Louisiana lawmakers skirmish in special session's final days
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — As they reached the final days of their special session, Louisiana lawmakers Thursday haggled over elections issues and a controversial police financing measure, skirmishes that kept them bickering rather than wrapping up the session early.
Gov. John Bel Edwards, who didn't support the special session, said he hopes lawmakers won't keep going until their Tuesday deadline.
“The truth is that they don't seem to be getting a whole lot done right now,” the Democratic governor said. He added that continuing a session that costs an estimated $40,000 to $50,000 per day until the final allowed minutes “wouldn't be a wise investment of their time or the public's money.”
Lawmakers hoped to end the session Friday, though it remained unclear if they would do so.
Republican lawmakers called the monthlong special session, their second of this year, to try to curb Edwards' coronavirus restrictions on businesses and activities and give lawmakers more authority over emergency decision-making.
After days of behind-the-scenes haggling, the House and Senate agreed Tuesday to a proposal that would give lawmakers the ability to scrap individual coronavirus rules enacted by the governor. Edwards hasn't said whether he'll veto the bill, though he's resisted any efforts to lessen his authority.
With that emergency powers measure passed, lawmakers found other issues over which to argue Thursday.
The House voted 59-27 for a proposal to give lawmakers more authority over emergency elections plans.
Senate Republican leader Sharon Hewitt initially sought to remove the governor’s authority to veto any emergency elections plan submitted by Louisiana’s secretary of state. That concept ran into constitutional concerns in the House.
A rewrite spearheaded by Baton...