Amtrak launches bus service linking Baton Rouge with New Orleans-Mobile Route
Starting on Monday, Aug. 18, the new service will allow travelers to take a bus from Baton Rouge to the New Orleans station, where they can catch Amtrak's direct line to Mobile, Alabama.
'We've been working on this for literally more than a decade and really excited to see the work of the Southern Rail Commission and all the communities from New Orleans to Mobile,' said Walt Leger, the president and CEO of New Orleans and Company.
Amtrak is also in the process of collaborating with state transportation agencies and track owners to accelerate the creation of a direct rail connection between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, which is expected to be completed in the next two years.
Jefferson Parish Schools decrease teacher vacancies ahead of school year
'We're working on bringing Amtrak service to Baton Rouge and we're talking about taking the train to go from let's say Mobile to New Orleans and bring them all up here. That's a few years away, why wait when we can have a bus connection now,' said Senior Public Relations Manager Marc Magliari.
When the full rail service launches, tickets, schedules and fares will be released. In the meantime, the newly introduced bus service will serve as an essential step toward enhancing the region's overall transportation network.Latest Posts
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E&E News
2 hours ago
- E&E News
Lawsuits over Louisiana's decaying oil infrastructure split GOP
GARDEN ISLAND BAY, Louisiana — Out on the water, the decaying legacy of oil and gas production here is hard to miss. Old well pipes stick up out of the river. The shorelines are dotted with pilings — the skeleton of long-abandoned docks. Narrow canals trenched through the marsh to drill wells have widened into small rivers. The derelict docks and rusted equipment, some here since before World War II, can have a forgotten feel. But on land, they're top of mind in a yearslong legal battle over whether oil majors should be forced to pay billions of dollars for the damage and fund restoration of the state's disappearing coast. Advertisement The sprawling litigation — more than 40 lawsuits — is fueling a fight that reaches from courtrooms in small-town Louisiana to the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court. Behind the legal maneuvering is a unique alliance between trial lawyers, long cast as the scourge of Republicans everywhere, and Louisiana Republican politicians such as Gov. Jeff Landry, who otherwise pledge allegiance to President Donald Trump's pro-oil agenda. Together, they threaten to cost the industry billions of dollars. But a big victory for that effort earlier this year — a $744 million verdict against Chevron — has triggered a backlash in Trump's push for 'energy dominance.' The Make America Great Again movement, or MAGA, demands allegiance to fossil fuels. And Republicans backing lawsuits against oil companies is considered a betrayal of Trump's agenda. Laura Loomer, a far-right activist and MAGA enforcer who drove the ouster of several Trump administration officials she deemed disloyal, has taken an interest. She's attacked Landry on social media as a 'perfect example of a Republican speaking out of both sides of his mouth.' Bill Barr, Trump's former attorney general, bashed the state's Republican attorney general, Liz Murrill, for supporting litigation that he said endangers Trump's agenda. Murrill responded that Barr is 'wrong about the facts and the law.' Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry (R) recorded a social media video outside the White House earlier this year. | Mark Schiefelbein/AP So far, the GOP-trial lawyer alliance has held, but it could face its biggest test yet in the coming Supreme Court term. The court, bolstered by three Trump picks, is threatening an arcane but damaging setback. Those moves have given a national profile to a pitched battle where industry supporters have been sounding the alarm for years. Marc Ehrhardt, executive director of the Grow Louisiana Coalition, calls the litigation a 'shakedown' that sends the wrong message to businesses that might consider investing in Louisiana. 'What we're essentially saying is, 'Come on in, invest in Louisiana, and then in about 20 years or so, we're going to sue the hell out of you,'' Ehrhardt said. His group was formed in 2014, shortly after the suits were filed, he said, 'to advocate and remind people about the importance of the oil and natural gas business to the state's economy and jobs.' The White House, Landry, Loomer, Barr, Chevron and the Department of Energy, did not respond to requests for comment. 'Wanton disregard' But parish governments, environmental groups and some people who make their living in the marshes say it's simply time for the oil companies to repair the mess they left behind after reaping decades of profit. 'I think it's reasonable for some of the companies to come and clean some of this stuff up,' said Richie Blink, a charter tour company owner in Plaquemines Parish, where the jury reached the $744 million verdict against Chevron. His johnboat is idling where the Mississippi River meets the Gulf, and he's looking across a few hundred feet of open water at a barge working the site of an oil spill several weeks before. An 82-year-old well started spraying oil in late April, the latest reminder of how oil field equipment left behind years ago continues to damage the coastal environment. Coincidentally, it happened about three weeks after the Plaquemines verdict. Further upriver, Blink swings his boat into the Mississippi by the skeleton of an old dock sticking out of the marsh grass near a pipeline platform. It's just a row of dark pilings poking a few inches out of the water, where a fisherman's boat could hit it at night or when the river is high and visibility is low. 