File this under “this is what I voted for.” In a super-majority Republican legislature, bills like these, which were attempts by Democrat politicians to expand their voting base at the expense of law-abiding citizens, should be killed in committee.

And they were.

Republican lawmakers killed two bills Wednesday aimed at improving voting access for incarcerated and formerly incarcerated individuals despite testimony highlighting gaps in current laws and barriers to participation.

House Bill 270 and House Bill 361, both authored by Rep. Terry Landry, D-Baton Rouge, sought to address what supporters described as inconsistencies and logistical challenges in the state’s voting system. While neither proposal would have expanded the number of eligible voters, advocates argued they would ensure existing rights were more accessible.

HB 270 focused on clarifying conflicting statutes related to voting by mail. Under current Louisiana law, individuals who are incarcerated but not convicted of a felony are eligible to vote.

However, a separate law requires first-time voters to cast ballots in person, creating a contradiction for those behind bars who cannot physically access polling places.

Landry emphasized at a hearing by the House and Governmental Affairs Committee that the bill was not about expanding voting rights but about ensuring consistency.

“We’re not expanding the voter population,” Landry said. “We’re not expanding rights. These rights currently exist. We’re just making sure that these other folks who kind of fall in that loophole also get that same right.”

The bill would have allowed eligible incarcerated individuals – such as those awaiting bond, awaiting trial or booked over a weekend – to vote by mail even if they were first-time voters.

Initially, HB 270 appeared to have support from Landry’s colleagues. However, Rep. Polly Thomas, R-Metairie, abruptly moved to involuntarily defer the bill.

The motion passed in a 9–7 vote after all the Republicans on the committee voted in favor of the deferment. effectively killing the bill.

What Terry Landry wants is to go in and register all the felons awaiting trial in Louisiana’s jails to vote, and turn them into Democrats.

And that’s a perfectly legitimate thing for an activist Democrat politician to want to do. It’s also something which Republicans should have zero interest in allowing.

Naturally, Sheridan White of the LSU Manship School News Service, who wrote this piece which went out to all the TV stations in the state for their websites, had to get quotes from Denise Marcelle – the Louisiana Legislature’s version of Jasmine Crockett or Ilhan Omar – about Thomas and the Republicans killing Landry’s bills…

“I don’t think that’s fair,” said Rep. Denise Marcelle, D-Baton Rouge. “This bill should have a fair hearing and a vote without somebody just deferring this man’s bill and not allowing people who are qualified voters to vote.”

Awwwww. Go to hell, Denise. You don’t like it? Win an election outside of a district where the voters are on public assistance.

Or where this is how the people live while they vote for the Terry Landrys and Denise Marcelles to give them good government…

There have been almost 8,000 crimes reported in Baton Rouge, Louisiana so far this yearhttps://t.co/pe2u79b57i pic.twitter.com/j2EhqR0K5h

— Tony Heller 🇺🇸 🇯🇵 (@TonyClimate) April 1, 2026

I’ve said repeatedly that in a Republican-dominated legislature, no Democrat bills without Republican co-sponsors should be allowed to advance out of committee. That isn’t intended to be punitive; it’s simply a time-saving measure because if Republicans dominate the legislature then you’ll have to have Republican votes to pass anything anyway – and therefore Democrats would have to train themselves to work with the majority if they want to be effective.

Which, I notice and I’m not alone, is not a particularly conspicuous feature of the modern Democrat Party. Therefore we should be getting some civic improvement out of such a rule.

Terry Landry wasn’t going to get any Republican co-sponsors for this bill. He didn’t even try. He didn’t romance any Republicans on that committee, at least not that I heard of, trying to persuade them of the righteousness of the bill.

Or more importantly, he didn’t offer anything in return.

For example, if you want us to let you register all the 18- and 19-year old criminals awaiting trial in the jails as Democrats, then we want the Secretary of State’s office, or the Louisiana GOP, via a contract from the state, to send people to all the churches to register the parishioners, in the knowledge that two-thirds or more of them will register as Republicans.

No takers on that trade? OK. So be it.

What Landry and the Democrats – and the state’s corporate media, but I’m being redundant – want is for Republicans in the Louisiana legislature to act as though Democrats are an equal partner in running the state. But they aren’t an equal partner – the voters have made sure of that by running off as many elected Democrats as they could.

As such, they’re dependent on RINOs like Stephanie Hilferty, who’s become the pet Republican of J.P. Morrell and Helena Moreno in the Louisiana House of Representatives, to give them air cover. Hopefully, the voters of the New Orleans area who have a GOP primary vote coming up to replace the outgoing Eric Skrmetta on the Public Service Commission will recognize that game and deny her a promotion.

Hilferty is a Democrat in all reality, but she can’t put a D next to her name and get elected. Because Louisiana voters don’t want anything to do with Democrats anymore. Louisiana voters know that Democrats are for transgendered lunatics, Munchausen moms and angry lesbians, Medicaid scammers, communist librarians and teacher union radicals, illegal aliens, misanthropic climate cranks, and violent criminals.

You can’t sell those poster children to the majority of folks in the state. Their interests constitute a fringe agenda.

It’s of no value to this state to accommodate fringe agendas like the one Terry Landry is pushing. If he wants to push it, fine, but the appropriate play is to kill his bills and tell him that if he wants to pass something he’d better start working with the majority and make some deals.

And the majority isn’t going to make deals on fringe bills. Not when it doesn’t need Terry Landry’s vote.