Louisiana Voice

(Editor’s note: Paul Spillman is a U.S. Navy verteran who has authored the following guest column. He is a resident of St. Francisville)

To the casual fan it may seem as though college athletics has succumbed to greed and selfishness now that athletes sign name, image, and likeness deals and are even being paid by the schools they attend. The headlines invoke the end of an era – college athletes not playing for love of the game or good ol’ State U. just for whoever will pay them the most. But that view is a result of the all-encompassing political climate we currently live in, a doom-and-gloom environment of both real and imagined horrors. College sports is not nearly so desperate or so difficult to address. But no problem can be addressed or resolved if it cannot be accurately stated. The biggest impediment to resolution so far is that so few people can accurately state the problem.

This current wild, wild west era of college sports began with a 2014 Supreme Court ruling in favor of former UCLA basketball player Ed O’Bannon who sued the NCAA for denying him the right to earn money from his name, image, or likeness while the NCAA profited by selling those rights to EA Sports. This ruling opened the door for athletes to be compensated for the use of their name, image, or likeness and effectively ended the NCAA’s definition of “amateurism.” That ruling was followed by a 2021 decision in the case of former West Virginia running back Shawne Alston who challenged the NCAA’s right to deny education related benefits and privileges afforded any other student by withholding athletic eligibility. In a truly remarkable 9-0 decision the Supreme Court found the NCAA in violation of antitrust law – remarkable for the unanimous ruling. How settled must an issue be for all nine justices on today’s Court to agree? This is a crucial point. All nine justices agreed the NCAA was in violation of antitrust law.  In a concurring opinion Justice Kavanaugh wrote the “NCAA’s business model would be flatly illegal in almost any other industry in America,” further commenting that price-fixing labor while generating billions in revenue is unjustifiable under antitrust law. The overriding issue forcing change is that the NCAA clung to its outdated definition of “amateurism” instead of adapting to the 21^st century. It is not athletes, agents, or greed that created the current circus. It was a governing body failing to govern, leadership failing to lead.

The lack of response from the NCAA is the very thing which created the current state of affairs. The NCAA took no action following the O’Bannon ruling leaving lawmakers in all fifty states on edge over the fallout of that ruling. Finally, California became tired of waiting and passed NIL legislation in 2019. Thirty-one states have followed. Perhaps that was the unspoken purpose of the NCAA’s failure to act because the only action it has taken is to go hat-in-hand to Congress begging for an antitrust exemption in the form of legislation that solves all their problems for them and one of their main arguments is to point to all the different state regulations regarding NIL. Since the Alston ruling the NCAA has lost virtually every case brought to court on the basis of violating antitrust law. And in the absence of a governing body to set and enforce rules in compliance with the law who is surprised that in free-market-get-it-while-you-can America the circus came to town?

It is possible Congress can write legislation that grants the NCAA an antitrust exemption. Courts will uphold legislation that is specific and narrowly tailored, but are less willing to support broad or blanket legislation with a one-size-fits-all law. Currently there are several pieces of legislation in Congress attempting to address the issues either all or in part. The SCORE Act, for example, attempts the specificity needed for an antitrust exemption but would likely require the NCAA to reorganize its divisions. On the other hand, legislation introduced by Senator and former coach Tommy Tuberville grants five years of eligibility over a five-year period with one transfer allowed without penalty. That is basically the full wording of the bill. Senator Tuberville is not known for loquaciousness. That legislation should it pass would certainly be challenged as too broad to allow wholesale application for an antitrust exemption.

But again, the NCAA itself is the larger part of the problem. The NCAA is the governing body for more than 1150 colleges and universities. Division 1 has just over 350 schools that range from a university such as Ohio State with athletic department revenue of around $170 million and fielding teams in 36 sports involving more than 1,000 athletes, to a school such as Mount St. Mary’s with an athletic revenue less than $14 million for 708 athletes comprising 22 teams, if you count flag football and bowling. And therein lies the problem. Ohio State and Mount St. Mary’s are not the same kind of athletic entity. To get legislation specifically tailored enough for an antitrust exemption would likely require acknowledging the differences between two such schools and placing them in different divisions. That would mean an end to March Madness – the men’s and women’s NCAA basketball tournaments – as well as the post season for almost every other sport. The SCORE act for example would apply to schools with athletic revenue of greater than $20 million – so it would apply to Ohio State but not to Mount St. Mary’s. This would require the restructuring of NCAA divisions which no one is eager to do. It’s why the NCAA has dragged its feet. It’s why they want a broad antitrust exemption from Congress. It’s why they are doing their best to drag us back to 1985 and keep us there. Because no one wants to be the person who makes the call that ends March Madness as we know it.