'This is the kind of stuff, the wanton disregard for the health and safety of residents here,' says Richie Blink, a tour captain. 'You've got docks that hang out into navigable waterways that are derelict. And they'll come slap like a light on top of it instead of taking the time to remove something right.' Tour boat captain Richie Blink points out damage to marshes along the Mississippi River in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, related to oil and gas drilling. | Mike Soraghan/POLITICO's E&E News Companies have been drilling for oil here since at least the 1930s, cutting canals into the marsh to sink wells and lay pipelines, building docks and adding other infrastructure. In Louisiana, a little more than 26,500 people worked to produce oil and gas last year, about 1.3 percent of the workforce, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the state ranks third in the country for natural gas production and accounts for about 10 percent of U.S. gas production as well as 1 percent of crude oil production. More broadly, the Grow Louisiana Coalition — which supports the energy industry — says oil and gas support 300,000 jobs in the state, and contributes millions of dollars each year to the state's coastal restoration efforts. 'No private entity cares more or is doing more to restore our coastline than the Louisiana energy industry,' Tommy Faucheux, president of the Louisiana Mid-Continent Oil and Gas Association, said in an emailed statement. 'It's time to stop incentivizing these lawsuits.' But production appears to have peaked, and the economic significance of the overall oil and gas industry in Louisiana has shrunk over time, according to a recent report from the state's Division of Administration. In 1999, oil, gas and petrochemicals accounted for about one-fourth of Louisiana's GDP. By 2023, the last full year of data available, that had fallen to less than one-fifth. The development came with a cost, and the bills are starting to add up. Canals cut in the marsh for oil wells disrupted the natural flow of water and funneled saltwater into the freshwater ecosystem, scientists say, killing plants that held the soil in place. Erosion widened canals until they were simply open water in some places, Blink calls them 'ghost bayous.' Coastal restoration The state has warned that it lost nearly 2,000 square miles of land since the 1930s and, without mitigation, could lose 3,000 more over the next 50 years. Plaquemines Parish, a jurisdiction that follows the Mississippi out of New Orleans all the way to open water, has been particularly hard hit. Criss-crossed by those canals, it has lost nearly half its land in the past 50 years. It has about half of the active lawsuits. Even people who don't spend much of their time on the water see the effects, Blink said, in homeowners' insurance that can cost tens of thousands of dollars for middle class houses. But oil and gas development isn't the only reason for that loss of land. Scientists and environmentalists blame a variety of factors, including sea-level rise from climate change. In the trial in Plaquemines, Chevron directed blame at the levees along the Mississippi that choke off the sediment in the river that the marsh needs in order to rebuild. 'It's not something that was caused solely by oil and gas. In fact, gas is not even the main factor,' said James Karst, a spokesperson for the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana, in an interview. 'Clearly the burning of carbon-based fuels is the main cause of sea-level rise and a warming planet, but those are just some of the main factors.' Cleanup operations seek to protect Garden Island Bay, Louisiana, after an oil spill in April. | U.S. Coast Guard The state has a coastal master plan for restoration, approved in 2023, with 77 projects costing roughly $50 billion over the next 50 years. But it's largely unfunded. Settlements and verdicts from the litigation could help trim that backlog. 'Louisiana has a problem funding coastal restoration for the long term,' said Karst, whose organization is not involved in the lawsuits and has no position on whether they should succeed or fail. 'This could be a lifeline for saving Louisiana's coast. It could help the state and the parishes do more projects. That will save more of our state for future generations.' The suits were filed in 2013, led by a Louisiana trial lawyer named John Carmouche, who did not respond to requests for comment. He identified sites along the coast where oil majors like Shell, Exxon Mobil and Chevron once produced oil, though many have since sold their wells to smaller firms. Then he signed on the governing bodies of coastal parishes — the Louisiana equivalent of counties. That's the legal strategy. But behind the motions and petitions and courtroom maneuvering, there's also political strategy. Forging alliances Rural Louisiana isn't friendly terrain for big lawsuits against oil companies. Many people in the state work for oil companies, or their job is related to the industry. The oil sector is also intertwined with the Republican Party, and in a red state like Louisiana, that means it's intertwined with state government. But in the years after filing the suits, Carmouche and his firm forged a unique alliance with the Republican political leaders who run the state. When David Vitter, then a Republican senator, ran for governor in Louisiana promising to end the litigation, Carmouche and his firm took action. The firm