Louisiana voters reject constitutional amendment advocated by Republican governor

NEW ORLEANS (AP) – Louisiana voters have been attacked by four constitutional amendments advocated by Republican Gov. Jeff Landry, which are related to crime, courts and finance.

According to preliminary results, after the Secretary of State's office ended Saturday night, voters rejected each amendment with a profit margin of more than 60%.

Landry and his allies crisscrossed in support of an amendment that would make a lot of changes to the revenue and financial sector of the state’s constitution. The amendment received bipartisan support from lawmakers at a special session on tax reform in November and serves as a way to raise teachers’ salaries, curb excessive spending and get rid of special tax breaks in the constitution.

However, critics from the political field criticized the proposed amendment for lack of transparency. The bill is more than 100 pages but is condensed into a 91-word voter issue.

Although the union of the main teachers supported the amendment, a coalition of liberal advocacy groups and influential conservative religious figures opposed changes that would liquidate the Education Trust and eliminated constitutional protections for tax relief for certain properties owned by religious institutions.

Another proposed amendment would make it easier for lawmakers to expand the crimes of juvenile convicted. Criminal justice reform organizes rallies against what they say are severe punishments, which will not address the root cause of youth crime.

The remaining amendments will allow legislators to establish regional professional courts, which opponents say can be used to usurp the judiciary from the district courts.

Landry said he was disappointed but would continue to fight for “generational changes” in Louisiana.

“We don't think it's a failure,” he said in a statement. “We realize how difficult it is to implement positive changes under the condition of failure.”

Landry blamed the losses on left-wing billionaire George Soros and the “leftmost liberal.” The Open Society Foundation, a charity founded by Soros, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Louisiana Democrats called Landry’s result a “huge failure.”

“Along with voters in every party, people concluded that the constitutional amendment was misleading at best — at worst trying to give tax cuts to the rich while locking in more children,” the party said in a statement. “That’s not the Louisiana values ​​we represent.”