Louisiana District 3
Louisiana, your primary election is on July 11. You have some work to do when it comes to sustainability and green energy, and we want to see your beautiful state remain a gorgeous for years to come.
Your primary is different than most states, meaning that you employ a majority vote system. This means that whichever candidate wins the majority of the vote, they win outright. If no candidate reaches that threshold, you vote again between the two top contenders. As long as you’re registered, you can vote.
Let’s take a look at your candidates!
President
We haven't reviewed any presidential candidates yet, but check back soon!
Louisiana Senators
Antoine Pierce
Antoine Pierce is a community activist and founder of Better Boys Initiative, Inc.
Pierce mentions ensuring environmental protections and subsidizing renewable energy resources, but otherwise doesn’t have an extensive platform.
Dartanyon Williams
Dartanyon Williams is a businessman, author, and pastor.
Williams has some good stances on improving transportation – which will also decrease harmful emission output into our atmosphere. He has a good grasp on how disastrous climate change is in regard to gulf coast and the issues that will arise as devastating natural disasters continue to hit the coast. He wants to address coastal erosion and the next steps to deal with losing so much coastline in such a short time.
Overall, Williams has good ideas, but we would like to see him expand the issues on his climate change platform.
Drew Knight
Drew Knight is a political activist.
Knight acknowledges that climate change is one of the most pressing issues facing the world, and he wants to see some systemic change. However, he has a limited platform and little information available on his plans to change the system.
Bill Cassidy
Bill Cassidy has been a congressman since 2009, switching between the 5 and 6 districts before he became a Senator. His LCV scorecard rating is 7%.
Cassidy has a terrible voting record. The few items of legislation that he has voted positively on are water conservation programs and research – a very important aspect of conservation in a state that is directly affected by rising sea levels. However, looking into water conservation and pollution reduction and expanding aid for natural disasters like hurricanes, floods, etc. is fairly useless if not researched and addressed in tandem with climate change, which is causing a majority of the water-related natural disasters in the gulf.
Additionally, he has continuously supported expanding and using oil as a major energy source. Louisiana has been a powerhouse of oil refining, and as a ranking member of the Senate Energy Subcommittee, Cassidy has real opportunities daily to work towards a clean energy future, and instead he has been pushed around by oil lobbyists.
His new clean energy angle is natural gas production and consumption. Although natural gas certainly causes less CO2 emissions, the real kicker is it’s methane emissions. Methane can hold almost 90x more heat than a carbon dioxide molecule over a 20 year time period (cited). In simple terms, this heat absorption causes the atmosphere to heat up, causing ice to melt, causing flooding and a rise is sea levels. Although natural gas is, debatably, a better alternative than oil from a ground and water pollution standpoint, it is still far away from being a preferable major energy production and consumption material. We want to see a real interest in solar and hydro power from people in power in the gulf.
Cassidy also clearly states that he wants to get rid of “red tape” to give oil and gas companies an easier time extracting, refining, and producing oil and natural gas. That “red tape” are often necessary and important restrictions and guidelines that refiners need to follow to keep pollution to a minimum and to protect those who live close to these industrial complexes from air and water pollutants. On a local scale, removing these regulations could have serious health repercussions for the people who live in these areas, and on a global scale, the impact on the water and atmospheric emissions will be catastrophic.
We want to see some positive changes from the Senator. He has so many opportunities to work on creating jobs in a vast and rapidly expanding green energy economy that he has been ignoring. Louisiana can’t afford to be left behind in the climate crisis- the rapidly dwindling shoreline is a testament to the amount of time that the Senator has wasted already.
Dustin Murphy
Dustin Murphy is a welder.
Murphy doesn’t have any information available on his stances on sustainability, clean energy, or climate change.
Jamar “Doc” Montgomery
Jamar “Doc” Montgomery is an attorney, mechanical engineer & Navy veteran.
Montgomery doesn’t have any information available on his stances on sustainability, clean energy, or climate change.
District 3 Representatives
Clay Higgins
Clay Higgins has been an incumbent since 2017. His LCV scorecard is at 1%!
With one of the lowest possible LCV lifetime voting scores at 1%, Higgins has a horrible record with the environment. In his past three years as a representative, he has only voted for pro-environmental legislation in one stance, against a bill meant to block protections for endangered whales. On his official website, Higgins champions the role fossil fuels play in American life, calling it the “lifeblood of our modern society,” and praising the removal of energy regulations. He does continue to discuss the need to ensure conservation and mitigation programs relating to water and air quality are in place; but his record shows this to be of little, if any, importance to him. Most recently, Higgins joined Rep. Scalise, Rep. McCarthy, and 57 members of congress to request quick relief for energy producers to alleviate oilfield disruptions and job losses in order to allow the industry to recover from COVID-19. His passion and advocacy for fossil fuels is horrific, and he has called for relief multiple times. Higgins also pushed against a severance tax on oil and gas in Louisiana, which is a state tax on extracting resources from the land in order to use the resources in different states. In March, Higgins commended the Department of Energy’s purchase of 30 million barrels of crude oil for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, an emergency stockpile in the case that commercial oil supply is disrupted. According to OpenSecrets, his campaigns have also been funded by the oil and gas industry with donations of $105,150 total since 2015. He has mentioned wanting to expand fossil fuel production, declaring that climate change is natural and predates fossil fuels, and he believes climate models have been manipulated.
Higgens has proven to be against climate change policy and environmental advocacy, instead accepting support from the very companies contributing the most to global warming. Instead of working towards clean energy, Higgens wants to expand our production of fossil fuels, showing a clear disregard for climate change. Going forward, we would like to see changes on the Representative’s stance towards climate change, with an acknowledgement towards its impacts and action on future climate and environmental policy in congress.
Brandon LeLeux
Brandon LeLeux is a political activist.
LeLeux does not have any information available on his stances on sustainability, clean energy, or climate change.
Rob Anderson
Rob Anderson is a construction worker, Ex-IT professional, and artist.
Anderson sees the importance of renewable energy, and believes Louisiana needs to invest in renewable energy both to combat climate change and create jobs. Otherwise, Anderson has not said much about his environmental plans. We would love to hear more!
Verone Thomas
Verone Thomas is a businessman, music engineer, navy veteran.
Thomas is concerned about environmental issues but does not have any information available on his stances on sustainability, clean energy, or climate change. We would love to hear more!