put $1.7 million into a PAC that was the first to hit Vitter for his role in a prostitution scandal. Democrat John Bel Edwards, himself a trial lawyer, beat Vitter with 56 percent of the vote in 2015 to become governor. Vitter did not respond to a request for comment. Landry, Louisiana's current Republican governor, was attorney general at the time. He backed the litigation, hosting a news conference to announce the first settlement in the litigation. Carmouche's firm gave $300,000 to a pro-Landry PAC in his 2023 gubernatorial election victory. During the 2023 campaign, a local news outlet reported that by August of that year, Landry had raised more from trial lawyers than Edwards had during his 2019 campaign. Last year, Landry gave Carmouche a plum appointment to the Louisiana State University board of supervisors. Carmouche and his firm also contributed more than $4,000 to Michael Clement, the judge who heard the case in Plaquemines Parish. Judges run for election in the parishes that would get the millions of dollars in coastal restoration dollars. Those kinds of local connections are among the reasons why state courts are viewed as more likely to deliver big jury awards against oil companies. The Supreme Court in Washington. | Francis Chung/POLITICO The oil companies and their supporters want the cases moved to federal court, where judges are chosen by the president and senators and considered more friendly to the oil companies. Federal jurists have their own conflicts, though. After the BP oil spill, numerous accounts flagged that many federal jurists in gulf states had oil and gas stock. The 5th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals meets in New Orleans and handles cases from the country's biggest oil producing states, including Texas. A review of the most recent financial disclosures by POLITICO's E&E News shows that among the 26 5th Circuit jurists, at least nine hold oil and gas interests. Still, the 5th Circuit has issued rulings favorable to the trial lawyers and the coastal parishes. Justices have repeatedly rejected industry's attempt to move the cases to federal courts. A representative of the 5th Circuit did not respond to a request for comment. The Supreme Court agreed. In 2023, justices declined to entertain a request to move the cases to federal court. In June, that changed. The high court agreed to hear the oil companies' argument that some cases should be handled in federal court because companies produced oil under contract to the federal government in World War II. 'Ceded control' In theory, the Supreme Court decision could go either way. The high court takes up only a fraction of thousands of cases it's asked to review each year. But Keith Hall, a Louisiana State University law professor who has followed the cases, said the court might be considering a change. 'I always assume there's a good chance of reversal if they take a case,' said Hall, a former litigator. However the justices eventually rule, their decision to reconsider the question likely puts all the cases on hold for months. The April verdict was under fire at the national level before the Supreme Court announced it was taking the case. Barr led the charge. He fired off his letter to Murrill, the Louisiana attorney general, less than a week after the state and local governments' big victory in state court. Barr, the former U.S. attorney general, is in charge of leading legal challenges for the American Free Enterprise Chamber of Commerce, which touts itself as a more conservative and aggressive alternative to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. He wrote on behalf of that group and several others, including ones with ties to Energy Secretary Chris Wright and billionaire Trump megadonor Tim Dunn. Barr accused Louisiana Republicans of giving the state's imprimatur to the trial lawyers' attack on oil companies. 'The state seems to have largely ceded control of the litigation to the private plaintiffs' lawyers and deferred to their legal positions,' Barr wrote. Things got hotter in July, when Loomer blasted Landry and Murrill on social media. She said that voicing support for the oil industry while supporting the suits is 'blatant duplicity.' 'They weaken the same energy sector they claim to defend while they support lawsuits against American energy companies,' Loomer wrote. 'Hopefully @realDonaldTrump calls Landry out for subverting his energy agenda. This is ridiculous.' Right-wing activist Laura Loomer speaks in front of a courthouse in New York last year. | Ted Shaffrey/AP Loomer hasn't followed up. But the Grow Louisiana Coalition did, with an opinion piece in the Washington Examiner about litigation issues noting Loomer's outrage. Murrill responded with a statement saying she's a staunch defender of the oil and gas industry. But, she said, the Chevron lawsuit showed the company 'caused real damage' and engaged in 'concrete, identifiable unlawful activity.' Blink, the tour captain, was an elected member of the Plaquemines Parish Council for four years. In the years before he ran for the office another council member, he said, was voted out for having supported the lawsuits. But the controversy had quieted by the time Blink ran. After four years, he chose not to run for reelection. He said he talked to more than 1,000 people in his 2018 campaign and 'maybe 10' asked about the lawsuits. But what they did talk about, he said, was anger at the damage to the marshes and the river. 'Everything in Plaquemines Parish centers around the Mississippi River, and it's a vulnerable spot, and people know it,' Blink said. 'They know it's not getting any better unless somebody's working on getting some things done.'