But if one thing is certain it’s that change is inevitable. One can either roll with it or get rolled over by it. Those are the only two choices. If the NCAA refuses to reorganize it likely cannot get a broad antitrust exemption. If Congress writes legislation specific enough for an antitrust exemption it will likely not be broad enough for the current division structure of the NCAA. Congress could legislate college sports to death but no one in their right mind should want Congress involved any more than it has to be, if at all. If Congress starts legislating college sports it will not stop with NIL, revenue share, and transfer portal. Realignment, scheduling, and playoff selection would all soon follow and all legislation would have other unrelated bills attached and carry the force of law. Truly that would be the end of college sports.

Another option is for schools that wish to participate in the modern era of college sports to break away from the NCAA and form a separate umbrella organization for its member schools with rules specific enough to members to grant the antitrust exemption needed to regulate and enforce rules concerning eligibility, transfer, compensation, etc. This would also mean the end of current post-season tournaments.

So, yes, it’s a mess and the future course is still undetermined. But for readers who are upset with the current state of affairs in college athletics the blame falls squarely on the failed leadership at the NCAA. No where else. But change is in order and it can’t be stopped. Leaders with a vision forward are needed, not dinosaurs clinging to the way it used to be.

What happens when a taxpaying citizen decides he’d like to know more about how a public, taxpayer-supported entity operates and proceeds to submit public records requests (PRRs) that conceivably could prove embarrassing to that public body?

Why, that public body files a lawsuit to stop the citizen in his tracks.

LouisianaVoice has documented at least two instances of that tactic being employed in the past: the first was when 4^th District Court judges up in Monroe filed suit against the Ouachita Citizen newspaper. That was more than a decade ago, back in 2015. We followed that sordid story with several posts. You can check them out HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE.

It was such a bizarre strategy that even a local television station had a STORY  about the unique litigation.

Of course, the Gannett newspaper, the Monroe News-Star remained characteristically mute on the subject, preferring instead to concentrate on the local chamber of commerce’s biggest draw to Ouachita Parish: the Robertson family and their Duck Dynasty reality show.

Then in 2021, then-Attorney General Jeff Landry, aka “Squeaky Toy,” captured the coveted “BLACK HOLE AWARD” for outright contempt of government transparency when he filed a lawsuit after he filed suit against Baton Rouge Advocate reporter Andrea Gallo after she made PRRs in December 2020 for copies of sexual harassment complaints against Pat Magre, erstwhile head of Landry’s criminal division. He resigned soon after a Baton Rouge judge ordered Landry to make the documents available.

Score: Transparency 1, Landry 0.

Now, as George Santayana or Edmund Burke said (no one’s certain who should be credited), “Those who do not remember history are doomed to repeat it,” the same strategy is now being employed by Butch Browning and the West Baton Rouge Fire Protection District No. 1, who have filed a similar lawsuit against John O Summers, editor and publisher of the WBR Independent news publication, who made the mistake of peppering Browning and the district with PRRs.

Oh, it’s not that the district has outright refused to provide records but for approximately 200 pages of documents it estimated it would cost Summers in excess of $1500.

First of all, the standard price for copies of records from a public body (except for clerks of courts, which generally charge $1 per pate) is 25 cents per page.

But, the Louisiana Public Records Law (La. R.S. 44:1 et seq.), stipulates that any citizen may view records at no charge and that that same citizen may make his own copies—again, at no charge. So, if one possesses a portable hand scanner, he should never have to pay for copies of public records. Again, clerk or court records are a notable exception because clerks are unique in that they fund their offices through charges for copies and through filing fees.

The basis for some of Summers’s PRRs is because he raised questions about safety procedures at a fire board meeting. As a result, both he and another firefighter were politely shown the door and told their services were no longer needed—or welcome.

Events have evolved rather quickly since Summers filed his first public records request last July and the fire district responded with a cost estimate of $1500. In August the fee was reduced to $83 and then waived—in writing—by the fire district’s own records custodian. Then over the end of August and first of September Summers was blocked on Facebook and he received a cease and desist from Browning’s personal attorney.

