The Louisiana Legislature made history in the 2023 Veto Session, in the process giving some Republicans a chance to display their middle fingers to Louisianans and some Democrats to gamble on fooling enough voter to gain successful reelection.

Louisiana’s most remarkable legislative passage ever occurred when HB 648 by Republican state Rep. Gabe Firment crossed the finish line. This was a bill rogue GOP state Sen. Fred Mills (aided by some stupid planning by Sen. Pres. Page Cortez) killed in committee, only to have it resurrected through rarely-used parliamentary procedures, killed again by Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards, only to have the veto session reanimate it into law, representing the first time ever a regular session bill had its veto successfully overridden.

The bill prohibits medical interventions, whether chemical or surgical, to alter a minor’s sex. It simply became a litmus test that even the most shallow Republicans and Democrats endangered for reelection had to support because it so self-evidently was needed. In their remarks carrying the bill in their respective chambers, Firment and Republican state Sen. Jay Morris demolished the evidence-free and weak argumentation of opponents to establish that children didn’t have the maturity to make such an irreversible decision, that many who in their haste did later regretted it, that such procedures often addressed a symptom of an underlying disorder and wasn’t the disorder, that these didn’t stop suicidal ideation for many, and that worldwide (within the last year country after country has placed similar bans on these actions) medical opinion supported such bans while further research occurred.

Thus, no Republican dared vote to sustain – although one prior vote for it, Paula Davis, didn’t show up for the session, and another who played hooky, Joe Stagni, had been the only member of the party to vote against it – and Democrats Roy Daryl Adams, Chad Brown, Robby Carter, Mack Cormier, Travis Johnson, Dustin Miller, and Pat Moore joined in overriding. Reelection chances for Adams, Brown, Cormier, and to a lesser extent Carter would have been seriously endangered had they not voted to override.

The three most vulnerable, plus Moore, also protected their reelection hopes with votes to override vetoes on HB 466, which would have prevented school employees from psychological coaching of students about their gender identity in ways inconsistent with state instructional standards and protect school employees and students from confusion over pronoun use of students, and on HB 81 which would have covered pronoun usage like HB 466. Yet the latter received only 68 votes and the former 69.

Part of that had to do with the strategic absences of Stagni and Davis, which dropped the 71 Republicans to one below threshold. But it was the actions of other Republicans, specifically Mary DuBuisson, Barbara Freiberg, Stephanie Hilferty, gubernatorial candidate Richard Nelson, and Speaker Pro Tem Tanner Magee, who torpedoed the will of the vast majority of their party to override by voting to sustain, while at the same time providing political cover to members of the other party on these issues.

But beyond that, vulnerable Democrats decided to take their chances on a number of other bills opposition to which is less toxic to more terms. HB 182, which would have prohibited requiring Wuhan coronavirus vaccinations to attend educational institutions; HB 646 which would have provided greater scrutiny of electoral rolls; and HB 188 which would have tightened parole requirements for dangerous offenders, among others, all narrowly missed the two-thirds threshold to succeed. Again, the curiously-timed absences of Davis and Stagni kept the margins below threshold, allowing Democrats with uniformity to sustain.

Note that the GOP votes to sustain often were traitorous or sandbagging. Various combinations of DuBuisson, Freiberg, Hilferty, Magee, and Nelson on HB 81 and HB 466 either went from yea to nay or had not voted on original concurrence with the Senate and then to sustain.

Two other measures did get passed along to the Senate. HB 125, which would have prohibited ownership of farm land by nationals of countries designated as foreign adversaries, picked up the support of Adams, Cormier, and Moore (Brown was absent), and HB 399, which would have required school communications about vaccinations to include information about state law allowing opting out, was passed along only because Democrat Tammy Phelps vote to override.

As choreographed among certain Democrats, the GOP House leadership, and a few Republicans the voting patterns appeared in the House, the collusion in the Senate perhaps even exceeded that. The few Senate vetoed bills simply were shoved aside with no attempt to allow them to leave. That’s perhaps because when HB 125 and HB 399 arrived, Republicans Louie Bernard, Fred Mills, and Rogers Pope voted against overriding, while the GOP’s Patrick Connick opted out of voting for the former and joined them in voting on the latter. These RINOs probably let it be known they wouldn’t vote for any overrides except for HB 648 (not including Mills).

This fall, constituents of Davis, DuBuisson, Freiberg, Hilferty, Magee, Nelson (running for governor), Stagni, and Connick (Bernard, Mills, and Pope aren’t running again) need to understand how these elected officials gave them the middle-fingered salute on a number of good bills that led to the defeat of these quality instruments. And those of Adams, Brown, Robby Carter, and Cormier need to realize how their representatives are trying to con them into making voters think they have an agenda that they don’t. Then, voters need to push buttons accordingly.