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Qatar sentences the country's Baha'i leader to 5 years for social media posts
The leader of the small Baha'i community in Qatar was sentenced Wednesday to five years in prison for social media posts that allegedly 'cast doubt on the foundations of the Islamic religion,' according to court documents obtained by an international Baha'i organization monitoring the case. A three-judge panel of Qatar's Supreme Judiciary Council issued the verdict against Remy Rowhani, 71, who has been detained since April, according to documents provided to The Associated Press by the Baha'i International Community office in Geneva, Switzerland. The judges rejected a defense request for leniency on grounds that Rowhani suffered from a heart condition, according to the documentation. Saba Haddad, the Geneva office's representative to the United Nations, depicted the verdict as 'a serious breach and grave violation of the right to freedom of religion or belief and an attack on Remy Rowhani and the Baha'i community in Qatar.' Haddad's office, in a post on X, called on the international community 'to urge Qatar's government to uphold international law and ensure Mr. Rowhani's immediate release.' There was no immediate response from Qatar's International Media Office to AP's queries about the case. The verdict came just two weeks after a group of U.N. human rights experts expressed 'serious concern' about Rowhani's arrest and detention, which they depicted as 'part of a broader and disturbing pattern of disparate treatment of the Baha'i minority in Qatar.' 'The mere existence of Baha'is in Qatar and their innocuous presence on X cannot be criminalized under international law,' they said. Rowhani — former head of Qatar's Chamber of Commerce — had been arrested once previously, accused of offenses such as routine fundraising related to his leadership of Qatar's Baha'i National Assembly. The latest charges, filed in April, involve the Baha'i community's X and Instagram accounts, which contain posts about Qatari holidays and Baha'i writings. According to the documentation provided by the Geneva office, Qatari prosecutors alleged that these accounts 'promoted the ideas and beliefs of a religious sect that raises doubt about the foundations and teachings of the Islamic religion.' Rowhani's daughter, Noora Rowhani, who lives in Australia, said via email that the five-year verdict is "so unfortunate and so shocking." 'My eye condition is deteriorating and in five years, even if I meet, him I will most probably not be able to see him anymore,' she added. The Baha'i faith — a small but global religion with an interfaith credo — fits comfortably into the religious spectrum of most countries but in several Middle East nations, Baha'i followers face repression that is drawing criticism from rights groups. The abuse is most evident in Iran, which bans the faith and has been widely accused of persecuting Baha'i followers, human rights advocates say. They also report systemic discrimination in Yemen, Qatar and Egypt. Advocates say Iran's government has pressed for repression of the Baha'i followers in countries where it holds influence, such as Yemen, where Iran-backed Houthi rebels control the northern half of the country, and Qatar, which shares with Iran the world's largest natural gas field. The Baha'i faith was founded in the 1860s by Baha'u'llah, a Persian nobleman considered a prophet by his followers. Muslims consider the Prophet Muhammad the highest and last prophet. From the Baha'i faith's earliest days, Shiite Muslim clerics have denounced its followers as apostates. That repression continued after Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution, when many Baha'i followers were executed or went missing. There are less than 8 million Baha'i believers worldwide, with the largest number in India. ___ Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP's collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. Solve the daily Crossword
Yahoo
8 hours ago
- Yahoo
Delaware Commission Issues 30-Day Suspension For 'Hidden Ownership'
