where majority-minority districts are necessary to remedy race discrimination and where they are not.
Recovering from Hurricane Katrina
As Louisiana commemorates the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, people who lived through the storm and its aftermath are offering differing accounts of the region’s recovery. Robin Keegan, former executive director of the Louisiana Recovery Authority, writing in the Times-Picayune | Baton Rouge Advocate, says the state succeeded in rebuilding “safer, smarter and stronger:”
Many of the changes that were put in place then are still protecting us today. We adopted international building codes to fortify new structures; we incentivized communities to plan for a safer future; we rebuilt and improved health care and school systems; we invested in quality, affordable rental housing; and coastal restoration became a shared mission. Communities along the coast and upriver have learned to “live with water,” adopting measures to protect against future flood events.
New Orleans natives Mark F. Bonner and Mathew D. Sanders, writing in the New York Times, argue that the federal government’s historic $140 billion investment toward the region’s recovery failed to put the Crescent City on the path to a brighter future:
Today, New Orleans is smaller, poorer and more unequal than before the storm. It hasn’t rebuilt a durable middle class, and lacks basic services and a major economic engine outside of its storied tourism industry. The core problem was the inability to turn abundant resources into a clear vision backed by political will. Federal dollars were funneled into a maze of state agencies and local governments with clashing priorities, vague metrics and near-zero accountability. Billions went to contractors and government consultants while public institutions such as schools, transit, health care and housing barely scraped by.
Federal changes help shutter solar installer
A Louisiana company that uses federal tax incentives to provide solar panels for low- and moderate-income households is going belly-up thanks to changes in federal law ushered in by the Trump megabill. PosiGen is ceasing operations and laying off more than 150 employees. The Times-Picayune | Baton Rouge Advocate’s Blake Paterson explains:
Founded in 2011, PosiGen specializes in marketing solar energy systems to low-income households and rode a wave of state and federal solar credits that allowed it to grow quickly for much of the past decade. But it said its ability to secure new investments, which were needed to fund recent expansions, were hampered by the passage in July of President Donald Trump’s tax and spending bill, which cancels certain renewable energy tax credits starting next year. The collapse of PosiGen comes as other clean energy companies struggle to adjust to the sudden changes in the tax code.
Colorado deals with fiscal fallout of megabill
Massive federal cuts included in the Trump tax law will strain state budgets. The Colorado Legislature gaveled into a special session earlier this month to close a $750 million hole in the state’s current-year budget, which was the result of the megabill. The Colorado Sun’s team reports on how Centennial State lawmakers raised new revenue by eliminating tax breaks for businesses:
To raise about $45.9 million for this fiscal year, which began July 1, Democrats nixed a tax break for wealthy owners of so-called “pass-through businesses” that would have taken effect in January. … To bring in about $44 million this fiscal year, Democrats passed a bill ending a tax break for insurance companies that have a “regional home office” in Colorado. … Democrats also passed a bill adding Hong Kong, Ireland, Liechtenstein, Netherlands and Singapore to the list of countries that corporations can’t route their revenue through without proving to the state that they aren’t shielding their earnings from taxation. That’s expected to raise about $36 million in the current fiscal year.
The federal megabill includes work reporting requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which states will have to administer, and mandates states shoulder 5 to 15 percent of SNAP benefits starting in fiscal year 2028:
To cover those costs, Democrats want to repurpose some of the revenue the state collects for Healthy School Meals for All, Colorado’s free school meal program, by tweaking a pair of ballot measures going before voters in November. Proposition MM and Proposition LL would raise more money for school meals by increasing taxes on Coloradans who earn more than $300,000 per year, and would allow the state to retain and spend all the revenue it collects for the program, rather than return some of it to taxpayers under the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. Money would only go to SNAP if there is enough tax revenue collected to fully fund the Healthy School Meals for All program.
Enhanced premium tax credits for the Affordable Care Act Marketplace, which helped millions of Americans afford health insurance, were left out of the megabill and are set to expire later this year:
Lawmakers also passed a bill to fund health insurance discounts, predominantly for low-income Coloradans. The discounts are expected to expire at the end of the year unless Congress steps in to renew them. That will happen by selling another $125 million in tax credits to insurance companies and other corporations. Like the tax credits being raised for the state budget, they will be sold for as little as 80 cents on the dollar, and are predicted to ultimately raise about $100 million.
Note: Colorado’s tax code is more linked to the federal tax code than other states, including Louisiana. The Trump tax law immediately reduced the state’s income tax collections by an estimated $1.2 billion for the current fiscal year, which began July 1.
Number of the Day
23.9% – Average gross premium increase for Louisianans enrolled in Affordable Care Act exchange plans, if improved subsidies that made insurance more affordable are allowed to expire at the end of 2025. A family of four earning $60,000 per year would see the price of their premiums increase from $84 per month to $311 per month. (Source: ACAsignups.net)