Then, in October, the Parish Council adopted a new fee schedule for public records that was four times the state standard. After that came more public records requests from Summers and a dispute over a fee of $121.50 until on March 20 of this year, a petition was filed in court at 9:02 a.m., followed at 4:51 by a blanket public records request refusal.

Exactly a week after that, a citation was issued against Summers and served on March 31 and a hearing set for April 29 before Judge Alvin Batiste Jr. of the 18^th JDC.

All of which has prompted a sharp, three-page letter to Browning and the district from the TULANE UNIVERSITY LAW SCHOOL’S FIRST AMENDMENT LAW CLINIC reminding Browning of the existence of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which spells out freedom of speech and freedom of the press.

The letter from the law clinic noted that John Summers is a decorated veteran who began his tenure following his return home from Iraq and Afghanistan, where he earned a Purple Heart (something Browning did not earn despite once decorating his state fire marshal’s uniform with military medals he did not earn).

The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press is now involved in the case on Summers’s behalf.

Just another day, folks, in the never-ending fight between people like John Summers who strive to keep the public informed as to what the local leaders are up to and those in positions of power who would rather not be held accountable.

I’ll be the first to admit that I know precious little about Facebook. But after years of covering the underbelly of Louisiana politics — public records requests, legislative hearings, sources who’d rather not be named — I’ve apparently done something that causes men of my generation to break into a cold sweat.

I rejoined social media.

LouisianaVoice now has a page at facebook.com/louisianavoice. Same independent, unfiltered coverage of Louisiana politics you’ve been reading for years — the stories the majority of media are too content attending ribbon cuttings and speeches to bother with.

Anyway, all this is just my way of saying we’re expanding our reach. If you’re on Facebook, give us a follow. Then share us with someone in this state who needs to know what’s really going on in Baton Rouge and Washington.

As always — your support keeps us independent. While you’re here — our Spring fundraiser runs through April. If Louisiana Voice is worth something to you, click below.

— Tom Aswell, Publisher

Few other outlets will bother to remind you of the lack of real issues actually being discussed by candidates the way we have done in the post below. The majority of media are content to attend speeches and ribbon cuttings, glean a few quotes from the candidate and call it coverage.

I learned campaign coverage the hard way, back in 1974, when I followed a congressional candidate into a small town in southeast Louisiana where one of his appearances was between matches of Friday night wrestling.

Now wrestling crowds are the type not generally prone to wanting to hear some long-winded politician make a bunch of empty promises, especially when he’s holding up the next match. Accordingly, the candidate I was covering was pelted with beer bottles from the audience and was forced to cut his speech short. I had the best political campaign story of my career.

On another occasion, while working for The Shreveport Times, I had occasion to cover a speech to the Claiborne Parish Chamber of Commerce by then-Sen. Allen Ellender. This was July 1972 and he was running reelection. The quote I included in my coverage of his speech went this way: “If I am reelected and if I serve out my term–and I see no reason to believe the Good Lord will not continue to bless me with good health–I will have served in the U.S. Congress longer than anyone else in history.”

Good quote.

Except that the very next day, July 27, he fell dead and his opponent, J. Bennett Johnston, who wasn’t given a ghost of a chance, waltzed in virtually uncontested. Oh, John McKeithen tried to challenge him, but his entry was too little and too late.

Anyway, all this is just my way of pointing out that LouisianaVoice offers a little different twist on Louisiana and national politics.

If you like what we do, we invite you to support us with a contribution during our Spring fundraiser which runs through April.

All you have to do to make a ONE-TIME contribution is go HERE, then scroll down to the yellow DONATE button and follow directions to contribute by credit card.

Anything you can do, large or small, is greatly appreciated and anyone who contributes $50 or more will receive a copy of my upcoming historical novel, The Dinosaur Club. It’s about a bunch of retired geratric newspaper reporters who briefly come out of retirement for the biggest assignment of their careers: identifying and taking down child sex traffickers.

Political campaigns these days just seem to come up woefully short of substance and painfully long on eyewash. Not even substance’s antonym, style. Just eyewash.

For example, have you heard a single candidate (among the Repugnantcans: Democrats are essentially mute at this point, perhaps waiting until the general election) offer anything on his or her position on any issue?

