State Attorney General Liz Murrill is filing a brief against the lawsuit filed against the state’s Ten Commandments law requiring them to be displayed in classrooms. Brooke Thorington has more.
Cut 1 (32) …I’m Brooke Thorington.”
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A public affairs research official says he just doesn’t understand some of the reasons why Governor Jeff Landry’s office withholds certain records from the public. Mel Bridges has the story.
Cut 2 (32) “…I’m Mel Bridges.”
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State Attorney General Liz Murrill is filing a brief against the lawsuit filed against the state’s Ten Commandments law requiring a poster of the biblical text to be displayed in all public school classrooms. Murrill says the suit that’s been filed by several advocacy groups is premature.
Cut 3 (13) “…constitutional rights.”
Loyola University Law Professor Dane Ciolino says the law is patently unconstitutional and he expects the state will lose the case at the district and appellate court levels. He says the really interesting thing will be to see what happens in two or three years when the case makes it to the US Supreme Court.
Murrill says the high-profile case is being handled internally through her solicitor general.
Cut 5 (05) “…outside counsel.”
Ciolino says it’s a political move by the Governor and the State Attorney General for the Ten Commandments law to go before the now extremely conservative US Supreme Court.
Cut 6 (08) “…realm of possibility.”
After the law was signed in June and lawsuits were filed, a federal judge ruled classrooms could not display the Ten Commandments until at least November 15th.
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Louisiana residents have a right to request information under the state constitution, and though the governor has legal avenues to deny those requests, President of Public Affairs Research Council Dr. Steven Procopio says some of the denials from Governor Jeff Landry’s office either don’t apply or aren’t legal.
Cut 7 (10) “…that they wanted.”
For example, Procopio says, legislative privilege doesn’t apply to the governor, and the deliberative process exemption was revoked under former governor Bobby Jindal. He adds Landry’s office only had 65 information requests in his first few months in office and should have been able to respond to all of them.
Cut 8 (11) “…to those records.”
Procopio stresses that the governor has legal avenues to refuse information, but says that Landry’s office can’t try to invoke just anything to keep records out of the public eye. Precopio says freedom of information is important since…
Cut 9 (12) “…in our constitution.”
Landry says such restrictions are necessary to allow officials to speak to each other without fear of those conversations becoming public or weaponized.
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Wall Street is reacting today after last week’s news that the unemployment rate increased. Economist Dr. Loren Scott says history indicates, according to the Sahm (pronounced Sham) Rule, that we’re in a recession anytime the unemployment rate increases a half percentage point more than the last 12-month average.
Scott says a change in the unemployment rate might mean more people are filing for unemployment versus more people losing jobs. It might not be necessarily all doom and gloom.
In the meantime, Scott says people should not panic, be cautious, but don’t panic. He doesn’t believe it will be a deep recession, especially compared to 2008.
Cut 12 (11) “…long recession.”
Without fail the Sahm Rule has observed the initial phase of a recession when the average U.S. unemployment rate is at least half a percentage point higher than the 12-month low.
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Cut 13 (05) “…all the way down.”
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Cut 15 (12) “…really important.”
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