Delaware Commission Issues 30-Day Suspension For 'Hidden Ownership' originally appeared on Paulick Report. The Delaware Thoroughbred Racing Commission has suspended owner/assistant trainer Mario Roberto Lopez for 30 days and fined him $1,500 after a hearing in the matter of hidden claimed to be the owner of unraced 2-year-olds Runaway Rooster and Sassy Senorita, both of whom had been working at Delaware to the ruling: "Through information obtained from Health Certificates and Digital Papers, the Stewards determined that Mr. Lopez was in fact substituting for a person who is ineligible for license in Delaware. The Board of Stewards determine that those actions to be detrimental to horse racing. "Mario Roberto Lopez is fined $1,500 and suspended 30 calendar days Aug. 16, 2025, through Sept. 14, 2025. Runaway Rooster and Sassy Senorita are 'Ineligible' to race at Delaware Park for the remainder of the Delaware Park race meet in 2025. All Horse Transfers must be approved by the Stewards." The ruling does not state who is believed to be the owner of the two horses, but Equibase lists the breeder of both as Strongline Thoroughbreds, LLC, a business entity registered in the state of Delaware to Elizabeth A. Martin. The Strongline Thoroughbreds' public-facing Facebook page includes video of Runaway Rooster training as recently as April 21, Martin's ownership license in Delaware was rescinded via a ruling dated July 30, 2024. Delaware rules allow the commission to revoke an owner's license for the spouse of a person ineligible to be licensed as an owner. That ruling states that her spouse is Silvio Martin, who was suspended six months by the Pennsylvania State Horse Racing Commission in 2020 after investigators found hypodermic needles, syringes, and injectable substances during a search of his vehicle at Parx Racing. Martin was also serving as a police officer in New Castle County, Delaware, at that time. According to the police department's Facebook page, Martin retired in 2024. Martin's name also came up in the federal horse doping trial of Lisa Giannelli, an employee of veterinarian Seth Fishman. Both were convicted of drug misbranding. Prosecutors said bottles of Banamine, Butaject, and Dexium were found in a box in Martin's truck with a shipping label addressed to Seth Fishman at Lisa Giannelli's address in that trial, an investigator testified that Martin told her Fishman was his vet at Martin's farm in Pennsylvania. At a hearing six months later, Pennsylvania stewards extended Martin's suspension and revoked Silvio Martin's license for allegedly conducting business related to racing while serving a suspension, failing to prove the validity of the sale of several horses, and giving false and misleading information to commission investigators, acts the stewards determined to be "detrimental to racing."Via reciprocity with the Pennsylvania State Horse Racing Commission, Silvio Martin is ineligible to participate in has not started a horse since August 2020. One of the horses Martin saddled in his last season as a trainer was Legendary Jack, a Thoroughbred owned by harness trainer Rene Allard, who was indicted and pleaded guilty in the same 2020 federal probe into doping that included Fishman, Giannelli and nearly two dozen others. Prior to 2020, Martin was also part of a 2018 lawsuit filed against Thomas Chuckas, Thoroughbred bureau director of the Pennsylvania Horse Racing Commission. Alongside owner-trainers Marcos Zulueta, Juan Carlos Guerrero, and owner Sean Mitchell, Martin filed the lawsuit after the quartet was suspended over failure to provide documents sought by the commission in a subpoena exploring possible hidden ownership and program training. The subpoenas – seeking extensive information over a three-year period related to training bills, horses, employees, taxes, banking records and telephone records – were issued to the plaintiffs and others in October 2017. When the plaintiffs did not comply within 20 days, their licenses were suspended. In January of 2018, Commonwealth Court President Judge Mary Hannah Leavitt issued a stay of the suspensions and said the commission overstepped its bounds by suspending the licenses without accusing them of specific wrongdoing. She questioned whether licensees are even required to keep some of the records sought in the racing commission subsequently issued rulings rescinding the suspensions and restoring the licensees to good standing. This story was originally reported by Paulick Report on Aug 13, 2025, where it first appeared.