• Has even one of them told you of any proposed legislation or solution to soaring prices of groceries, utilities and gasoline?
• Have you heard any of them offer any way to cool down the war rhetoric that threatens to erupt into WWIII? The brash braggadocio of a POTUS, his out-of-control secretary of defense and his sycophant secretary of state?
• How do the candidates feel about the incursion of ICE into our daily lives—through warrantless invasions of homes, arrests and even beatings and shootings of non-violent American citizens, the planned development of huge detention centers to detain tens of thousands of people who happen to have the “wrong” skin pigment?
• And of course, even as Repugnantcans and Democrats alike clamor for release of complete and unredacted Epstein files, has either candidate dared to address that festering issue?
• Most important of all, has any candidate made a public statement, pro or con, about Trump’s assault on voting rights? The federal seizure of state voting registration records?

Are there any limitations to the dangerously autocratic and increasingly bizarre actions of an obviously mental unstable POTUS?

The answer to each of those questions is a resounding NO! Not one. Zilch. Nada.

One can usually tell which candidate has the early upper hand by the amount of piling on by his or her principal opponent. In this case, it’s a no-brainer that incumbent Sen. Bill Cassidy, after incurring the wrath of President Inepstein by voting for conviction in his second impeachment trial, is fighting for his political life.

Accordingly, he has taken dead aim at his main threat: U.S. Rep. Julia Letlow, who has the endorsement of TACO Con. Early on in the campaign, CASSIDY DENIED any association with the attack ads against Letlow, but deny though he will, his fingerprints are all over those ads.

And Sen. Cassidy’s newest ad trumpets his work on “reducing taxes for the elderly,” “no taxes on tips,” yada, yada, yada. C’mon, Senator, do you seriously think a few dollars more on a tax return (money that was already ours, by the way), a few spotty tax reductions here and there will offset the quantum leaps in the prices of groceries, consumer goods, gasoline, college tuition, housing, commercial travel, utilities and natural gas? I mean, really?? Kinda makes that $400 million ballroom and Trump’s expenditure of $1 million taxpayer dollars to play golf seem a bit extravagant, doncha think? Why the hell haven’t you addressed those little matters?

Letlow, for her part, has been strangely, almost EERILY QUIET during the campaign, apparently content just to have Cadet Bone Spurs’ endorsement. That, however, may not be enough as the attack ads are beginning to have a withering effect on her early favorite’s role. The charges of her insider trading, valid or not, are taking a toll as is her record of never having passed a bill while serving in the House, a fact Cassidy gleefully touts.

Equally puzzling is the quiet candidacy of State Treasurer JOHN FLEMING who, like Cassidy, is a medical doctor and like Letlow, once served in the U.S. House.

Let’s face it, Louisiana voters just are not accustomed to the lull before the storm during a political campaign.

The only thing the three senatorial candidates have in common is Trump. One (Letlow) has his endorsement and the other two are desperate to run on his coattails even as he ignores their efforts to endear themselves to him.

The same thing can be said of the 5^th District House candidates, each of whom is seeking to succeed Letlow as she walks away from her presumably safe seat in pursuit of a promotion to the Senate.

State Sen. BLAKE MIGUEZ of New Iberia, which is not even in the 5^th District, has garnered Mar-a-Lardo’s endorsement over equally devoted State Rep. MICHAEL ECHOLS of Monroe who, absent an endorsement, reached into his bag of fealty and pulled out a legislative bill to name the proposed new Mississippi River bridge near Baton Rouge after His Orangeness. Top that Miguez!

State Sen.  RICK EDMONDS is another aspiring MAGHAT who apparently wants nothing more out of life than to represent the 5^th District voters in pursuit of the IMPOTUS agenda.

Likewise, State Board of Regents member MISTI CORDELL of Monroe wants to defend Genghis Don from the “constant attack from the extreme left” and from “partisan impeach attacks.”

Again, though, no real solutions to the problems staring down American families—just those that threaten der Führer. Not a damn word about making college affordable, making housing more affordable, making life more affordable. Just protecting the interests of a tyrant.

That is the sum total of every Repugnantcan candidate for the U.S. Senate and for Louisiana’s 5^th District U.S. House seat.

That is indeed a sad commentary on the field of candidates for these two critically important offices.

Seven candidates and not a single original thought among the seven. No not one.